And talk about looking into the camera, I just noticed something about those gym photos. Looks like two of the pix are of HL outside of the gym, and he is looking very intently towards the camera. I think he had just spotted the photographer and stepped outside to check him out and from that look on Hugh's face the pap is lucky he's not within reach of those boxing gloves. :wink:

Out of curiosity, what sketch were they showing, and how did it relate to writing a position paper? Did your professor introduce it with any explanation as to why he'd play something from a 20 year old British comedy show that most people don't know about? It's very cool, but seems so odd! One about grammar and words. It didn't really related beyond being about words, and he told us that since it was a 7.5 minute sketch, we could leave if we wanted. But no one did, because it was hilarious.

I'd be much more afraid of DeNiro . . . Hugh is too nice and civilized to give a smack-down. Not like Sean Penn or someone like that. The worst Hugh would do is insult them linguistically. (Anyone see that Family Guy ep of how British people fight? So awesome!) Oh, I don't know about that. Remember that bit in his bio about the 'many fights he was in as a boy', and that story about throttling some jerk who was heckling Stephen and Emma during a performance early in their careers. I hope nothing ever happens, but the paps are driving people nuts these days. Today's news includes a bit about Julia Roberts chewing out a group of paps for chasing after her near a school. Hopefully, our Hugh would never do anything worse than throwing baked beans. :wink:

It feels funny defending Sean Penn, but apparently the paps would wait until he and Madonna would come outside and then they'd scream insults at her, calling her a whore, etc. And when they goaded him enough to react, they'd take the picture. In a way, it's a good thing the Lauries didn't move over -- there aren't too many pictures of the kids around and I could see that being one thing that would really get to Hugh.

Hugh was nominated for a Satellite Award today for the third year in a row! He won the last two...as I'm sure you all know. :) I know this isn't one of the big big awards but I figured it's Hugh so you all probably care at least a little! Here's the field... ACTOR IN A SERIES, DRAMA Eddie Izzard, "The Riches" (FX Network) Michael C. Hall, "Dexter" (Showtime) James Woods, "Shark" (NBC) Hugh Laurie, "House" (Fox) Bill Paxton, "Big Love" (HBO) Denis Leary, "Rescue Me" (FX Network) and the link at Variety. I know this should go in the awards thread too so I'm gonna post it there also.

Poeia is absolutely right - touchy people like Penn, O'Neal, Baldwin and Crowe are often set up, pushed until their very short fuses invariably ignite. Actually, DeNiro is no Penn. He just has such a powerful, what, aura, (and probably a VERY good lawyer) that people simply know to back off when he's out picking up some arugula. He made it very clear from the beginning of his career that he is religiously self-sacrificing for his craft, but the rest of his life is his own. In a way, it's a good thing the Lauries didn't move over -- there aren't too many pictures of the kids around and I could see that being one thing that would really get to Hugh.My thoughts exactly, Poeia. Every time I feel sorry about HL's separation from friends and family, I stop myself short. The relentless pursuit of the children would be especially infuriating/frightening. And they don't need to pal around with the Lindsays and Brittanys either. I found HL's Actor's Studio interview excruciating at some points; it was painful and invasive. And much as I enjoy seeing charming famous people in a normal setting, those gym pictures, for example, really creeped me out. Maybe it's a old NY thing? You saw them more like fellow citizens here. If they were out clubbing (LE is actually prettier now than as a Club Kid), or behaving outrageously, they got nailed. But only a rube or a pap pestered someone going about his everyday business. Some of the most private people have chosen to live here. Dustin Hoffman ran out in front of my car, VERY nearly ending his career. I called him a reckless moron, and he agreed. We didn't talk about Marathon Man, and no, he didn't say "I'm walkin here.". :) Jon Voight very politely told me he was next in line at the newsstand when I unknowingly cut in front of him. Christopher Reeve joined me on a bench behind the Museum of Natural History while my niece, nephew and his girlfriend's little boy played. We chatted about the joys of "borrowing" kids - his star status never came up until we left the park. My rambunctious 3 yr old nephew dashed across the Museum driveway while a truck was coming out. My niece, very poised even at six, quietly hissed at him "That's right, Chris, shame me in front of Superman." Reeve went hysterical. One Easter Sunday, the family went to the South Street Seaport. Billy Joel was strolling the pier with a friend, like the rest of us. The same niece looked so cute, he was gazing at her and smiling. She looked up and asked me, "Why is he staring at me- I didn't start the fire!" Joel completely lost it, doubled over laughing. Then he asked to take her picture. She was leery, but said ok. And it never crossed our minds to ask him why Christie wasn't with him. It would have been gauche somehow, to take photos on any of these occasions. Sure, I enjoyed these little encounters, because THEY enjoyed that normalcy. I feel for someone who just can't do that stuff. Maybe it's the current lack of class, camera phones, the Internet, "Jackass" behavior, and I don't know what. Anyway, I certainly don't envy a life where you're publicly grilled about your most difficult personal experiences, or you pop out in your sweats to catch the recycling truck, and the next day, there is your slovenly self , all over the Web. Yuk.

I'm waiting for the whole paparrazzi thing to somehow implode, but I don't think it's going to, given the public's apparently insatiable appetite for those photos. I'll admit to having a look at them myself on occasion, though I always feel faintly dirty for having done so. To echo warycary's comments about NYC vs. LA, it seems that people go to LA specifically for the purpose of seeing the stars, and they have done since the early days of Hollywood. Remember the tour buses and the "Maps of Stars' Homes"? Those are fairly ancient in Hollywood terms. I lived in NYC back in 1982, and remember seeing celebs all over the place wihtout much fanfare. I can't recall much about that era now, but I do have a vivid memory of seeing Jerzy Kozinski at a window table in a restaurant, and I followed Jackie Onassis for some distance down Fifth Avenue before she finally lost me with her superior speed. Even beyond the NYC vs. LA comparison, however, I think the days of letting people live their lives is over. We seem to have this idea that people belong to us because we see them on TV or read their books or know their names from magazines. It's bizarre, and truly unfortunate for people who just want to work, as I suspect is true of -- getting this back on topic -- Hugh Laurie.

I came across this while wandering through the archives of the New York Times and thought it was something to share: Sept 17, 2007 The art of casting comedians in dramatic parts has been refined at Fox in recent years. The other networks should take notice. Hugh Laurie on “House,” Mary Lynn Rajskub on “24” and now Anthony Anderson on “K-Ville” ....don’t whisper their lines, or abuse their close-ups by laboriously narrowing their eyes and squaring their jaws. They’re not afraid of variety in their voices, and motility in their faces. These actors skip middle C altogether — staying away from that sustained note of sexy solemnity that’s supposed to stand for heroism. Sometimes, as ensemble-trained comedians, they even know how to work with others. And next to them performers like Evangeline Lilly on “Lost” and Milo Ventimiglia on “Heroes” seem stilted, pompous and introverted. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/17/arts/television/17heff.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

Everyone has a cell phone with a camera, everyone has a point and shoot digital camera and everyone has a website or livejournal or flickr account that they can share their pics on. It's contributed to a prevalence of "Oh, there's Alec Baldwin, I'm gonna take his picture!". Of course, it's also contributed to a surplus of pictures of people's cats and random foliage on the side of the road and funny road signs. We can take a hundred pictures and upload them immediately and share them. We're on picture taking overload all the time and we want people to see what we see. And even when we don't take pictures we know that we can alert Defamer or Gawker and tell them we just saw someone from the cast of "Gossip Girl" at Starbucks and then we can feel good later when we see it in a Privacy Watch. The internet is pretty much the greatest thing ever, but it's also made us all feel like we have to share every single little thing in our lives. That said, it was suggested that the gym pictures were taken by someone who was "lying in wait" specifically for Hugh and I just don't believe that. There have been pictures of Hugh around his apartment and pictures of Hugh all around the great Los Angeles area and I've never particularly thought that any of those were the result of someone staking him out, just the result of a paparazzo who, on his or her fifteenth lap around the neighborhood, finally spotted a celebrity. Given that these pictures very rarely show up in magazines or on sites that pay for run them I can't imagine that there's a big enough market for someone to actually wait on him to get a shot of him at the gym. I see pictures all the time of various celebs at the gym or around the gym. People on my flist are always posting various shots. To be honest, in spite of the fact that, like a lot of other folks who have said they feel "icky" when they see certain pap pics I felt the same way, my first thought was "I think Adam Brody goes to that gym". Yeah. I don't actually care enough to troll through the ONTD archives to see, but that was the first thought that went through my head. You're inundated with these images, both by choice and because they're everywhere, and you stop questioning why you would even know half of this stuff. It's just *there*. Sites like TMZ and splash and such have made everyone an amateur paparazzo so on top of the already abusive and intrusive paparazzi there are amateurs out there who are abusive and intrusive because they don't know what the hell they're doing. It'll stop when someone finally gets seriously hurt, but even then it's not gonna ever stop all together. And that's sad. I don't care how much they court the paparazzi and use them to their advantage, I still feel very sorry for the Britneys of the world who literally cannot move at times. And I feel sorry for all of those around them. I feel sorry for all of Paris Hilton's neighbors who couldn't get out their front doors a few months ago. I feel sorry for the people at Lindsay's AA meetings who have their privacy completely invaded by the wire services who sell the pictures without blurring out their faces. It's ridiculous. And I feel sorry for Hugh Laurie, who can't have a smoke on his balcony without it winding up on the internet. On the other hand, I don't feel sorry for people like Hugh Laurie when they go on something like ITAS and are asked personal questions. Hugh's not a stupid man. He knows the show and if he wasn't familiar (which I would have a hard time believing that he knew nothing of it) he has people to give him the low down. I just can't feel sorry for someone in that situation, partly because he revealed exactly one thing that I didn't know (the rest I'd seen him talk about in interviews before) and partly because I just can't feel sorry for someone who agrees to be interviewed on a show known for asking the personal questions just because the host winds up actually asking those personal questions.