Ben Affleck: Jennifer Lopez was bad for career

Ben Affleck has finally dropped the bomb about his time with Jennifer Lopez, saying that dating her was not the greatest decision he's ever made. Actually, we'd think Reindeer Games would top that list.

"I was no longer in control of my life," he told Contact Music. "I thought I wanted certain things, but I didn't. I got lost. I felt suffocated, miserable and gross. I should never have gone down that route or got sucked in to all the publicity."

All the negative press from 2002 to 2004 made life difficult he says. Even more difficult than making Gigli together?

"I was typecast as myself. Too many people weren't getting past what they read about me. That was damaging. I can tell from experience it's bad for you, and bad for your career. So I took a break, went away for a while and let things calm down."

By letting things calm down, he means no longer working steadily and marrying Jennifer Garner, with whom is is very happy to have two children.

"Work has taken a back seat. My job is not as important as it was. Saying that having a family changed my life is a cliche. But it's true -- it re-arranged my life and made me see clearly."

With any luck, it also helped cure that awful mouth-breathing thing he does.

[Photo: Bennifer in 2003. Getty Images]

Mel Gibson returns to the screen in The Beaver

Mel Gibson's return to the big screen sure says a lot about the 53-year-old's frame of mind lately. At least, we can read plenty into it.

Variety says Gibson, who is expecting a baby with mistress/girlfriend Oksana Grigorieva -- is going to be the star of The Beaver, a new drama directed by Maverick co-star Jodie Foster. The flick is about "a depressed man who finds solace in wearing a beaver hand puppet," Mel Gibson returns says.

A guy who goes looney tunes and begins talking to his own hand? That sounds like our Mel, all right. Shooting starts in September, but it's possible Gibson has been training for years.

[Photo: Getty Images]

Brad Pitt's Moneyball may still be coming

That $50 million screen adaptation of Michael Lewis' book Moneyball starring Brad Pitt may have been shut down days before production was slated to begin, but don't count it out yet. Unlike the Oakland Athletics, who are pretty much done for the season.

The New York Times says The West Wing creator Aaron Sorkin has been hired to rewrite the script, which Sony took exception to because it was too much like a documentary. That's tough, since it is a nonfiction book about a baseball team's financial strategies.

Sony Pictures hopes to add on producer Scott Rudin, who was behind such light-hearted fare as There Will Be Blood and No Country for Old Men. The Times says if the Sorkin rewrite goes as planned, Moneyball will be ready to shoot in the fall. At least Pitt would still be involved -- unless he doesn't like the new script.

[Photos: Getty Images]

Patricia Arquette not divorcing Thomas Jane

Maybe there is a higher power after all, because Juice* fave B-list actor Thomas Jane is still married, thanks to wife Patricia Arquette calling off the divorce dogs. Would it have anything to do with his new HBO series Hung?

TMZ says Arquette on Thursday filed papers asking that her January divorce petition be dismissed. She had retained high-powered attorney Laura Wasser, so you know she meant business.

Maybe this whole thing was actually about Jane finding work. That is to say, his turn in The Mist was great and all, but they gots to pay the bills! Besides, he was seen hanging out with family members Alexis, Rosanna and David Arquette at the Hung premiere back in June.

[Photo: That's him with Rosanna and Alexis on June 24. Patricia must have gotten his shoes. Getty Images]

Morgan Freeman marrying his granddaughter?

Ever since Morgan Freeman's wife Myrna kicked him out and said she wanted a divorce, we've wondered what happened. But we never imagined it was because the 72-year-old was planning to marry his 27-year-old step-granddaughter -- whom he has allegedly been seeing for 10 years. Ugh.

We'll hedge our bets considering the source, but the National Enquirer says that Freeman intends to wed E'Dena Hines, the granddaughter of Morgan's first wife, whom he raised with Myrna since Hines was a child.

"Morgan has led her to believe that he wants to marry her," a source told the rag. "Becoming Mrs. Morgan Freeman has been E'Dena's goal."

As if all this isn't creepy enough, the Enquirer points out that Morgan and Myrna had an open marriage, and that he was having an affair with a former teacher named Mary Joyce Hayes during the same period he was with E'Dena. If it's even partially true, this is adultery on a Shakespearean level.

[Photo: Getty Images]

Jason Bateman had to give up drinking, drugs

Jason Bateman was no Charlie Sheen, but he tells Details magazine that he was known to head out for a party or two, and it nearly ruined his marriage. More than Teen Wolf Too?

Bateman's life was like being in "Risky Business for 10 years... I'd worked so hard that by the time I was 20, I wanted to play hard," he said. "And I did that really well."

Apparently his wife Amanda Anka (daughter of Paul) curbed that when they wed in 2001, but after a year of his nights out, she demanded a change.

"I was never at the place where rehab would have been appropriate," Bateman said. "Booze was what would make me want to stay out all night and do some blow or smoke a joint or whatever, so shutting that off was key. It's like ketchup and French fries — I don't want one without the other."

The wake-up call, however, was when Anna went to a Mexico for a planned Christmas vacation without him.

"So that's the moment," he tells the magazine. "Do you want to continue being great at being in your twenties, or do you want to step up and graduate into adulthood?"

Wow, he must have really channeled those days when he played that creepy guy in Juno. What range!

[Photo: Getty Images]

Arnold Klein denies giving Michael Jackson drugs, being the father of his children

Michael Jackson's dermatologist, Dr. Arnold Klein, has denied prescribing any sort of drug for the late pop star, or of being the father of his kids. And here we thought we'd get through the whole day without more MJ news.

"All I can tell you is, to the best of my knowledge, I am not the father of these children," Klein said on Good Morning America about those rumors, which first showed up on TMZ. "I can't answer it any other way. I don't want to feed any of this insanity going around."

Speaking of feeding insanity, he also says he had nothing to do with the alleged over-prescribing of drugs by doctors, which may have attributed to Jackson's heart attack.

"I didn't give him this crap they are talking about," Klein said. "I've never prescribed Oxycontin in my life. How am I going to prescribe Diprivan when I don't understand how to use it?"

He also said that he is not one of five doctors supposedly under investigation in California over those allegations.

"I am not even under any examination by the police as one of those individuals," he said. "I have not been examined by anyone. I have not been contacted by the police in Los Angeles."

So that should settle everything, right? Because whatever people say in TV interviews is obviously 100 percent the truth, right? Right?!?

[Photo: Getty Images]

Shauna Sands cheated on Lorenzo Lamas with his 18-year-old son

Lorenzo Lamas is no stranger to daytime drama, but even we couldn't make up the reason why he left former Playboy model wife Shauna Sands (his fourth, by the way). It seems mom was cheating on dad -- with then-18-year-old son A.J. Lamas! How Oedipal!

"Shauna came on to A.J.," a source told Star about the reason for the couple's 2002 divorce. "It was the ultimate betrayal. Lorenzo had no idea; he was in the dark about the whole thing."

Of course, this is all a carefully orchestrated media blitz to get you to watch the new reality show the Lamas family is shooting for E!, but still!

"He thought Shauna was acting like a mom to A.J.," the source added. "He had no clue that she was his son's lover!"

Thanks for taking all the drama out of it, Star. Now we don't have to watch, unless we want to know exactly how many months this whole sordid thing went on. Besides, our TiVo is too full of Denise Richards episodes to record it.

[Photo: Shauna and Lorenzo signing autographs in 2003 -- after the big divorce. How can he sit so close to her? Getty Images]

Kate Winslet was happy to be stark naked

If you got an eyeful of Kate Winslet in her Oscar-winning role in The Reader, she wants you to know she's glad, since being nude for the role was no biggie.

"If people are noticing my boobs in a movie and saying they do what real boobs do, then that's great," she says in the latest issue of Harper's Bazaar. But there's an expiration date for everything.

"I'll be 34 in October. I can't keep getting away with (nudity)," she says. "There was so much of it in The Reader because the story required it, but people have seen enough of my bum and my boobs. I have to put them back."

To what does she owe her longevity in an industry that shucks actresses like ears of corn? Being careful: "When everyone was out getting plastered, I didn't do all of that. I was working. I was doing life," she adds. "Now that I look back, I feel very lucky. I've never taken drugs, never been offered cocaine."

Wow, always taking off her clothes on camera and drug-free -- what a role model for today's young starlets.

Lindsay Lohan turned down The Hangover role

How many people still care about Lindsay Lohan? That's what we thought. Too bad she didn't make things any easier by reportedly turning down a role in hit comedy The Hangover. Too busy stealing tanning formulas, perhaps?

The 23-year-old could have been Jade the stripper after director Todd Phillips asked her, but she said the script "had no potential," Us says. Apparently LiLo and Phillips share an agent, but that didn't matter: "The agent tried hard to get Phillips to consider her, and when he finally agreed, Lindsay said she didn't like the script," a source told the mag. Heather Graham thanks her, though.

By no potential, that means more than $200 million at the box office thus far. That's a lot of eBay Maseratis.

[Photo: Getty Images]