It’s interesting that the N.Y. Times has ran a story about Alec Baldwin‘s backstage temper problems. I’m not saying that Baldwin appears to have issues along these lines and I certaily don’t wish to minimize the difficulty of working with anyone who punches walls, but the upshot is that actress Jan Maxwell so didn’t want to be around Baldwin that she resigned from a Roundabout theatre production of “Entertaining Mr. Sloane”, in which she and Baldwin have been costarring. I wonder how many producers of stage plays or films or TV movies made a mental note after reading this story, to wit: “Hammer is a top-notch talent but think it over before hiring her…perhaps a tad too sensitive, can’t handle the rough and tumble.”

Leonardo DaVinci has an IMDB credit (“painter — Mona Lisa”) for The DaVinci Code.

Tom Hanks has written a tribute to his longtime makeup guy, Dan Striepeke in the New York Times. Dan did Hanks’ makeup on The DaVinci Code, but I’m not quite sure why this piece ran when you get right down to it. Striepeke sounds like a gifted, amiable, very hard-working guy but so was my father in his prime and so are a lot of other people out there right now. (Not a huge deal, but Striepeke isn’t listed on the IMDB credits for the film.) Of course, it isn’t Hanks’ makeup in the forthcoming Ron Howard thriller that has gotten all the attention so far, but his longish haircut. And the guy to talk to about that, according to the IMDB, would be hair designer Frances Hannon.

Mission: Impossible III is not a snoozer. It may not be an ideal repeat-viewing thing (I probably shouldn’t have seen it twice in one day), but it’s faster-paced and easier to follow than the DePalma opener and more engrossing than the Woo.

This is fascinating: Time magazine has discovered and passed along (as of 4.25.06) a comprehensive rundown of websites and various other online p.r. initiatives regarding this film called …wait a minute…written here somewere….Snakes on a Plane!

Michelle Rodriguez is expressing regrets about the factors that led to her Hawaii drunk-driving bust and…I feel funny going on about this but given the temperament and tendencies of most actresses I’ve known or heard stuff about, I’m deeply impressed with MR’s decision to take the slammer over community service. “This has more to do with her street cred than anything,” says Manhattan-based journalist Lewis Beale . “She’s a tough babe from Jersey City, and I’ll bet if she hadn’t turned up in Girl Fight she’d be gang banging or in jail for armed robbery. She’s always struck me as someone who was thisclose to returning to the ghetto from which she came. I remember when James Cagney won an AFI Lifetime Achievement award, he referred to the ‘little touch of the gutter’ that made his performances so real. With Rodriguez, it’s a whole heaping helping of New Jersey crude.” A studio- based publicist adds that “another factor is that she’s a regular on Lost. They could write her out of the show for one week, but more than that might be pushing it. She’s already on thin ice as it is.” And reader Amir Hanif says that “calling her MR is appropriate because she has more cojones than most guys out there…when I read that she took jail time over community service, I thought to myself, ‘This is tough chick and not just a poser.’ Gotta give her props for that.”

“…undeniably the most gut-wrenching and captivating film released this year.” — USA Today‘s Claudia Puig on United 93.

N.Y. Times reporters David Halbfinger and Allison Hope Weiner are reporting that Hollywood divorce lawyer Dennis Wasser is now entangled in the Anthony Pellicano investigation. On a scale of 1 – 10, how sexy is Wasser as a prosecution target and subject of a Times story? Is it just me or is this story starting to deflate somewhat?

Faced with either 240 hours of community service or five days in the slammer in Honolulu over a drunk driving conviction, Lost costar Michelle Rodriguez (“How ya livin’?”) has chosen jail. This is obviously the less spiritual and less nourishing option, but any gainfully employed actress who says “okay, I’ll do time” deserves (and I know this may sound strange to some) a slight tip of the hat. There are intimations of obstinacy in this choice, yes, but also intestinal fortitude.

Hollywood Elsewhere is jetting to Houston today and four or five days at Worldfest, a longstanding local-flavored film festival with interesting shadings. A slight interruption in WIRED postings, yes…but only for a few hours.

An amusing N.Y. Times story by Bill Carter about the creation of Rob Burnett‘s Let’s Rob Mick Jagger series.

Tom Cruise was “at his best, and most unlikable, as the misogynistic self-help guru Frank T.J. Mackey in Paul Thomas Anderson‘s Magnolia,” writes MSNBC’s Eric Lundegaard. “Here’s the fascinating part. As he was being interviewed by the female reporter, and glared at her warily through a big tight grin, the character seemed only a step or two removed from the Cruise character we see promoting his latest film on entertainment shows. That is: spooky.” I alluded to the same thing when I wrote on 4.19 about Cruise’s Ethan Hunt in Mission: Impossible III, to wit: “He’s made Hunt into a kind of mirror image of hard-core tabloid Tom. Hunt is a ‘character,’ yes, but based more than ever on the pumping piston rods of Cruise’s personality. A guy who’s all about focus, juice, intensity, endorphins. Plotting strategy, eyeballing his costars, running for his life (in more ways than one) and turning tomato red in the face. Neck veins! Neck veins!”