Pro wrestler Bill Goldberg is a fierce competitor in the ring but, as seen here in Atlanta, Ga., with a kitten named Mo, he’s got a soft spot in his heart for furry creatures.

Bill Goldberg, by his own admission, is a man of extremes. The 33-year-old World Championship Wrestling pro is known for signature moves that have names like “the Spear” and “the Jackhammer.”

At 6′4″ and 285 lbs, Goldberg, a former pro football player for the Atlanta Falcons and the L.A. Rams, seems custom-built for his over-the-top profession. But underneath all those muscles, he’s really just a big softy — especially when it comes to animals. In fact, he’s the official spokesperson for the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS). “Deep down inside, a lot of these tough-image guys have pets at home and adore them like they’re their children,” he says. “I can tell you for sure a lot of the guys in the WCW feel the same way.” Lately, Goldberg has had plenty of time to hang out with the pets he loves so much (not to mention long-time live-in girlfriend Lisa Shekter) because of a wrestling-related injury he sustained last December. While attempting to shatter a car window, he severed tendons and muscles in his arm, coming within a centimeter of hitting a crucial nerve. He admits that “the scar from the 190 stitches doesn’t look too good.” A recent return to the ring resulted in another injury. Fans might be surprised about his love of furry creatures, but he says those who know him well have long seen his sensitive side. “I’m an extremist in my difference of emotions,” the surprisingly soft-spoken Goldberg says. “I go from the bottom of the spectrum all the way to the top. People who know me expect nothing less.” He understands he may “shock” the average wrestling fan with his charity of choice but offers, “I’m a human too, just like anyone else.”   The wrestler’s interest in animals was sparked way back when he was a kid in Tulsa, Okla. “All the memories I have of the dogs the family had when I was a kid are all so positive,” he says, adding that it was when his sister gave him his own pup that he “learned the true meaning of the relationship between man and animal.” Then, when Goldberg’s parents — Jed, an obstetrician, and Ethel, a former concert violinist who’s now a professional orchid judge — were going through a tough divorce, he says he turned to his dog for comfort. “My dog Rocky, my Rottweiler, became my best friend at that point,” Goldberg confides.

A few years ago, after achieving so much success as a wrestler, Goldberg figured it was only natural to give something back. So in 1998 his agent, at Goldberg’s request, contacted the Humane Society. “To do nothing with [my success] would be worse than not having it,” Goldberg says. “So I turned my energy into doing as much as I could for the community.” One of the first official duties Goldberg performed for the Humane Society was in February 1999, when he spoke in front of Congress about illegal animal fighting. According to the HSUS’s Pat Ragin, senior director of campaigns and planning, “Capitol Hill was electrified.” In fact, Ragin couldn’t be more thrilled with Goldberg. “He’s very gentle and caring,” she gushes. “Kids love him. He stands and patiently signs every autograph for hours and hours . . . I’ve gotten letters from people who have joined the Humane Society because of him. He really cares about beings who can’t speak for themselves.” Right now, Goldberg says, he’s working on creating Bill Goldberg Pet Adoption Day. While he’s adamant about the importance of getting pets spayed and neutered, he believes, “If you can’t immediately raise awareness about neutering your animals, the No. 1 priority is to get good homes for the ones that are out there.” Goldberg’s other pet peeves include fur (”How bad is it to know that you could have a stuffed animal with cat or puppy fur on it?”) and pet stores (”I don’t think that should be legal. It kills me to walk into a mall and see a dog displayed behind a glass wall.”). His intense love of animals notwithstanding, Goldberg hasn’t taken the plunge into vegetarianism — yet. “I watch what I eat. I stay away from certain things,” he says. “I’m getting towards the idea that it doesn’t taste as good as it used to because I really think about where it came from.” The sensitive man of steel pauses for a moment. “I’m becoming aware of everything now.” — TRACEY MIDDLEKAUFF Posted on June 29, 2000 Copyright © 2000 Time Inc.

The Eyes of Tammy Faye offers an inside glimpse into the life of the former televangelist.

Tammy Faye Messner — formerly Bakker — is a vision in lavender. Her 4′11″ frame is swathed in a full-length skirt and matching sweater set, accented with an eye-poppingly large amethyst ring, purple-beaded bracelet and matching necklace. The whole lot is topped off with a stunning red coif, and she’s been given a boost with the help of 3-inch heels on strappy silver sandals.

But it turns out that Tammy Faye, 58, doesn’t need any kind of a boost. The former televangelist known for crying mascara into rings around her eyes is now the star of a new documentary about her life. The Eyes of Tammy Faye (narrated by female impersonator RuPaul, a fellow extravagant dresser), will be opening across the country throughout August. And on this particular July day, Tammy Faye is greeting reporters at New York’s Essex House, a swanky hotel on Central Park South. She’s generous with friendly greetings and bubbly chit-chat, and her eyelashes don’t look nearly as extreme in person as they do on television.

In fact, Tammy Faye Messner is certifiably cute. And despite all she’s been through, she remains upbeat.

Born in a devout family in International Falls, Minn., she married itinerant preacher Jim Bakker in the early ’60s. They co-founded and served as hosts on the North-Carolina based PTL (Praise the Lord) Club, a 24-hour Christian broadcasting network, which reached over 20 million people in its heyday in the early ’80s and spawned its own Christian theme park, Heritage USA.

But then came the fall. Bakker became involved with PTL secretary Jessica Hahn in 1980, then in 1987 was convicted of tax fraud. Since then Tammy Faye has successfully battled drug addiction and colon cancer. She remarried (Heritage USA contractor Roe Messner) and faced his imprisonment (and release) on a fraud conviction for hiding $400,000 in assets during his 1990 bankruptcy proceedings. After her remarriage, she became estranged from her grown children from her first marriage, Tammy Sue and Jaime, but they’ve since reconciled.

Filmmakers intrigued by her attitude

It’s no wonder Fenton Bailey and Randy Barbato, directors of The Eyes of Tammy Faye, say they have been fascinated by their subject’s never-give-up attitude.

They were also clearly interested in her views. One of Tammy Faye’s unexpected facets is her open-minded attitude about homosexuality, which may seem paradoxical given her strong fundamentalist Christian beliefs. In fact, the film contends that the Christian right was instrumental in the PTL’s downfall, partly because of Tammy Faye’s beliefs.

Personally, she says she believes Christians are far too
judgmental. “The Bible says that our job is not to judge, it’s to
love,” she says. “And I think Christians ought to drop the judgmental
thing and begin to love people.” Besides, Tammy Faye — who cohosted
1996’s short-lived talk show The Jim J. and Tammy Faye Show, with the openly gay Jim J. Bullock — maintains she can never forget the way the gay community came to her rescue during her darkest hours.

“When [current husband Roe Messner] was in prison for two years, the gay community literally took care of me,” Tammy Faye remembers. “They sent me gifts, they sent me money, they sent me pictures of their dogs named Tammy Faye!”

She says her bond with the gay community is only natural: “I, too, have been a minority in that the whole world was against me. I know how that feels. I know how it feels to have people run you down and hurt you.”

These days, Tammy Faye and Roe Messner live in North Carolina. She was spending her time being a grandma — “Mama Faye, they call me” — when the film came along.

“We were gonna settle down and just enjoy life,” she says. “Well,  this movie came along and a bomb exploded in my life, and I’m really doing more than I’ve done in years. Which is fun because I’m not a person to just sit down.”

An added bonus was the bond she developed with the film’s narrator. “We have so much fun,” petite Tammy says of the 6′4″ RuPaul. “We laugh all the time we’re together . . . We talk about makeup, we talk about life, we talk about God, we just talk about everything.”

For the future, says the woman who’s done TV and now film, she’d
like to write books about fashion, style, “looking thin and dressing
thin, and how to make something out of nothing.” She’s also interested
in another TV platform: “I would love to have a talk show where
you bring people on who have been in similar situations and ask,
‘How did you get through it?’ And give people hope that no matter
what we go through life is still fun.”

But on this day she is most looking forward to her upcoming visit
to a New York City gay bar. “I can’t wait to get over there,” she
says. “I don’t drink, though. I will just be drinking Diet Coke.”

But Tammy Faye delivers her biggest surprise when she reveals
that she won’t be shopping on this particular trip to New York. “I have been busy from early morning to late at night,” she says
with a sigh. “But can you believe, Tammy Faye saying she’s too tired
to go shopping?”

— TRACEY MIDDLEKAUFF

Fighting AIDS in Memory of Her Father

British actress Natasha Richardson used to put her money where her heart was when it came to charities– and that was it. But when her father, director Tony Richardson,died of AIDS in 1991, she realized that she wanted to do more than sign a check.

So Richardson, 37, asked the American Foundation for AIDS Research if it could use her help. The answer, of course, was a resounding yes.

Cut short her honeymoon to help

Richardson didn’t just lend her name to amfAR, she started organizing and planning, and she hasn’t stopped since. In fact, she even cut short her 1994 honeymoon with actor Liam Neeson to work on a benefit gala for the premiere of her father’s last film. She and Neeson,who starred together in 1994’s Nell, now have two sons (Michael,5, and Daniel Jack, 4) and Richardson has continued to work steadily as an actress in films and theater. She won a 1998 Tony for Cabaret.

“Whenever it gets to be too much and you think, ‘Aaahhh, I’d rather be with my children or doing anything other than making all these phone calls or writing all these letters,’ then you remember just how many people are sick and dying,” she said in a recent telephone interview. “That just spurs you on.”

Founded in 1985, about two years after attention began to focus on the AIDS epidemic, amfAR has so far raised nearly $166 million for the cause. Funds are raised for AIDS research and prevention,and lobbying for AIDS-related public policy. Though Richardson is not the only celebrity to speak on the organization’s behalf –Elizabeth Taylor and Sharon Stone are also well-known supporters– she is highly valued.

“She is an absolute magnificent pro,” says Jerry Radwin, amfAR’s CEO. Recalling when Richardson hosted amfAR’s 1996 World AIDS Day Luncheon, he says: “It was quite spectacular. She is an incredible presence, so articulate and so clearly motivated. That dedication really comes across to people.”

Richardson will be recognized for her contribution on Nov. 30, 2000, at amfAR’s World AIDS Day Honors. Although the actress says she is “touched and humbled” by the recognition,Radwin maintains that it’s long overdue.

A London native, Richardson belongs to the formidable Redgrave acting clan; she and sister Joely are part of the third generation to pursue the profession. Mom Vanessa Redgrave won an Oscar for 1977’s Julia and continues to act, and dad Tony Richardson,who won two 1964 Oscars (for direction and best picture, for Tom Jones), worked until he died. In fact, Natasha’s first major benefit for amfAR — after a benefit screening of her 1993 PBS filmSuddenly Last Summer — was the 1994 premiere of Blue Sky, her father’s last film, which stars Jessica Lange and Tommy Lee Jones.

Premiering her father’s last film

This particular event served a dual purpose. “At the time, Orion[the studio that produced Blue Sky] had collapsed, so there wasn’t really anyone behind the movie,” says Richardson. “I thought it was important it have an impressive opening, and I knew it would benefit amfAR.”

Most recently, Richardson conceived and masterminded the Unforgettable Fashions of the Oscars dress auction in conjunction with Christie’s auction house. By all accounts, the event was an enormous success,raising over $1.5 million.

“That’s probably the most satisfying thing, to know that the money is going into research to save lives,” she says.

Even though Richardson doesn’t have a major benefit in the works right now — she’s been busy working on her forthcoming films, Wakin’ Up In Reno with Billy Bob Thornton and Never Better –you can bet her work with amfAR will continue.

“I think all people have the responsibility to give back,” she says. “I’ve always thought — I don’t know which gospel it is in the Bible because I’m not very religious — but, ‘Cast your bread upon the water and it shall be returned a thousandfold’ . . . I’ve always felt that very strongly.”

DJ Chick

Miss Bliss is settin’ the groove in a male dominated scene

By Tracey Middlekauff

Ever notice that most DJs are guys? Cara Wolinsky did, but that didn’t stop her from chasing her dream. The 20-year-old Pomona College student, also known as DJ Miss Bliss, started mixing about a year ago, and now she spins regularly. Miss Bliss plays “breaks,” a style of music which she calls “more feminine” than straight-up techno because it uses more organic samples like voice and piano.

We talked to Miss Bliss about what it’s like to be a mixing chick.

react: What made you want to be a DJ?
Miss Bliss: I was dating a guy who was really into jungle. I guess that’s how a lot of girls get into it. But I thought it would be fun to try doing it myself, and it really was. I like playing for people, especially when they’re into the music and dancing.

react: Was mixing hard at first?
Miss Bliss: It’s hard. I guess it’s like any other skill. You mess up and try again.

react: Were you nervous the first time you played?
Miss Bliss: I was, but I just pretended I was in my room. I just looked down at the records and the turntables and pretended there was no one there, so it wasn’t that bad.

react: There’s a lot of sophisticated equipment involved. Was it expensive to get started?
Miss Bliss: Yeah, it’s really expensive. But I think any hobby gets expensive when you get to a certain level.

react: Do you act tougher so people won’t think you’re ‘just a girl’ DJ?
Miss Bliss: I don’t try to be tough. I just try to DJ as well as I can. I do play more feminine-type stuff. It’s not dark jungle or anything. It’s kind of happier–singing and pianos. And it’s hard not to be kind of a girly-girl when you’re playing that.

react: What advice would you give a teen who wants to be a DJ?
Miss Bliss: You definitely need to get decent equipment. If your turntables aren’t good, it’s really hard to have the right control over it, and you’ll just get frustrated. Find a friend who’s into it and use their equipment. Find someone who’s willing to teach you and go get lessons all the time. That’s how I did it.

Originally published in React

By Tracey Middlekauff

NEW YORK — At 78, Dave Brubeck has enough energy to shame a man half his age. The legendary jazz pianist and composer still plays over 80 one-night engagements a year, and says he needs “years and years more” to complete his unfinished projects.

Dave Brubeck

Way back in 1954, Brubeck appeared on the cover of Time magazine, with a feature that announced the rebirth of jazz. In 1960, The Dave Brubeck Quartet, then consisting of Brubeck, Paul Desmond on sax, Eugene Wright on bass and Joe Morello on drums, released their groundbreaking experiment in time signatures, Time Out. The LP and its two singles, “Blue Rondo a la Turk” and “Take Five,” became the first ever million-selling jazz recordings.

More recently, Brubeck appeared at Carnegie Hall in New York City June 20th as part of the JVC Jazz Festival. His continued joy in playing and mastery of his art form were apparent and infectious.

This week marks the release of his 134th recording, The 40th Anniversary Tour of the United Kingdom, on Telarc Records. According to Brubeck, the CD consists of “things from the ’20s and ’30s and things no one’s heard yet. … It has a picture of a double-decker red bus with Big Ben in the background. It’s a wonderful cover.”

From his home in Connecticut — “Do you hear those crows? I’m sitting here watching otter and squirrels and deer!” — Brubeck spoke with Fox News Online about his kids, his career, popular culture, Miles Davis and the current state of jazz.

Fox: How would you compare your place in jazz today to your place in say, 1945 or 1959, in terms of the reception that you get and the impact you have?
Brubeck: You were at the Carnegie Hall concert — and you can’t imagine a much better reception than that — and it’s that way all over the — used to be all over the world, but I’ve quit going to Japan now and Australia and New Zealand and Hong Kong — and I’m more or less touring in Europe. That’s far enough. My next concert will be the Montreal Jazz Festival — that’s a very great festival — and we’ve just played the New Orleans Festival. But I’m trying to cut down a little, but it seems like it’s impossible.
Fox: Why do you still love to perform so much? Do you get something different out of it every time?
Brubeck: Well — like at Carnegie Hall — that was a blast from that audience — that keeps you young, and I think vital, and you introduce a lot of new music. And we had a lot more we could have introduced at Carnegie Hall but there wasn’t time, that’s the thing. I have so much new stuff. I just set 19 Langston Hughes poems — that will be coming out next year, Hold Fast to Dreams is going to be the name of that, it’s on Warner Brothers. …

Fox: What would you describe as some of the advantages and some of the disadvantages of maturing as a musician?
Brubeck: Well, I’m lucky because I feel like I can do everything I did when I was younger — some things a little better and some things not quite as fast — but it’s very close if you listen. If you listen to the new recording from London you’ll hear me playing some tempos that I couldn’t play when I was young. …

Fox: Does the keyboard still hold surprises for you?
Brubeck: Every night. I’m constantly testing myself and pushing myself to do new things.

Fox: What do you feel like you still have to learn?
Brubeck: Oh, I was up at 5:30 this morning working on the Langston Hughes and, if I had my life to live over again, I don’t think I’d catch up with what I haven’t finished. I mean, I need years and years more to finish the unfinished projects in my studio, so every day I rush to try and get these things finished.

Fox: Are “Blue Rondo a la Turk” and “Take Five” double-edged swords? Even though Time Out ended up bringing jazz to a much wider audience, do you feel limited by being so strongly associated with those two tunes in particular?
Brubeck: No — they’re a challenge … young kids cut their eyeteeth on those, and a lot of old guys still can’t play ‘em. You know what I mean? A lot of older guys do not like to play in 5/4, cuz they grew up playing in 4/4.

Fox: And they can’t adjust to it?
Brubeck: Some of ‘em can and some of ‘em can’t, so there are things I wrote 40 and 50 years ago that are still a challenge to me and to other musicians, like a piece called “Tritonus,” the “Salmon Strikes” is another one — they will challenge you whether you’re young or old, and they’re always gonna make a good player really stretch to play them and then improvise on them. Even “The Duke” that I wrote in 1954, you know, that went through every key in the first 8 bars and a lot of guys had a lot of trouble playing that — it wasn’t even easy for me!

Fox: Do you find something different every time you do it?
Brubeck: Sure — you got to if you’re playing jazz.

Fox: Why do you think people have responded so strongly to those tunes in particular? What do think there is about them that would reach out to people who don’t even listen to jazz and still respond to that?
Brubeck: I don’t know. But [Time Out] wasn’t anything that anybody believed in, especially at Columbia records, and they didn’t want to put it out —

Columbia Records ‘Time Out’ was Brubeck’s seminal work

Fox: Yet it became a million-seller—
Brubeck: Yeah — the president of Columbia was a musician named Goddard Lieberson, and he heard ‘em and said ‘That’s the greatest thing you’ve done, we’ve gotta put this out,’ and he had to fight the whole sales department, publicity department … It broke a lot of rules, because it had all originals, on one LP. They’d let you do originals if you put a show tune or a standard in with it — it was all in different time signatures, and they said, ‘People won’t like this, they can’t dance to it’—

Fox: People loved it!
Brubeck: Yeah — (laughs) they were proven wrong — and it had a painting on the cover, and they hadn’t done that with jazz, so I did four in a row after that … one after the other, and we kept doing those odd time signatures. A lotta guys learned to play in different time signatures and they’ll say, ‘You know, I’ve done what I’ve done, and it’s because of that Time Out album.’

Fox: Were other people doing anything similar to that at the time you were getting interested in it?
Brubeck: People — didn’t like me doing that — some people — and said it wasn’t jazz—

Fox: Drummers, especially, I guess—
Brubeck: No … (laughs) Well, some drummers. But not Joe Morello and Max Roach. But there was a meeting up … in Lenox, Mass., and there were the best known jazz musicians, and we were all discussing different approaches to jazz, and somebody brought up what I was doing, and they discussed whether it was good or bad. And the wonderful Dr. Willis James, one of the first Afro-American musicologists, got up at the meeting and started singing an African work song. It was very complicated, and when he finished he said, ‘Who knows what time signature that’s in?’ And I’ll tell ya, it was the best musicians in the country sitting there, and nobody raised their hand. And he said ‘That was in 5/4, and Brubeck is on the right track.’ So that kinda silenced a lot of people, if they were smart enough to know who Dr. Willis James was. ‘Cuz he was taking what I was doing right back to the African roots, which wasn’t always in 4/4 by a long shot.

Fox: [Miles Davis'] Kind of Blue and Time Out came out around the same time. I wonder how you’d compare their respective influence on jazz.
Brubeck: Both of them were very strong at that time, and I think they were very different — they still — when you listen to them, they both are very individual — Miles and I were thinking in our own sweet way.

Telarc Records ‘The 40th Anniversary Tour of the United Kingdom’ is jazz great Brubeck’s 134th recording

Fox: Do you think that different people have been influenced by those two records and have gone in different directions because of it?
Brubeck: Well, if I told you what I really think a lot of people would say I’m tootin’ my own horn — But I’ll give you some facts.’Some Day My Prince Will Come’ I recorded way before Miles — and then he came out with an album called Someday My Prince Will Come — and then Miles recorded ‘In Your Own Sweet Way’ — thank God he did — and he recorded ‘The Duke’ — which were two originals of mine. So we were both aware of each other, and many musicians who played with Miles were influenced by me. … I could tell ya maybe 30 real great pianists that really broke new ground that came out of listening to me when they first started, and a lot of them are admitting it more and more — they’re not afraid to come out of the closet.

Fox: What do you think of the state of jazz today? Is it still vital?
Brubeck: Oh, it’s plenty vital — there’s all kinds of young kids that are 10, 11, 12, 13, that I know that are playing like they’re old men …

Fox: Is there anything that’s come out lately in terms of popular music that you like or find intriguing?
Brubeck: Well, I’ll tell ya, through my kids I get acquainted with some people … My son Matthew is opening for the Rolling Stones in England tonight with Sheryl Crow, do you know her? And last year he played with Jewel, and then he has his own group that’s very avant-garde, and he plays with the Berkeley Symphony when he’s not on tour. But he’s always introducing me to new things. And then my son Chris… who just had his trombone concerto played by the Boston Pops last week — and he just recorded it with the London Symphony Orchestra. And then my son Darius, who has a world music-type group, he just played in Peru for the State Department … so he introduces me to a lot of world music, so through my kids I’m constantly bombarded with all kinds of new things.

Fox: So what do you think of the Rolling Stones?
Brubeck: Oh, they’re a classic old rock group.

Fox: I remember reading in your liner notes to the ‘96 reissue of Time Out you had said you heard a jungle version of ‘Take Five.’
Brubeck: Yeah!

Fox: And I’m really curious first of all where you heard it.
Brubeck: It was on Telarc Records — very weird recording — and when it first came out in England there were great arguments with DJ’s … some refused to play it, some were playing it all the time.

Fox: And what did you think of it?
Brubeck: Oh — it was different! I’ll tell you that!

Fox: One thing that’s been said — sometimes as a criticism — is that your music is happy. What’s wrong with happy? Why is that necessarily a criticism?
Brubeck: My favorite musicians make me smile … if I listen to Louis Armstrong — most of the time it’s just plain happy.

Fox: And he was criticized sometimes for being happy —
Brubeck: Yeah, but who were these critics — one of my friends said, ‘They criticized Louis Armstrong and he had a hit 10 years after he’s dead’ — I think that’s so wonderful. That was when ‘What a Wonderful World’ came out, and here the guy had been dead for 10 years, and he comes out with a hit that just made you feel so good.

Fox: So I guess you probably don’t agree with the myth that to make great art or great music you have to suffer?
Brubeck: It doesn’t hurt, but you rise above it, and that’s what’s great. The blues rises above the suffering — and you can feel both — but sometimes blues are so happy that it makes me smile … These old blues players — I just sit there with a smile on my face.