Romance novelist Adriana Trigiani shares her recipe for Valentine's amore

Adriana Trigiani (third from left) with fans, image by nancydowd via Flickr

By BOB ANDELMAN

Valentine Roncalli is 35 and feeling every bit of years. While her friends and siblings all have families of their own, she lives in her 80-year-old grandmother’s home, amongst all of her grandmother’s trinkets and memories, running her grandmother’s shoe company.

Valentine wants—needs—a man.

Gianluca is that man. The suave, sophisticated Italian lights her up like a Roman candle when they’re close—which isn’t often, as she’s in Manhattan and he’s in Italy. What’s a woman to do?

That’s the issue novelist Adriana Trigiani (author website) confronts in her second Valentine story, Brava, Valentine, on sale today, February 9. The previous novel in the series, Very Valentine, was a New York Times bestseller and this new one is probably headed for the same territory.

(Get a free Adriana Trigiani audiobook download from Audible.com!)

ADRIANA TRIGIANI AUDIO EXCERPT: "Thematically, the two things my books are always about is, Who do you love?, Who do you choose to love? and What do you do with the labor of your own hands? They're the two things that keep giving." 

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You can LISTEN to this interview with ADRIANA TRIGIANI, author of BRAVA, VALENTINE, by clicking the audio player above!

Copyright 2010 Bob Andelman. Click here for copyright permissions!

NEXT LIVE on Mr. MEDIA: Brian Alexander, author of AMERICA UNZIPPED

TUESDAY: JAN. 29, 1 p.m.
BRIAN ALEXANDER, author of AMERICA UNZIPPED

Amateur porn sites, swingers, S&M - Fringe experimentation has gone suburban. These days, soccer moms, your accountant, or even your own parents are likely to indulge in kink. Stunned by the uninhibited questions from ordinary people on his msnbc.com column, "Sexploration," Brian Alexander was driven to understand Americans' desire to get down and dirty - especially in an era in which conservative family values dominate.

Call in and ask MSNBC.com's sexpert and author of AMERICA UNZIPPED whatever is on your mind, LIVE on BlogTalkRadio.com.

The number is 646-595-3135.

Don't miss these other upcoming, exclusive and LIVE Mr. Media interviews:

1/31/2008 1:00 PM - Bret Carr, REVOLOUTION star, director

2/14/2008 1:00 PM - Sara Zarr, SWEETHEARTS, STORY OF A GIRL novelist

2/15/2008 10:00 AM - Alberto Ibargüen, THE KNIGHT FOUNDATION, chairman and president

Stacy Collins and Breann McGregor, "Playboy Special Editions" editor and model: Mr. Media Interview, Part 1

Guys, Stacy Collins has your dream job.

As a managing editor of Playboy special editions, she spends day after day looking at the world’s most beautiful, mostly naked women. Some are in photographs, but many meet her discriminating eye in the flesh.

And now that I say that out loud, it’s not hard to understand why she’s in the job and you’re not.

Breann McGregor is one of the beauties Stacy works with. They actually spent a lot of time together this past year and will probably be just as inseparable in the coming year considering that Breann was named “Playboy Special Editions Model of the Year” and “Playboy’s Cyber Girl of the Year.” She is featured on her own website www.breannmcgregor.net. I’ll say it again cause I know you guys are pre-occupied – www.breannmcgregor.net.

You can LISTEN to this interview by clicking the BlogTalkRadio.com audio player below!

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BOB ANDELMAN/Mr. MEDIA: Stacy, let’s start with you right now. What exactly are Playboy Special Editions, and how are they different from the monthly Playboy magazine?

STACY COLLINS: Sure. This question comes up quite a bit. And what happened was back in the eighties when Playboy magazine spent thousands upon thousands of dollars on pictorials and photographs, and they only used a select number in Playboy magazine, an archive of material became available. And the powers that be in Playboy said well, we should really be doing something with these amazing images, and viola, the idea of Playboy Special Editions, actually they were called newsstand specials or newsstand flats back in the day, and it was literally just a place to showcase all these beautiful photographs. Not a lot of editorial content, really just a lot of pretty pictures. That’s how it started back in like ’84. Now we actually have 25 issues a year. We do 2 issues every month. They’re thematic in nature so there’s Lingerie, College Girls, and Vixens. We do themed playmate titles. And now, instead of just re-using content that was available from the Playboy library, we actually commission our own images, and we have our own models. And we’ve sort of built our own little business here and have become a content provider for not only our special editions but for Playboy magazine, for playboy.com, for our cyber club, and we’ve got our own little business unit happening here. And we’ve become sort of a brand within or underneath the Playboy umbrella.

ANDELMAN: So I want to make sure I understand cause I’m a little slow. Special editions are for the guys who hadn’t been reading the articles anyway.

COLLINS: That’s correct. That is correct. There’s not a lot of copy to get in the way, no fussy ads and articles to compete with the beautiful women. So, again, it’s really just a way to showcase the beautiful young ladies that we find all around the country. There is a little bit of information about the girls inside of each of the issues, but it’s really meant to showcase the beauty and glamour of our girls.





ANDELMAN: Now don’t tell my wife, but I have a copy of Playboy’s Lingerie in front of me which, of course, has Breann on the cover. And I think after you get past the necessary information, well, there is about four paragraphs of information about Breann right up front, but then I don’t think there’s another word other than the name of the model until maybe the inside back page.

COLLINS: Right, and that is on purpose. And that particular issue is a little bit unique in that we do showcase the “Model of the Year,” which was clearly Breann. But for the most part, some of the other issues we do don’t have any copy whatsoever. And we’ve heard a little bit from our consumers. They do love the photographs, but they’d like to know a little nugget, a little tidbit about the young lady. They like to know is she 5’4”? Is she 5’10”? Is she curvaceous? What’s her cup size? So we’re trying to incorporate a little bit of information in there without detracting from the photographs.

ANDELMAN: Guys want to know the model’s cup size? I’m shocked at that.

COLLINS: Yes, they do.

ANDELMAN: And, Breann, I just can’t imagine, in conversation, that that comes up very often.

McGREGOR: I’m sorry?

ANDELMAN: I can’t imagine that when you’re in conversation with someone that someone is going to ask you what your cup size is.

McGREGOR: No, it doesn’t happen often.

ANDELMAN: One more thing, Stacy, before we actually bring Breann more into this, but what have been some of the bigger sellers over the years for special editions?

COLLINS: Well, there are a couple things here. We actually publish Lingerie six times a year so that is the only special edition that is available by subscription, and we make it available in print subscription and also via Zinio, which is a downloadable version of the magazine which is becoming incredibly popular. So Lingerie is sort of our staple. It’s sort of our cornerstone of our publishing program. We will continue to publish 6 issues for the foreseeable future. And then we sort of mix and match other titles. Guys have their favorites. Vixens sort of focuses on girls who have a little more…

ANDELMAN: Cup size?

COLLINS: …ample assets, if you will. Curvaceous, bodacious, that type of thing. We have an issue entitled Natural Beauties where only girls who are completely natural, have no enhancements, are featured in that type of a magazine. And then we have College Girls which is, College Girls and Lingerie, are really pretty much our 2 major titles. And I think College Girls just because of the young, fresh coeds and sometimes there are girls from the conferences that Playboy does their searches so it might be the SEC or the Big Ten or the Pac 10 or Big 12, whatever those conferences are. And then we take that film and take it a little bit further because, again, the magazine can only use so much of the images. But, again, Lingerie, College Girls, Vixens, and then a lot of our Playmate titles are pretty popular. They’re all popular, Bob.

ANDELMAN: Well, as a Gator, I can’t imagine that once you’ve seen an SEC girl that you ever go back to any other conferences, but I guess you do.

COLLINS: Yeah. I’m a Big Ten girl, Bob. Be careful.





ANDELMAN: Breann, I did not forget about you. Did I read where you had wanted to pose since you were a little girl?

McGREGOR: Yeah, I have since I was 5.

ANDELMAN: Why, pray tell?

McGREGOR: Well, my dad would…I’d go get the mail, and I just remember asking my dad, “Why was this magazine in plastic?” And he’s like, “Oh, honey, don’t touch that. That’s for daddy.” Well, when you tell a kid “No,” it brings the curiosity out in them. The next month I just remember getting the mail and that one happened to be there so I snuck into the closet and opened it and was just like stunned by all the beautiful women. I was just like, “I want to be one of them.” I was like, “Wow, they’re gorgeous.” I’ve always wanted to do it.

ANDELMAN: This is why when, as my daughter was getting a little older, my wife made me start hiding the Playboys. So when my daughter said to me at one point, she said, dad, I want to be a baseball player, I said well, why is that? She said cause you’ll come and see me play. But it never occurred to me that she would see a Playboy and think I want to be one of those girls. But that’s okay. What was the first modeling that you ever did? Was it for Playboy, or was it for something else?

McGREGOR: No, it was for Playboy.

ANDELMAN: Really? How did you get in the door to do this?

McGREGOR: I went onto playboy.com, and they have their address there. And I sent in four Polaroids and from there got a call back, and then we communicated back and forth. And I sent in some other photos and then they called me to come in in August for a photo shoot.

ANDELMAN: And what was it like to actually do the photo shoot because I imagine thinking about it for years is one thing, but to go in and I don’t know, maybe it’s my own hang-up, but to go in and take your clothes off for strangers, be in a studio setting, that’s a little different?

McGREGOR: I was so comfortable. They made me feel very comfortable. It was surreal. I brought my mom up there with me. She was kind of like, “How do you know this is real? Are you sure?” I’m like, “Yes, mom.” She was a little scared about it. She was like, “I’m not gonna believe until I see the issue.” But when I was there, I remember the first photographer I shot with. The first scene that we did he was like, “Could you show a little bit of your shoulder?” So I dropped my slip down a little bit. He was like, “Okay, show a little bit of your breasts,” and I just dropped the dress down. He’s like, “Okay, we’ll get started there.” I had a good time. It was great. It was a lot of fun.

ANDELMAN: So, Stacy, is that pretty much the way these things go, that someone is either very into doing it, or they get there and they just don’t do it at all?

COLLINS: For someone to go this far into the process of submitting pictures and communicating with us and then showing up on set and not going through with it, that is incredibly rare. Usually, this is a dream come true for a young lady, and we are very particular about the photographers that we work with. We do have seven sets of photographers and producers around the country and in the U.K. and Canada, and they’ve been with Playboy for a very long time, and they know the drill. They know how to make a model feel comfortable. They know how to make her feel beautiful, and it just really sort of happens naturally. I have been surprised sometimes by a girl who’s incredibly green. We’ve just plucked her out of Midwest USA, put her on a set, and she comes alive in front of the camera because the comfort level is there. And I think, again, the excitement level to be affiliated with a brand like Playboy that is world-renowned, that is respected, that they know that they’re going to be treated properly and that the pictures are going to be beautiful.

ANDELMAN: So what was it like, Breann, to see yourself in the magazine the first time?

McGREGOR: I remember the first issue that I was in, it was College Girls. There’s a main girl on the front cover and then on the back, they’ll put a picture from a couple of the pictorials like one of each girl or a couple of the girls on the back of it just to show kind of what’s on the inside. And I was right there in the middle, in the center, and it just drew your attention. It was just like, “Oh, my God, I don’t know!” The Playboy editors called me, and it shocked me, and I’d gotten all excited. Like I was getting into the car, and they called me with some news, and I literally just fell out of the car while they were backing up cause I wasn’t in the car yet. I was just like, “Oh, my God!” It’s like excitement. I can’t explain it. Like she said, it’s like a dream come true. It’s just like wow, this is really happening.

ANDELMAN: Who was the first person you showed the magazine to?

McGREGOR: I showed my mom, and I think everybody went out and got it that day. The next day I was signing forever. Everybody was like, “Oh, my God, I saw your issue!” I think actually my friend had called me ‘cause he saw it first, and he was like, “Oh, my God, you’re on the back, you’re inside!” I’m like, “Oh, my God!” So I went and got it.

ANDELMAN: Was there anyone that you hesitated to show it to?

McGREGOR: No. No. My grandma is 79, so she’s kind of old-fashioned. She supported me. She went to Barnes & Noble, and she’s like, “Do you have a Playboy?” And they looked at her all weird, and she’s like, “My granddaughter’s in it!” She supports me. Everybody’s really supportive. They know this is what I want, and it makes me happy, and they’re happy for me.

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© 2008 by Bob Andelman. All rights reserved.

Stacy Collins and Breann McGregor, "Playboy Special Editions" editor and model: Mr. Media Interview, Part 2

(Return to Part 1)

BOB ANDELMAN/Mr. MEDIA: Stacy, what is it about Breann that made her stand out? And were you the first to kind of recognize that in her? How does that sort of happen when you have so many models to choose from and so many pictures probably coming in everyday?

STACY COLLINS: There is absolutely something to when a girl has the “It” factor, and there’s something about Breann that connected with myself and the executive editor and publisher for special editions, Jeff Cohen. And immediately, it was like this girl has something, not only an amazing, curvaceous figure, but something in her face and her eyes that just lights up with the camera. And that first photo session then led to a cover and then another cover and then another cover. Breann has worked her way through the ranks of Playboy, coming through Special Editions and then becoming a “Cyber Girl of the Week,” a “Cyber Girl of the Month,” and then “Cyber Girl of the Year,” and our “Playboy Special Editions Model of the Year” because the fans, again, connected with her. She also has a very sweet presence about her, and I think that connects with the male audience because she’s kind of sweet, but there’s something sexy underlying and you just want to know more about her. You want to kind of know what makes her tick and is she really sweet or is she really sexy or is there a combination of the two? So, again, there’s an “It” factor that Breann has.

ANDELMAN: I could see that. And I’m on record; I have read the magazine for over 30 years so I’ve seen a lot of the women who’ve been featured. And, Breann, you just seem to have that kind of Playboy look that some of the women who get featured have it, and it’s something you can’t quite put your finger on, and some of the women don’t have it, and they disappear from view very quickly.

BREANN McGREGOR: The Model of the Year issue is one of my favorites. I love it, and Stacy was actually on set on that one. I have to say that was probably, by far, out of all of them besides the one that’s out this month that you liked as well, Stacy. I don’t know. Stacy can make you feel very comfortable in your skin, and that photo shoot was just different. I was very comfortable. With Stacy in my presence, I don’t know. She’s a gorgeous woman. She’s five feet, and she makes me feel comfortable in my skin. Just being chosen to be Model of the Year was just…I was just so honored and just so thankful. And everything about that photo shoot was just like…I was so like wow, this is amazing. Very thankful for all of it. But that’s the issue that I believe that you have in front of you.





ANDELMAN: I think we’ve got someone who has a question for one of you.

CALLER: Hello, Bob?

ANDELMAN: Yeah.

CALLER: Hi, Bob. Pete Williams here.

ANDELMAN: Hey, Pete, a friend of Stacy Collins here, I think.

PETE WILLIAMS: Yes.

COLLINS: Hi, Pete.

WILLIAMS: Hi, Stacy, great to hear you and Breann.

McGREGOR: Hello, Pete.

WILLIAMS: Hi there. Just wondering, Stacy, from a scouting standpoint, I know you go all over the country looking for new faces and figures for your magazine. How do you begin to cull the herd, for lack of a better term, with all these thousands and thousands of sure deserving women that could possibly appear in your magazine?

COLLINS: That’s a great question, Pete. It’s not an easy process, and what we actually do now is we hold a monthly casting call in a new city every month. In fact, we have a crew and a team in Houston today from 9 to 6 and tomorrow from 10 to 6 where we’ve got almost 200 girls signed up each day to come in and have their 5, 10, or 15 minutes with Playboy. And they meet a Playboy photographer, and they take their test shots, and that really gives a young lady an opportunity to let her personality shine through other than just submitting photographs. What’s happened now is you really have to weed through and cull through and really find that diamond in the rough is have a little personality behind it because sometimes a static photograph just doesn’t do a young lady justice. So through these casting calls, we’re finding tons and tons of girls, in fact, so many girls that we can’t utilize them all, but we’re then providing a lot of these girls opportunities within a lot of arms in the Playboy universe. So there are website opportunities. There are catalog opportunities, just any sort of other Playboy opportunities that might not be specific to Playboy Special Editions or Playboy but any number of the other properties that are branded sites that we have under the Playboy umbrella. So we’re trying to make as many young ladies’ dreams come true but still being selective. Again, it takes something really special for a young lady to be accepted by Playboy. Clearly, Hef, Mr. Hefner, chooses 12 girls a year, and every young lady wants to be a Playmate and not everyone can so we try to find as many other avenues and opportunities to give these young ladies a chance to have a Playboy experience.

WILLIAMS: I wonder, too, with everyone seemingly being a figure model, fitness model, their own website, MySpace, everything else, does that help or does it create a professionalism that maybe you’re looking to get away from when you’re looking for fresh faces?

COLLINS: You know what, the quick answer is we take both. We love the young ladies who have an entrepreneurial spirit who are already doing their own thing, but they look at Playboy as a way to take them to another level, and they’re really their own promotional machine and can also drive business back to us, so we’re thankful for that because as big a company as we are, we don’t have enough manpower to support the hundreds and hundreds of girls who appear in Playboy Special Editions every year. So, actually, we’re kind of thankful and grateful that some of these gals have their own marketing machine behind them, and we try to be supportive and make sure they’ve got issues to sign and promote and sell. And then by the same token, we love the fresh face, the girl who this is their first modeling opportunity, and they’ve not really been exposed to all the things that are available in the Playboy universe and otherwise. So we really sort of accept both. Now, I would say we don’t want somebody who’s so over-exposed that someone’s like why would you put her in the magazine? She’s not this or that. But, again, we try to keep that balance of truly fresh faces, new girls, and the girl who hey, this is her career, this is her livelihood and adding a Playboy notch to her resume is great for her and good for us as well.

WILLIAMS: I see. Breann, congratulations on everything you have won.

McGREGOR: Thank you very much.

WILLIAMS: And I hope you can help me in finally convincing Stacy to appear in the “Employee of the Month” feature.

McGREGOR: I know. I tell her she’s gorgeous. She’s very sexy.

COLLINS: Okay.

McGREGOR: She just has that look that you just can’t put your finger on, as Bob was saying earlier.

ANDELMAN: Or you can’t put your camera on, either, apparently.

WILLIAMS: Thanks everyone.

ANDELMAN: Breann, your picture is all over the internet and these magazines, but Pete raises an interesting point. Tell us about Stacy.

McGREGOR: She is gorgeous. Not only does she have a very sexy voice, but she’s just got something about her, her face and her eyes. She’s very sexy, and she’s got a charm to her. She really does. Doing a photo shoot, to have a gorgeous woman tell you, make you feel comfortable and like I said, just feeling good in your skin was just like…that’s a good thing. That’s very good. I don’t know. She’s got something about her. She really does.

COLLINS: I’m blushing.





ANDELMAN: Stacy, you think it’ll ever happen?

COLLINS: I don’t think so, Bob, but thanks for asking. I will say that a lot of young ladies will say, “Have you been in the magazine” or “When were you in the magazine?” And what I like to do is sort of mentor and guide some young ladies through this process that, “Hey, take advantage of this amazing opportunity while it’s at your fingertips. Do as much as you can with this opportunity -- you’re smart, you’re bright, you can do things after this.” I sort of have that nurturing mother hen instinct. I’m not sure where it came from, but I want to protect them. I want them to enjoy the experience. I want them to get as much out of it as they can. And I think they, in some way, they trust me because I’m not a 400 pound man or bearded lady, so they sort of trust how I would guide them and herd them through this or shepherd them through this process. They can say okay, if you were to do it, I would trust you so I trust you helping me through the process.

ANDELMAN: Stacy, a lot of people feel that Playboy -- and this is an old thing -- but they feel that Playboy and magazines of this type exploit women. Do you ever feel that you’re in that role? How would you argue that?

COLLINS: I would not and have not ever felt that way only because I’m incredibly comfortable with the philosophy of Playboy and the way that we do business, the way that we conduct ourselves, the way that my department, for example, goes about recruiting and finding young ladies. We know what we’re doing in terms of giving these girls an opportunity. We know what we’re delivering into the marketplace. We do it with style and class and grace, and no one young lady comes into the door and is in any way made to do something she’s uncomfortable with. That’s just not our style. That’s not what we do. And there are enough young ladies in the world who want to just at least have a piece of this Playboy experience that we don’t have to do anything unsavory or stoop to any level that we’re not comfortable with. So if anyone ever has a question about my morals or my standards of being involved with Playboy, I just look to look at what this magazine has accomplished since 1953. It’s iconic. It’s been responsible for some amazing things in the literary arts, with music, with politics, and I have no qualms whatsoever being affiliated with that brand. And like I said, a whole new generation is becoming exposed to the Playboy brand through the show “The Girls Next Door” to our licensing and merchandising. You see rabbit head logos everywhere. So it is something that I defend if anyone has any questions or concerns. And I, in no way, feel as though we exploit women whatsoever.

ANDELMAN: Breann, when Pete called before, he was asking Stacy about whether women who had their own websites, that kind of thing, if that was good or bad for the situation. Did your website come after you did your first modeling? How do you use the website?

McGREGOR: Actually, yes. I did the website about 2 years ago, which was about a year after I had been into Playboy. And I was new to it when I first started it and was kind of doing research on what other girls who had websites did and stuff like that. And then some things happened and a year later, I got “Cyber Girl of the Year,” and with a contract was unable to have my website. But I use it pretty much just to promote any events that I’m doing, and I just can put up glamour pictures, or I have an event calendar, any news that’s going on, any awards or appearances that I’ve done, and it’s basically just for fans to kind of see what’s going on in my life and just a journal and any issues that are out or any upcoming news and stuff like that.

COLLINS: What tends to happen, Bob, is that when a young lady comes through the Playboy family, and they really do start to build a fan base, and we’ve got message boards where our fans are able to communicate back and forth. And they really start to follow these models, and they want to make sure that they get every issue, and they want to see when the new pictures are out, and they want to know if she’s going to appear at a nightclub or host an event. Again, if we’re not able to as Playboy, as an entity, promote that on our site because it’s not really conducive to that, for a young lady to have that opportunity to promote herself and give herself a platform to communicate with their fans is fantastic. And many models have a membership part of their website where, for a few extra dollars, you get to see some never-before-seen pictures or get some little added extras. That takes a lot of management from behind the scenes, but I know that it’s become lucrative for any number of Playboy models to have membership-driven parts of their site.

ANDELMAN: And Breann, where do you want to go with all this? I saw that you are actually up for 2008 Cyber Girl of the Year, I think.

McGREGOR: For Model of the Year.

ANDELMAN: For Model of the Year, I’m sorry. And so the voting is going on now, and guys, you can go to breannmcgregor.net, and there’s a link there to the Playboy page. You can vote for her. But where do you want all this to take you?

McGREGOR: Before I had got into Playboy, I was going to school for a molecular biology. I wanted to go to med school, and it’s not happening. Honestly, like Stacy said, when you have it at your fingertips, take advantage of it and make the best of it. And I’m really, honestly, enjoying my two titles and traveling. I’ve done so much traveling this year. I want to build up my website. I like the marketing and the advertising. I’d like to start my own business of some sort someday. What it is, I’m not sure. It’s just wherever my heart takes me. I’m still, like I said, I’m traveling, and I’m enjoying every moment of it while I can.

ANDELMAN: Some of the girls you see over the years who do this kind of thing, they wind up going in very different directions. Some wind up doing more modeling. Some wind up maybe doing movies. Some wind up doing soft-core stuff. Some wind up, you see them at the, not that I have, but you see them advertised at neighborhood strip clubs. It doesn’t sound like any of that is the way you’re going with this.

McGREGOR: No. No. I’d like to start my own business. I don’t know. Part of me wants to go to culinary school cause I want to learn to cook, and I’m like maybe one day I can open up my own restaurant. I don’t know. This entrepreneur in me is coming out. And I say, if anything, Playboy has definitely given me the opportunity if I take advantage of the exposure that they have given me and use it to an advantage and make something of it. So, again, wherever my heart takes me. Honestly, before Katrina and all this, I thought I wanted to go to med school and go to anesthesia school, and honestly, that’s not really where my heart was. You really can’t plan anything. You kind of have to take each day by day and just be very positive, follow your heart, and make the best of it. Life is short.

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© 2008 by Bob Andelman. All rights reserved.

Stacy Collins and Breann McGregor, "Playboy Special Editions" editor and model: Mr. Media Interview, Part 3

(Return to Part 2)

(Return to Part 1)


BOB ANDELMAN/Mr. MEDIA: How far into the future are you obligated to Playboy at this point?

BREANN McGREGOR: For Cyber Girl, it’s a year contract.

ANDELMAN: Okay.

McGREGOR: But as far as working with them in the future, I’ll always be there. They’re like family to me. They’ve been there through some of the hardest times, and so whatever they need, I’m there for them. It’s not something that’s ever gonna end.

ANDELMAN: I want to ask you both. Strictly by coincidence, I got the new issue of Playboy yesterday, and there’s an interview with Tina Fey. Have either of you read it?

STACY COLLINS: I have not had a chance to read that yet, and I’d actually like to. I took the issue home, and some guy in my house swiped it so I have to find another issue around the office.

ANDELMAN: Some “guy” in your house, huh?

COLLINS: Yeah, I can’t really disclose, but yeah. Some guy.





ANDELMAN: Well, it’s a very funny interview with Tina, but there’s this one part and I can just read it to you. I have it in front of me. There’s this one part that I’m kind of curious to get your response to. She was talking about women who feel that they have to get super skinny and get a fake tan and fake boobs, and the interviewer was very surprised that she wanted to talk about this in Playboy of all places, and she says, “I don’t want to seem like a bad guest, but I have a few general theories. If you look back at old Playboys from the ‘60s and ‘70s, the Playmates represented the girl-next-door and some of them had maybe different size boobies, perhaps with brown nipples or large areolas. There are even ladies with their actual hair, with hair that wasn’t blond.” What she’s saying is that a lot of women feel they have to change themselves physically to be part of this universe. And I was kind of curious what each of you thought of that.

McGREGOR: Stacy?

COLLINS: Well, I was gonna let you talk first, but I’d be more than happy to address that. Again, part of what I believe Playboy Special Editions brings to the table is an avenue for all types of different girls. We showcase exotic beauties and natural beauties and the voluptuous vixen. We know that there’s a different taste out there for every customer so we try to accomplish that through some of our themes. But there is, definitely, an overriding social expectation about what the ideal girl is for Playboy: blond hair, blue eyes, big boobs, tiny waist. And there have been any number of those types of girls in the magazines throughout the years, but people tend to forget that there’s always a nice balance of different types of women in the magazine. So I feel like Playboy does get pigeon-holed in that, and I think because Hef’s personal taste has sort of trended that way in terms of his girlfriends and the women that he surrounds himself with, but that doesn’t mean that all of the Playboy universe. There is a spot in the Playboy universe for all different types of women. Different shapes, colors, sizes, ethnic backgrounds, the whole nine yards. So I would like to dispel that myth. If someone asked me do I have to have a boob job, I say absolutely not, but I still have to see how you look naked. I still have to see are your breasts perfectly proportionate? Are they nice? How do you look with…I would never automatically say you have to have a boob job, you have to have blond hair and blue contacts. That is not the criteria that we use to select the young ladies that are featured in Playboy.

McGREGOR: I’ve never felt being in Playboy I had to lose weight. I’m a curvier model. I’m not bone-thin. I’ve got curves. And I feel that Playboy likes that about me and so do my fans, and that’s why I’ve been able to have a career with them for as long as I have. But I’ve never felt that I’ve had to look a certain way or, of course, you have to, like Stacy said, you have to keep up with yourself. I work out, and I diet because I want to because it makes me feel good about myself, but it’s not anything that I felt like I had to do it. I do it for my health and again, because it makes me feel good. But, again, I’m a curvy model. I’m not like a zero or a one. I never will be. And it makes me feel good that I, being a I don’t want to say bigger model, a more curvaceous model, I guess, I don’t know, a curvier model that other women can see that you don’t have to be a size zero to feel beautiful or to be in Playboy cause I’m not. I hope I can help other women feel comfortable in their skin as well.

ANDELMAN: Before we come off of that topic, I have to ask about tattoos. Stacy, I guess this is particularly to you. You see so many women. Are we seeing any lessening of the tattoos on these women? And if you see a woman who is particularly beautiful, but she’s got a tattoo in the wrong place, can you airbrush that? Do you cover it up? How do you handle that?

COLLINS: I will tell you it actually is very regional in terms of ink. We seem to find New York is pretty ink-heavy. Miami can be a little bit ink-heavy. But we were just in Denver two months ago and Memphis last month, and it was not very prevalent. It really is somewhat regional. And sometimes tattoos are a nice enhancement and a beautiful addition to a woman’s body, and then other girls who see their bodies as a canvas, and tattoos are a work of art on their bodies, they sometimes take it a little too far. If, for any reason, myself or Jeff Cohen, the executive editor, find that it’s a little overwhelming or a little too intrusive, doesn’t really complement the photograph and the pictorial, we will remove it. But it’s an expression of a young lady’s personality and how she feels about herself, but sometimes, they are a little too much. I can’t lie to you. We try to leave as much of the natural beauty and inner beauty of the girls shine through in the photographs, but if something detracts from that, whether that be an unsightly scar or a tattoo that’s just a dragon spitting fire, we might use our best judgment and remove it.

ANDELMAN: Breann, I don’t want to look too closely. I looked generally over a couple pages. I don’t see any tattoos there.

McGREGOR: I don’t have any.

ANDELMAN: Okay. Good. Good! My faith in these things is restored.

COLLINS: I do have young ladies email or say, “Will you reject me if I have a tattoo?” and that’s not the case. It would never be something that we would automatically say, “If you’ve got a tattoo, you can’t be in Playboy.” It’s part of the culture. It’s part of the pop culture phenomenon, to be tattooed and pierced, and I hope I don’t offend anyone here but bare down there. We’re in an age where there’s not a lot of body hair, and that’s up for debate with a lot of our customers as to whether they like that or they don’t like that. But it’s just a way that young ladies are expressing themselves these days, and so we let them express their beauty.





ANDELMAN: I’m not gonna touch the body hair issue. I’ve got to draw the line somewhere. When the cup issue came up at the start of the conversation, I didn’t ask what size, and I’m not gonna ask about body hair at this point. So let me change gears slightly before we wind up. Stacy, you were a book editor for, I guess, about seven years before joining Playboy. Now you’re dealing everyday with models, a professional category not renowned for intellectualism. And no disrespect, but what’s the dumbest thing you’ve ever heard out of a model’s mouth?

COLLINS: I don’t know that it’s necessarily out of a model’s mouth, but we have a bio form that we have our young ladies fill out when they’re coming through a casting and ask all kinds of different questions so that we can really kind of get a sense of their personality. And the one thing that never fails to crack me up is they’ll say, on the bio form it says “birthplace,” and sometimes they put “hospital” rather than Indianapolis, Indiana. They put hospital! That is one that really never ceases to get a giggle out of me. But that’s maybe a little unfair because a lot of young ladies that we see are pursuing higher education, are entrepreneurial, are business owners who just happen to be beautiful and say, “Hey, you know what, I’ve always wanted to try to be in Playboy. I’m gonna give it a try. If it doesn’t work out, at least I gave it a shot. I submitted my pictures, or I came to a casting call,” and they can walk away and say, “You know what, I did something for me, and it made me feel good” and be happy with their decision. And sure, there are girls who might be challenged with spelling or identifying capitals of the states, but that’s not really what we’re interested in. We’re trying to create a fantasy and fulfill a need that still exists in the marketplace whether that’s via print or online or other mediums. And that’s just finding the most beautiful, exotic, sultry young women and giving them a platform to be adored and worshipped.

ANDELMAN: Breann, as a former molecular biology student, I want to give you a chance at the last word here. Do you want to defend the intelligence of models, or do you want to add a story of your own to the legend?

McGREGOR: As far as the women, I just think it’s stereotyped. I guess they think blond Playboys, all blonds, and you know how the blonds have the dumb blond stereotype, but I have a lot of friends that model in Playboy, and they’re in nursing school. A friend of mine has her own body shop where she sells her own lotions and stuff. And they’re very smart, and I think they’re very smart to take advantage of what Playboy has done for them to have given them exposure, and they use that to their advantage. And I think that’s very smart, but I have to say, I think it’s all stereotyped. Yeah, there are some girls that are a little ditzy, but that’s what makes them cute or makes them different. I don’t know. Sometimes I say things that are really dorky or just like did you just say that? Sometimes I find myself saying the dumbest things, but I think we’re all like that. But I think it’s all stereotyped, the dumb blond model. I think there are a lot of very smart, intelligent women in Playboy.

© 2008 by Bob Andelman. All rights reserved.

Michelle Borth, "Tell Me You Love Me" actress: Mr. Media Interview, Pt. 1

The ironic thing about Michelle Borth’s role as Jamie, a woman whose fiancé won’t commit to monogamy in the new HBO series "Tell Me You Love Me," is that she is the kind of sexy, intoxicating woman that could probably drive the best-intentioned married man to cheat on his wife.



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BOB ANDELMAN/Mr. MEDIA: I was fascinated watching the show. It was very unlike anything I think I’ve ever seen, even on HBO.

MICHELLE BORTH: Well, that’s a huge compliment. Thank you.

ANDELMAN: How was this show pitched to you, and what was your first reaction to it?

BORTH: It was pitched to me about three years ago, during pilot season, and it was very much what you would think. It was proposed to me as this really graphic show, and that that was something I should know before going into it. And I was like, “Okay, well, let me read it.” And I read the pilot, and I was floored. I was really floored by it because I personally really connected with the character Jamie on a personal level that I was like, “Someone is following me around and writing my life because this is my life.” So I went into the audition for this project with wanting it moreso than I think anything I’ve ever auditioned for in the past before that.

ANDELMAN: It seemed like, looking over your resume, that it was quite different from anything you had done before.

BORTH: It is. It absolutely is. I haven’t actually done much TV work. I’ve worked quite a bit and have been in the low-budget indie/horror/sci-fi genres, which are great. But this is actually more along my speed and what I really would like to do. This kind of show, on this kind of network, specifically, is a dream come true for me and I think for any actor, but for me, specifically, it was a dream come true.

ANDELMAN: Well, you mention right at the top there that it was presented to you as a very graphic, sexual show.

BORTH: Yeah.






ANDELMAN: Did you have any hesitation with that?

BORTH: Of course. Initially, I did when I had the first conversation with my agent. The way that it was presented I was like, “Oh, I don’t know, I don’t know how I feel about that.” Because, even in the films that I’d done, I’ve done one topless scene prior to any of this, and I was like that’s it, I did my one, I’m not doing anything more. So I was like oh, no, but after reading the pilot, it was just so smart and so beautifully written. Something, like you said, I’d never read anything like that. I haven’t read a movie script or a pilot or anything even close to what I read. It automatically then didn’t become an issue. And that’s the truth. It honestly was not an issue to me from that point on.

ANDELMAN: It’s funny. Ten years ago, I probably wouldn’t have even thought to ask you this, but here I am. I’ve got a daughter going on 11. My view of some of these things, I notice, has changed, and I think, my goodness, how would I feel if my daughter was portraying a character like that on screen? You said you did one topless scene. This is, for people who haven’t seen it yet, this is way beyond a topless scene.

BORTH: Absolutely. It’s absolutely difficult. It’s not a show that I am pushing my father or my brothers to watch because I think it might be awkward for them as family members. But, in general, I think that it’s a big deal because there hasn’t been anything that’s been this true to life on TV at all, especially primetime TV, and HBO is known for raising the bar and setting a new precedent. And I think that this goes along the lines of anything else that they’ve done. “The Sopranos” was an extremely violent show and showed things that you wouldn’t be able to show on basic cable and stuff like that. And we’re just doing the same thing with a different context. We’re now dealing with sex which, in America, I’m realizing now that we’re a little sexually repressed. So I think it rubs people the wrong way.

ANDELMAN: How do you think America will be after a season of “Tell Me You Love Me”? Will we be less repressed, or will the people who are repressed want to be more repressed and the people who aren’t want to be more exposed?

BORTH: How do I feel? Well, first off, I think people are gonna be, I hope not, but I think people might be a little disappointed when they initially watch the show and realize that it’s not a big porn fest. That it is actually a really smart, intelligent show, and sex is a part of it because we’re dealing with intimacy of relationships and all of that. So I think that the HBO audience is a smart audience, and the show is slow-paced, and there’re no bells and whistles. There’re no big booms or music or fast cuts that it’s gonna take a certain audience to watch it, but once they do, the storylines will pick up where maybe the sex drew people in. I think the storylines are gonna draw people in, and so the people who watch it just for the sex I think will be disappointed because it’s not just about that. And the people who I think maybe will get offended, just don’t watch it. Don’t watch it.

ANDELMAN: I have to say, in defense of the sex scenes, that, if you like to watch a movie or TV and check out the sex scenes, the ones in the first two episodes are pretty intense.

BORTH: We come in with a bang. We’re coming in with a bang. I would say probably the two most graphic episodes of the entire season are the first two. Absolutely. So, yes, we’re coming in with a big bang.






ANDELMAN: You mentioned other HBO shows. It kind of reminded me of the opposite of an older HBO show, “The Mind of a Married Man.” It’s not a comedy. It’s a drama, and it’s more like, except for your character, “The Mind of a Married Woman,” although when we meet you, you’re on your way to becoming a married woman.

BORTH: Right. I actually just got HBO. I needed to get HBO. So I haven’t seen that show, but viewing the lives is really voyeuristic. You feel like you’re there going through these problems with these couples. And what I think is great about the show is that it’s so universal, and it hits every demographic that pretty much, if you’ve been in a relationship and you’re an adult, you’re gonna be able to relate to one of them. There’s gonna be one of the relationships that’s gonna draw you in and say, “Ah, I know that, I know that and I have said that before.”

ANDELMAN: Are you or have you ever been married?

BORTH: No, I am not married, and I have never been married. I have not been in a relationship in four years.

ANDELMAN: So you’re even a little separated from where Jamie is.

BORTH: I am. The thing about Jamie, though, that was difficult for me and what initially drew me in, what I said earlier about the pilot, was just a lot of the pain and heartache that she has in her relationship with Hugo and the breakup with Hugo and all of that is something that I have experienced. So, for me, as an actress, what was difficult was all that baggage that you dealt with and put away, I had to pull out and open up and live it for six months so that wasn’t fun. That wasn’t great. I’m like I spent a lot of time and hard work getting over all those issues, let’s go on back out and play in it again.

ANDELMAN: Michelle, I have to ask, maybe you’ll tell me, maybe you won’t, how old are you?

BORTH: I just turned 29.

ANDELMAN: Oh, that’s amazing. I would’ve guessed 22, 23.

BORTH: Thank you very much. You know what though, I will say this much. I auditioned for this show on my birthday, on my 26th birthday. So this has been a very long process filming the show. It’s been about a year since I shot it, and it’s been two years since I shot the pilot. So the first episode you actually watch is the pilot. We shot that over two and a half years ago. So I am younger.






ANDELMAN: And do you guys know yet if you’ll be picked up for another season?

BORTH: We don’t know because the show hasn’t aired yet. So we don’t even know what the response or the ratings are gonna be like, and they haven’t told me anything specific. They can’t because there’s no guarantee.

ANDELMAN: Usually, they have a sense of this.

BORTH: Yeah, but HBO’s track record because they can, they have the ability to, they give shows a chance. I can only think of one show in the past that didn’t get past the first season, but they usually give them two or three seasons for people to start to settle into it.

ANDELMAN: Right.

BORTH: I would be really surprised if we didn’t have a second season, honestly.

ANDELMAN: Well, let me come back to the characters for a minute. Most of the married couples in the show seem likely, at this point, to stay true to one another, although perhaps, tempted by other fruit. And that kind of allows the actors in those relationships to build intimacy with one another. But Jamie and Hugo, they seem doomed from the start, leading me to think that you’ll be getting physical with, perhaps, a series of actors or, for all we know, actresses, in search of the right mate. And so I wondered, does that make the role and your job tougher than maybe some of the other actors on the show?

BORTH: Oh my God, absolutely, absolutely! The one thing that was difficult, specifically, is that throughout the entire shooting of the episodes, everyone’s got their partner. As an actor, you’re working with the same person over and over and over again. You build that trust. You build that stability. You build that chemistry with that other actor. And little things like right now, like interviews, when you do interviews, a lot of the couples get interviewed together, and so they bounce off one another. And what’s been difficult for me is that because of my storyline and Jamie going in and out of relationships to try to find what she’s looking for, I’ve had to do this journey on my own, not only as the character but as Michelle Borth. And it’s a little frightening because number one, this is my first big anything, especially my first TV show, so having to go through all of this by myself and figuring it out all myself is ironic to me because it parallels my character on screen. But it is, it’s difficult. I would like to have had Luke, say, go through all of that with me and do it as a team like the other couples and the other actors got to do. But that wasn’t the case. But it’s been a great learning experience. Had to do it trial by fire.






ANDELMAN: I have to ask you so I guess this is a man’s question, I don’t know. There’s a scene with you and the actor who plays Hugo in the car, which is pretty intense and pretty graphic. How do you start and stop where the acting and the human being begins and ends in a scene like that?

BORTH: That’s actually a really good question because I thought about it, and I don’t really know how to answer it. You have to distinguish your work from personal, absolutely, and although Luke and I did develop quite a strong relationship, and it made those scenes a lot easier to do because we had this really great chemistry in real life. So I think that just shows even more on screen. But it’s acting, and I feel like in whatever technique or however people work, I substitute people. So in that scene, I’m thinking of someone else. I’m bringing someone else into that scene in my mind.

ANDELMAN: And thank you for thinking of Mr. Media in that scene. I appreciated that. I could see that.

BORTH: I was! I was thinking about you in that scene, which is why it was so intense. But you have to. You have to distinguish, otherwise you’re gonna find yourself in really awkward, weird situations which happens a lot on sets. I kind of understand now why people who work together tend to date afterwards. Just reading magazines and watching “Extra” and stuff like that, I get it because you spend a significant amount of time with that person and, especially with what we’re dealing with on this show and that close and that intimate, you do develop that relationship off-screen. I think you have to in order to bring it on-screen, but it is all for the sake of the work and for the job, and that’s it. And then you come home and let it go.

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©2007 by Bob Andelman. All rights reserved.

Michelle Borth, "Tell Me You Love Me" actress: Mr. Media Interview, Pt. 2

(Return to Part 1)

BOB ANDELMAN/Mr. MEDIA: One of the things that I know people have talked about a lot about the show is the male full frontal nudity, which, even in movies, you don’t see that, and that seems to bring that other element to the show that makes it seem that much more graphic because you’re really not used to seeing that.

MICHELLE BORTH: I think that’s the whole point, though. I think it’s really interesting that that’s been like a big fuss because I almost want to say to the men, “Oh, boo hoo, are you feeling exploited? I’m sorry!” I think it’s funny that people are shocked by it because we’ve seen frontal nudity from women. We’ve seen topless scenes and all of that. I like the show. I like that we’re bringing that to the screen. I think that it wouldn’t do the show justice if we just favored one gender. The show is about the truth of relationships, and it doesn’t favor specifically to the men audience by giving you lots of T & A. I love that because that’s not what the show is about. It is not about the sex and the nudity and all of that because a lot of the sex, number one, is unsexy sex. It is not sex that turns you on. It is awkward, and it’s weird. And maybe showing male genitalia will reinforce the whole point. People are comparing it to pornography, but it’s not. It’s about showing an authentic relationship, and I’m glad that we’re doing it because I think we should be.

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ANDELMAN: But, Michelle, at the same time, you’re right, fair is fair. We’re gonna see female nudity; we should see male nudity. But because we’re so unused to seeing it, it seems like seeing that penis, at times, makes the sex seem that much more real even if it’s not “happy” sex. I think that’s the part of it that makes it more surprising to people when they see it because it’s like, “Wow, that guy’s not covered up there. That doesn’t look as simulated as that movie I saw in the hotel.”

BORTH: No. You are absolutely right. And I think that the reason for that is it will pull you out of the moment and pull you out of the scene, I think, if you cut to a lamp during a sex scene. The show is very voyeuristic. You’re watching people go through all their troubles. You’re watching them in the bedroom. You’re watching them in the therapy room. We don’t cut away at the awkward moments. We don’t pan to something else when you’re not supposed to see something, so you’re right. It does make it more real, and it does exactly what it’s supposed to do for the show, and that is to make you feel involved with these characters and to live and breathe with these characters. And it doesn’t take you out of the moment. So I think that it does justice for the scenes.





ANDELMAN: Now, you said that you’re 29. You’re not 22 or 23, which is what I guessed from just watching, so you seem more confident and more secure in your sexuality and who you are. That’s got to make it easier for you to do something like this.

BORTH: Absolutely. I am. I am really comfortable with sexuality and nudity. I think it’s just kind of the way that I was raised, just really liberal. And I am just comfortable with myself. My mom did a good job. I’ve got great self-esteem. This doesn’t say that it wasn’t completely nerve-wracking doing them. It absolutely was. It’s not easy. It’s not easy getting naked and being in scenes in front of a room full of people. Oh my God, it’s terrifying. I don’t care how confident or how great you think you look, you’re nervous. Once I initially got over the nerves in doing it, it’s like riding a bike, after the first one you’re just like oh alright, let’s do it. Let’s do it. Let’s get naked. Let’s do it. Yeah, then absolutely then it’s fine. But I also thought it was really essential to really own the confidence because that is Jamie’s whole deal. She is this really sexually confident woman and individual. She uses it as a crutch for so many different things, and if I didn’t portray that, I wouldn’t be doing her character justice. I had to.

ANDELMAN: As we’re talking, the show is still a few days away from airing for the first time. Are you nervous about the potential loss of privacy that may take place if the show catches on? Even if the show becomes a minor hit, people are gonna see you in a completely different light.

BORTH: I never even thought about that. I honestly didn’t think about that. No, no I’m not. If it happens, yeah, then fine, great if people notice me. I think people are gonna have their own opinions. I know some people are gonna judge me and whether or not I’m gonna get heckled or people are gonna be mean to me, I don’t know. I think that I prepared myself for all of it because I’ve been with this project for so long and after the TCA’s and the big stir of the sex, I was like, “Alright, this is gonna be a big deal. I need to prepare myself for anything that’s gonna come because there’s gonna be good and there’s gonna be bad and, whatever it is, I’m just ready for it.” So, yeah, I think that maybe I’m ready for it. I hope so. I think I’m ready for the good and the bad.





ANDELMAN: A few weeks ago I interviewed the editor of Playboy for Mr. Media, and we were talking about how, over the years, many actresses who are looking to break out or change the world’s perception of them posed for Playboy. I wondered if this was the kind of thing that would have kind of the same effect or if that might even be the effect that you might be looking for.

BORTH: I would say no. For me personally, I don’t feel I need to have to justify. No, I don’t. I didn’t do it for any other reason than I thought it was a great show and a great character and a great job on a great network.

ANDELMAN: Let me ask a little bit about you. We’ve talked an awful lot about sex. I think I’ve talked to you more about sex this afternoon than I usually talk to my wife about it in a month. Where are you from? Why did you want to become an actress?

BORTH: I’m from New York, and I don’t really know why I wanted to become an actor. Now, in hindsight, I would’ve been like, “No, don’t do it! I don’t advise it!” I think it was because it was the only thing that, for me, it was an outlet for me that I couldn’t find anywhere else that allowed me to express myself. I was a little out of control as a teenager, and I did some bad things. I found acting to be that outlet that allowed me to express my anger and my pain and my hurt and my fears without having to do anything bad, without having to be bad, or do anything bad. It was just an outlet that I finally found. I was like, “Oh, my God. This makes me feel good. It feels right. I’m good at it, and I’m not breaking any laws.” So that’s why.

ANDELMAN: And you mentioned brothers. How many siblings do you have?

BORTH: I have two younger brothers. Two younger brothers, yeah, and they’re back in New York.






BOB ANDELMAN: Okay. And your folks, what do they do?

MICHELLE BORTH: My mother owns a home improvement business. She’s like the Mrs. Bob Vila of the 21st century. She’s a hot, hot Italian woman with a lot of tools. She is. I want to get her her own show so bad. She’s like Sophia Loren with a tool belt. She’s amazing.

ANDELMAN: She sounds like a TV show waiting to happen.

BORTH: She is! I could talk about it forever. And my father works for the New York Times.

ANDELMAN: Really?

BORTH: Yeah.

ANDELMAN: What does he do with the New York Times?

BORTH: He has for about twenty years. He does all the layout and formatting and color corrections. Whatever you see physically on the page, he’s probably put there.

ANDELMAN: You’re a perfect interview for the Mr. Media space. Great. We talked earlier before the interview. I found your MySpace page kind of by accident. You allow people to see your page, but let’s warn them ahead of time, they cannot contact you directly through the page.

BORTH: No.

ANDELMAN: It looks like you have a lot of fun. It looks like you have a lot of friends, and there’re some good times on there. This comes back to the privacy issue, though. Are you a little nervous about letting people see that much of you? Will that page disappear soon?

BORTH: It’s interesting that you’ve brought this up, but I really never thought about it in the past. I’m a person who’s pretty honest, and more than anything else, I’m a really honest person. I’m really open. I don’t like secrets. I think it takes too much energy and effort to lie about stuff. So it’s a lot easier just to tell it like it is, and I’ve always been that way. I honestly couldn’t say that six months from now that page is gonna not be private. I can’t say because if I start getting flooded, it’s one thing if I’m getting flooded with positive things, but if I start getting flooded with negative things, then yeah, I will make it private because I don’t need it, and I don’t want it. There’s no point in it so I would probably make it private if that starts to happen. But otherwise, I don’t have anything to hide unless it completely inconveniences my life to a point where I can’t function on a daily basis. I don’t have a problem with it. I think that if you’re on a TV show, and you do a hit movie or something, yeah, okay, you need to expect the fact that people are gonna be interested in your life. And people are gonna want to know what you’re doing and stuff like that, and I’m like why not? I don’t care. I don’t. I don’t care. If people want to see or they’re just curious, fine. I think it’s harmless.

ANDELMAN: Then let me ask you two questions based on your MySpace page. Can you stand on your head?

BORTH: Oh, my God! I was a gymnast for thirteen years. I can! I can stand and twirl and twist on my hands and on my head.

ANDELMAN: And then explain the quote right next to your picture. It says, “Bikers n bitches, skydivers n witches.”

BORTH: That is exactly what it means. I like bikers and bitches, and I love skydivers and witches. My dad’s a big biker, and I love motorcycles. Skydiving is my biggest passion, second to acting. Yeah, I can’t say anything more than that. It just makes me feel incredible and alive. And one of my closest friends, who I actually met through skydiving, is a goddess witch, and I just really started getting into it. I’m not practicing anything. I’m not really a religious person, but it’s interesting to me. And it’s a really interesting kind of people in that whole witch world. It’s interesting to me. It’s like a big summation of me, that quote.

ANDELMAN: Is your friend a Wiccan?

BORTH: Yeah.

ANDELMAN: Okay. I don’t know that much about it, but I know enough to be dangerous.

BORTH: Yeah, yeah. She throws goddess parties, and she does, if your pet is out of whack, she can come and talk to your pet, and she cleanses houses for people. She’s like a Hollywood witch. Her name is Fiona Horn. She’s amazing. She does these great things, and she’s got a huge following, and it was just something that I never knew about. This whole world I didn’t know about. They’re really quite interesting.





ANDELMAN: I thought your page was quite interesting. It looked, like I said, it looked like you have a lot of fun, and you have friends. And it’s nice to see that. It’s obvious that a page like that was set up for you, literally, as a personal MySpace page because there’s no hint of an HBO publicist putting their stamp on it yet.

BORTH: No. I thought about it. I don’t think I’m gonna try to use that page as a tool for promoting myself. The closest thing I’ve done is probably put some photos that I use to submit myself for magazines and stuff like that because, more specifically, the photographers are friends of mine so I want to promote them, and I have their name under. But otherwise, I’d like to keep it personal. I don’t want to use it as a tool for like oh, what’s Michelle Borth doing next. It’s just more for me like, “Hey, my skydiver friends, when are we going up north? Where are we going next, and what’s happening?” I’d rather keep it to that.

ANDELMAN: Well, you’ve been very patient and generous with your time. Just a couple last things. Where would you like to see your career go alongside and beyond “Tell Me You Love Me”? What kind of things would you like to be offered?

BORTH: I would love for my career to go alongside and beyond “Tell Me.” It’s hard to say because my personal taste is definitely more towards the indie films. I’d love to work with Darren Aronofsky. I just really like those dark sort of indie films. So I’d like to go in that direction, more of like a Lili Taylor or something. But, which isn’t to say that, if Superman 3 came out, that I wouldn’t want to do it. Absolutely. I just hope to continue to do quality work more than anything. I enjoyed the work and the films that I’ve done in the past, but now having been on a show, I feel unspoiled, and I’m fucked at the same time because I’m like, “Oh, well, it doesn’t get any better than this.” So I can’t digress into anything bad. I just want to do good work whether it’s big blockbuster films or small indie films. I just want to do good work that I’m proud of.

ANDELMAN: And I was giving you an opportunity to say, “I’d really like to do a voice on ‘The Simpsons,’ or I’m a secret Trekkie, and I’m really hoping to get a cameo on a Trek film” or any of that kind of stuff.

BORTH: David Fincher, call me!

ANDELMAN: That’s good. Alright. And for the men, you brought it up early on, and I have to ask the question. You mentioned that before this, you had done one topless role, and I want to save them some time searching the internet. What movie was that in?

BORTH: I’ll save you all the time, and it’s only on a DVD. It’s not on when it’s on cable. Silent Warnings was actually one of my first films with Stephen Baldwin and Billy Zane. It’s a bunch of aliens, yeah, trying to kill us in a crop circle. Sorry to disappoint, it’s only two seconds. It’s a two second topless scene. And that’s it.

ANDELMAN: Sounds like a Mr. Skin moment.

BORTH: If you want the skin, you tune in to HBO.


© 2007 by Bob Andelman. All rights reserved.