The Hollywood Exclusive - Column by Marilyn Beck & Stacy Jenel Smith

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The Hollywood Exclusive: Cookin' Coolio Flays Flay/Victor Garber Confident Audience Will Show Up For 'Eli Stone'

Marilyn Beck and Stacy Jenel Smith

Coolio, who rose to fame with his hit song "Gangsta's Paradise" in the '90s, is now turning heads as an unlikely chef with his own online cooking show, "Cookin' with Coolio." As he's moving toward a second season of the show, the rapper has a few choice words for popular TV chef Bobby Flay, although we can't quite figure out why.

"Bobby Flay don't create nothing. He goes around using traditional recipes and recreates other people's s---. He's a copycat," claims Coolio, who admits he's never even met the guy. "I should drag Bobby Flay's cooking out onto the street and stomp on it. That would make good television." Well, hey, we can't argue there!

In fact, fans will be seeing an even more irreverent Coolio this fall as he's teamed up with Oxygen for a new reality show called "Coolio's Rules." Cameras will follow the musician at home as he tries to get his six kids under control by using some untraditional methods of discipline. The show has been a long time in the making. Coolio, who claims he is an open book.

"People have tried to get me on this show or that show. I didn't really want to do a reality show, especially on someone else's reality show," says Coolio of finally agreeing to let cameras follow him around. "Everything I do, you're going to know anyway. Cameras follow me everywhere even when I don't want them around. Especially with the new trend now of TMZ and all these people, you can't do s--- anyway. I figured I'd at least make money off this thing." At least he's honest!

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'STONE' ROCKS: Although "Eli Stone's" first season finale aired back in April to modest ratings and an uncertain future, Victor Garber says he's confident viewers will show up for the offbeat ABC series when it returns Oct. 14.

"I have faith in the public because I think the show is worth the attention," notes Garber, who plays the owner of the firm where attorney Stone (Jonny Lee Miller) practices law -- when he's not busy getting hallucinations that may actually be divinely inspired visions of the future. Garber says his character and Stone are "more enmeshed" this coming season. There's also lots more of the show's signature, George Michael-heavy musicality coming up. And if all that isn't enough to grab attention, "Sigourney Weaver is our first guest star, and Katie Holmes is in the second week, and there's talk of a lot of other interesting guests."

Garber is hoping some of his "Eli Stone" cast mates join him at this Sunday's (10/5) Memory Walk for the Alzheimer's Association in downtown Los Angeles, though the troupe has been laboring long days and nights on the show. The esteemed Broadway, film and television actor lost his mother to the disease two years ago, and his father died of the disease in the '90s.

Alzheimer's "is getting more attention. But until there's a cure, it's not enough. That's the bottom line. There've been 450,000 people diagnosed in California alone, so obviously it's affecting more people," notes Garber. "I was fortunate that I could look after my mother in a dignified and comfortable way. So often the effect on caregivers is devastating. It really is a family disease."

He notes that the Memory Walk is "a really wonderful thing to bring families and friends to -- festive and positive." Luminaries expected to be on hand, besides Garber, include Leeza Gibbons, Bryan Cranston, Shelley Fabares, Peter Gallagher, Lea Thompson, "Cold Case's" Tracy Toms and L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaigarosa.

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INSIDE TRACK: The pop rock band Paramore has produced hit after hit with their album "Riot!," and now that they've finished their tour, lead singer Hayley Williams tells us it's time to rest. "We're going to go home and write a little bit -- work on a new record, perhaps," Williams reveals. "We want to relax, though. It's been a while since we've been home and done nothing." Her band mate, lead guitarist Josh Farro, admits it will be nice to be out of the public eye for a little bit. "Sometimes it's a blessing, and other times you kind of wish you could be a normal person," he says of their newfound fame. "You get recognized places, and people treat you differently. You really find out who your real friends are. But we can't complain. For us it's been easy. It's a fun job."

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BARREL OF FUN: With CBS's summer hit "Flashpoint" assured a second season, cast member Hugh Dillon says he'd like to see some of the real stories he and his peers have been hearing from their real-life Emergency Task Force counterparts in Toronto find their way into the show. "There are a couple of great ideas from things the real guys are doing. Like, they have these competitions where teams of ETF and SWAT guys come from all over the States and Canada and compete in shooting -- top guys against top guys. I've heard the real guys talk about it, and it's hysterical when they go through security: 'Yeah, those are guns. We're cops. We're going to a shooting competition.'"

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With reports by Emily Feimster. To find out more about Marilyn Beck and Stacy Jenel Smith and read their past columns, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.

Copyright 2008 Creators Syndicate Inc.

This news arrived on: 10/02/2008

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