For a former child star, Ryan Gosling has made some unconventional show biz decisions. Instead of jumping into a boy band (like his fellow "Mickey Mouse Club" star Justin Timberlake) or featuring in a sappy teen film franchise, the actor, now 30, carefully chose to feature in more thoughtful indie films, working with well-regarded directors to build up his resume as a serious actor.
Those career decisions, presumably agent-guided, worked wonders for the Oscar nominee, who has three critical hit films out this year. His rep's latest suggestion, though? Probably not the best advice he's received.
Appearing on "The Tonight Show" last night, Gosling revealed an interesting meeting he had with one of his agent's team members.
"I ran into my field Lisa Shields last night. She works for my agent now and one of her jobs is to record all my late night appearances," Gosling told hos Jay Leno. "She told me this last night, she I'm trying too hard on talk shows. She said 'You're trying too hard to be cool.' ... I said 'I'm going on Jay Leno tomorrow, what should I do?' She said, 'I don't know, just don't talk. Sit there and don't talk.' And I was like, 'It's a talk show, how do you not...' And then she said, 'Do something weird like sit behind his desk and get him to sit in a chair.'"
Gosling has been tearing up the talk show circuit of late to promote his films "Drive" and "The Ides of March," so there are plenty of instances to which Ms. Shields could have been referring, but our suspicion is that she was nodding at an appearance her client made last week on "Conan."
Assassin cats in Disneyland, anyone?
"There is a belief that Disney has been breeding an army of cats," the star told Conan O'Brien last Tuesday. "And they're not just ordinary cats. They have a special set of skills. They're like commando cats and they live in a barracks -- a cat barracks, I don't know what you call it -- and they live on the outskirts of the park. And at night, when they close the park under the cover of darkness, these cats descend into the park and they eat all the mice. Which is what I love about Disney because they're so weird and they think of everything... But what's so messed up and why I hate them, is that the whole empire of Disney is built on the back of one mouse."
Ryan, we say stick with the weird. Much more fun! And as for your fashion choices? Hey, play the Hollywood everyman and wear something twice. Be bold. Spit in the face of fashion, as you say. After all, you did wear the same white silk jacket throughout "Drive," sticking with your uniform as blood spread higher and higher, and that looked pretty badass.