Festival Girl Ellis Cooper

No, she does not sing and no, she is not at a festival (well she might be, we do not know). But Ellis Cooper is mighty fine and in a field… enjoy.

Natural Beauty Jessica Alba

If you had a body like Jessica Alba, would you have a no-nudity clause? The A-list actress, best-selling author and supermom opens up about her ‘flaws’ and shares her inspiring views on eating and living well.

“I like a naughty treat as much as the next person, but I stick to neutral sugar” – Alba

 

Guitar Hero India Reynolds

Forget Noel Gallagher, rock with the sexiest leather-clad lass to ever grace a festival stage.

YAMI GAUTAM – BARES HER SHOULDERS & WRISTS

On bikinis, sperm donors, political correctness and hopeless flirting.

The next time your father gives you one of those ‘impossible is nothing’ lines ask him to convince Yami Gautam to pose in a bikini for FHM, or for that matter even for a sequence in Steven Speilberg’s film! In over ten different ways, we coaxed her to say yes to wear bikini, but she refused to budge. “NO. I won’t wear a bikini. Not even for Steven Speilberg. If he ever approaches me for a film, it will be more on the basis of my acting skills, and not on the basis of the two-piece.”

It’s her denial that has kept her away from FHM and those Google pictures searches of her chaste. “I was apprehensive about shooting with FHM, the clothing part worried me a bit. If I shoot with FHM, I should be able to do justice to your content and in some way add to your immense popularity. If I am not able to do that, what’s the point of me being on the cover! I am not comfortable with the bikini image because that’s not what I am. Also, I didn’t want to portray myself as someone who is desperate for being called a ‘hot chick’ because you guys have helped a lot of women break their stereotypes. Being on your cover is of great importance and I didn’t want to take it lightly. So, we had to come to a consensus where you get something hot, and I get to keep my existing image intact.”

That’s for the bad news, the good news is that the 25-year-old isn’t under some lifetime oath to wear clothes that cover her wrists and ankles. “People change so do their opinions, so I wouldn’t really say that I will never wear a bikini, but as of now, it’s a dead NO.” For Now. Yes, we did add the ‘for now’. Yami is not new to the FHM fold, she has been pretty clued to our covers. “I loved every cover of Katrina Kaif. Also, the one that you guys shot with Nargis was brilliant.”

As for work, the Himachal born, Chandigarh bred girl is completely focused, she is busy like never before and is still fine-tuning herself to the slaving life of Mumbai. Infact, she is so busy that this interview of hers was rescheduled thrice from happening at 10.30 am on a Sunday to late in the evening that day and finally happened at 3.45 on a Monday. When we finally spoke to her she was travelling to Pune. “I am now living every word of those interviews that I read of film stars about how Mumbai occupies you completely. I know it sounds like a cliché, but I am never not occupied in something or the other.” Even in her prayers, something that is as much part of her daily routine as rushing from one shoot to another, all she does is pray about getting more and more work.

Yami has come a long way in her life from her initial appearances in television commercials and soap operas your mother watches. She has also gotten way past the stage of thinking being called ‘Yummy is cute’. “Oh God! Calling me Yummy is so cheesy. I am used to of being called Yami to Yummy to Yemen from school days, so I have given up. When I was in school, I would fear my name being announced on the stage because the boys would later take my trip. In fact, a childhood friend called me Yemen, I don’t why, but she did.”

Yet somehow, for someone who made a huge splash with her debut film Vicky Donor she’s had a slightly uneventful couple of years. Her next movie after Vicky Donor, Total Siyappa tanked at the box office, but such is her hold on the audience that they have now moved their attention and expectation to her next release Action Jackson, which co-stars Ajay Devgan, Sonakshi Sinha and Kunal Roy Kapoor.

She hasn’t forgotten how much of her success she owes to VD, “I wouldn’t have been on your cover if Vicky Donor wasn’t my film. Everything that I have today is because of Shoojit. Working with him will always be my priority.” As for other film that she is currently filming, there is no point talking about them because everything has to be protected like Nuclear launch codes, so we picked on her for the flak that she received on twitter for endorsing fairness creams, “Endorsing a fairness product isn’t debatable nor do I need to defend it. I endorse them because that’s my job. Whether a celeb uses a product that he endorses or not completely depends on them,” she shoots us down.

45 minutes down the interview, we asked her something we’ve been itching to for a while – would she date someone who is a sperm donor, only to have her freak out mid question. “I would never date anyone who donates sperms to earn money, might still consider someone who does it for charity. When the script of Vicky Donor was being read out to me, I was just saying ok…ok…okay and even the narrator was giggling all the while. I came back home and I told my mom about the film and even she was like ‘okay’. No one knew how to react, so you can understand why dating a sperm donor isn’t as cool as you think.”

And what are the other kinds of men you will never date? “I can never be with a man who fantasises about Carmen Electra, Cindy Crawford and Pamela Anderson.” This is where the conversation got a bit doozy for us because as you know there is Carmen Electra heating up the front of the book as the Access Girl this month. But then full disclosure is for fools. “Certainly Ben Affleck. If there is an embodiment of how my man should be, it has to be Ben. If you are seriously match making then I would like to take things forward with someone who is a bit different from me, adventurous and open minded, but again, he shouldn’t be a Pam (Anderson) fan,” she says ruling out anyone born in the 80s.

And what about the films that come to her, how does she select them. “Firstly, I look at my character, then the story and then the director.” But shouldn’t it be like story first, then the director and then the character. “Not really. A script may not always be impressive. A film like Barfi, do you think, it would have sounded as promising to the actors on the papers as it turned out to be?”

By the time we finished our chat, she had reached half way to Pune, we were still moping about bikinis and she was talking about how much she’d love to be in a remake of DDLJ. “It’s impossible to imagine DDLJ without him,” she says. We continue to mope about the bikini. Or the lack of it.

Playmate Bernadette

CARMEN ELECTRA – 15 YEARS AFTER BAYWATCH

15 years on since Baywatch, Carmen Electra gets out of our highschool fantasies and into the magazine. Booyah.

Back in 1991, a 19-year-old dancer from Ohio moved to Hollywood to become a celebrity. Like every other bright-eyed and bushy- tailed teenage, hopeful, pitching up in Los Angele’s, with dreams of superstardom, Tara Leigh Patrick was convinced that she was the real deal. Since childhood, people had always told her she was destined for big success, and she believed it.

Tara Patrick was a brilliant dancer and a decent actress and singer. But she had the sort of face – and body – that doesn’t just turn heads, but makes grown men bite their fists. Most importantly, she possessed (in the language of the TV talent shows that hadn’t even been created then) what Simon Cowell would describe as the X factor – that magical aura of superstardom that only a lucky few emit.

Little did Tara know that she’d go on to become such a global megastar that some 20 years later, she’d be appearing as a judge on the world’s biggest TV talent shows, let alone dating the Lord Master of television, Simon Cowell, himself. But before all of that, before the red swimsuit and the Hollywood career spanning more than two decades, Miss Patrick had to change her name. Not her decision, but that of the pop legend, Prince, who first championed the artist who would thereafter be known as Carmen Electra.

GOING SOLO

“I was dancing for Prince in a nightclub called Glam Slam in LA .” says Carmen, like it’s no big deal at all. “Then I had the opportunity to audition for this all-girl group that he was putting together. I didn’t hear anything at first, so I assumed I didn’t get it, and I just kept working on demos. Then I remember receiving a call from him and he said, “I think you should be a solo artist. I don’t think you should be backing anyone up.” I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. It just blew me away for someone like him to believe in me at such a young age, at such an early stage in my career.”

Prince had so much faith in the teenager that once she’d changed her name, he gave her a solo record contract. Her debut album performed unspectacularly, but a star had been born, and from that moment on there was no stopping her. Besides helping make Baywatch one of the most iconic TV shows of all time (more on this later), Carmen has starred in some 42 movies. She has appeared on more FHM and Playboy covers than any other person in the world. She has been in The Pussycat Dolls. She has been married to and divorced basketball player Dennis Rodman and musician Dave Navarro. You name it, and it’s likely that over her 22-year career, Carmen has done it. Hell, she even has a fly named after her (the Carmenelectra shechisme) on account of her ‘splendid somal structure’ (aka banging body).

What is most remarkable is that through this roller-coaster life, Carmen has never really changed who she is. Which, given the accepted commandments of achieving longevity in showbusiness, is perhaps her biggest achievement of all.

ENDURANCE TEST

The first rule of celebrity survival is that you must reinvent to remain famous. Trace a pop-cultural line from Madonna in the ’80s to Gaga and Cyrus today and you’ll find a trend: in order to stay relevant, most female performers have, at some point, undergone a radical metamorphosis. A change in hair colour, in style, in personality. Not selling enough records? Try twerking. Haven’t signed any big movie deals recently? Cut all your hair off. In Hollywood, reinvention is the cure for irrelevancy, an instant tonic for public indifference.

There are, however, a very small number of celebrities who are so pop-culturally iconic, held in such high esteem across multiple generations, that reinvention isn’t necessary. Their appeal is themselves, not whatever their latest look or fad is. Not only does the public not need them to change, the public doesn’t want them to change. Over 20 years, Carmen Electra has stayed true to what made her so adored in the first place. “So badly, throughout my career, I’ve wanted to make drastic changes,” she says. “I’ve wanted to change my hair, my make-up, whatever. But when I’m hired, there’s a certain look that they want and it’s a look I’ve had for a long time.”

Carmen, has never really stopped being relevant. Critics will complain that she only gets jobs because of her looks and her boobs, but the public will continue to watch films she’s in and buy magazines she appears on the covers of.

While models model and singers sing, Carmen is a jack of all trades. She is, as much as anything else, a brand. You realise the extent of this when you talk to her at length – she’s as media-trained and savvy as a politician in an electoral campaign. You get a lot of, “I’m always grateful”s and “It’s important to be true to yourself”s, and it can be hard to really see the real Carmen Electra. It’s the Kate Moss approach: don’t say anything too opinionated, and you can’t piss anyone off.

But regardless of what she says in interviews, people will form an opinion and, in the Twitter age, this means putting up with plenty of abuse along with the praise.

“I usually stay away from Twitter because I feel like I want to do what I want to do and, after a while, when you’re constantly reading criticism, that can affect you.”

Does it affect you?

“I try not to let it. I want to be myself, I always want to be myself. I don’t want to change.”

Do your famous friends see what people are saying about them on Twitter?

“I have friends in the business and they read every single comment and they’ll be sad about it. I say, ‘Just don’t even pay attention. You’re part of social media, post what you want.’ Obviously, I really want to connect, especially on Instagram, and I do read some comments just so I can stay in the know, and connected. But it can be hard.”

LIFE BEGINS AT 40

At 41, Carmen is officially the oldest Access Girl in FHM’s history – not that she looks it. Is

it harder modelling in your forties than in your twenties? “I feel more comfortable now,” she says. “Less nervous. I feel like I’m in a really good place in my life and just being in that space makes me feel sexier. FHM has supported me throughout my career.

“The secret to being sexy starts on the inside. I think it’s all about embracing yourself. I love being on shoots because you can get into the fantasy of it all. I love getting into new outfits, stuff I wouldn’t normally wear.”

Of course you can’t discuss outfits with Carmen Electra without bringing up that red swimsuit. The one that made her – as well as co-stars Pamela Anderson and Yasmine Bleeth – a global pop-culture icon. “I still have the red swimsuit,” Carmen proudly says of her famous Baywatch one-piece. “The whole Baywatch experience was just crazy, because it was such a new phenomenon at the time. It was really exciting and I learnt a lot on that show.”

Did she have to run in slow motion in the audition? “No, but I had to put the swimsuit on. I was really nervous. And then it all got a little weird: we all had to swim. It was definitely the most unusual audition I’ve ever done!”

Unusual it might have been, but Carmen nailed it, got the part, and went from being bit famous to really bloody famous – at its peak, Baywatch pulled in a global audience more than one billion. These days, she gets recognised so frequently that she has to go Disneyland in disguise. “I was there recently – I love roller coasters – but I do get approached a lot for photos, so I have to throw on a snapback and glasses and try to blend-in by dressing super casual.”

‘Super casual’ isn’t a look that Carmen Electra embraces in most of her cinema performances. Across the spoof movie franchise (she’s starred in Scary Movie, Date Movie, Disaster Movie and Epic Movie), Carmen sends up not just the genre but herself, playing the part of the ditsy, pillow- fighting, sexed-up bimbo that many people assume she embodies in real life. “I’ve just always loved comedy,” she says. “Even when I was a little kid, I loved to make people laugh and act stupid and do loads of silly things. So it’s fun to do spoof movies because you can be really silly.”

After auditioning for Scary Movie, the casting agents were so impressed, they rewrote the role to fit around her. “Once I got the part, they tailored the dialogue around me and my personal life a little bit, which was awesome,” she admits. “I think sometimes you can be really critical of yourself, so being part of those parody movies with that humour is a really nice balance to all that.”

Now that she’s conquered the worlds of modelling, film and television, what’s next for Carmen Electra? Well, there’s the perfume industry (she’s launching a new fragrance later this year), as well as a second stab at the charts with the release of a new record some 21 years after her first… Not to mention the small matter of FHM’s 100 Sexiest. “Obviously it would be great to win, but there have been so many amazingly sexy girls in FHM over the years. My vote goes to Beyoncé – she’s just been so hot for so many years and she looks better than ever now. But it’s always fun to see how high you get on the list!”

Brazilian Miracle – Gabriela Milagre

There’s something about Gabriela Milagre. Tall, with deep brown hair and eyes, she’s from Divinopolis, Brazil, a city named for its divinity. Gabriela made her debut in Kiel, Germany, where she was a student of physics at university. After a stint as Cyber Girl of the Month, she made headlines as Miss August 2012 in the German edition of Playboy. ‘Milagre’ is Portuguese for ‘miracle’, and with her full lips, smoky eyes and dusky skin, smooth and shining from head to toe, that’s precisely what she is.

The Professional – Kerry Washington

Kerry Washington never had the intention of becoming an actress.

The Bodies We Want

OK … SO THE FOLLOWING 22 BODIES ARE AWESOME AND MESMERIZING.

But equally stunning? What we learn about them. Spindly swimmer Michael Phelps? He’s got stubby little legs—a 30-inch inseam on a 6-foot-4 frame. Boxer Bernard Hopkins? Gets facials. Gets his nails done. Got a pedicure the week before our shoot. Cliff diver Ginger Huber? Afraid of heights. Receiver Larry Fitzgerald? Shy. Likes leaving his shirt on at the pool. And daredevil Travis Pastrana? Thus far this year, he’s broken his tibia and fibula, dislocated an ankle, suffered a few concussions and broken ribs. And that’s a good year. So enjoy the bodies. Be awed by the bodies. But try to read the words. Because we do, in fact, interview them too. In case you hadn’t noticed.

Venus Williams – Larry Fitzgerald – Coco Ho – Nigel Sylvester – Megan Rapinoe – Travis & Lyn-Z Pastrana – Serge Ibaka – Prince Fielder – Ginger Huber – Angel McCoughtry – Michael Phelps – Danyelle Wolf – Omar Gonzalez – Aja Evans – Thomas Berdych – Amy Purdy – Bernard Hopkins – Marshawn Lynch – Jamie Anderson – Hilary Knight – Jimmy Spithill

Escape with Hercules star Irina Shayk