Jeremy Helligar

Question of the day: Are you still a couch potato if what you’re doing on that sofa doesn’t involve channel surfing with a remote control, spending hours watching videos on YouTube, or simply napping? What I mean to ask is this: Do couch potatoes read, too?

Despite the now-predictable American influence on pop culture here, when I turn on the TV, I’m still never quite sure what I’ll see, other than that it will be something old and something borrowed.

He’s big. He’s green. He’s scary. He’s hideous like The Thing, only with a better complexion. He lacks the sex appeal of Superman and Batman, and if I saw him coming in my direction, I’d pray for a swift, as-painless-as-possible demise.

I’m not sure what it was about her annoying That ’70s Show character or anything she’d done before this year that impressed director Darren Aronofsky…

These are hard times for lovers. Longtime companions may not be endangered, but they’re in danger. Everywhere people are saying that passion doesn’t last. When you fall in love, it might be forever, but at some point, you’ll probably look at your husband, your wife, your lover, and feel frustrated, annoyed, bored, or simply not be turned on.

Nowadays, thanks to spoilers, we’d all know the identity of the culprit before she even pulled the trigger. We’d have spent months reading endless discussion of the cliffhanger and its resolution on internet chat boards, maybe even throwing our own two cents into the ring.

I shouldn’t have been suprised. Outside of Tracy Morgan on 30 Rock, Chandra Wilson and James Pickens Jr. among the rainbow coalition on Grey’s Anatomy, and several other shows that include a black face or two in predominantly white ensembles (True Blood, Private Practice, Glee), prime-time TV lacks a significant black presence.

Chris Brown is having a good week, possibly his first in ages. For about the last year and a half, ever since he brutally assaulted his ex-girlfriend Rihanna, his name basically has been mud — and his sales have been just as desirable.

And what about the famous women — past and present — in Tom Cruise’s life? Nicole Kidman is a fine actress, one of the best, but would she have spent more years on the outskirts of stardom, like her best friend Naomi Watts, if she hadn’t become Mrs. Cruise in 1990?

Then there’s Madonna, 52, whose taste in men, despite a brief fling with Warren Beatty during her Dick Tracy/Blond Ambition era, always has skewed younger. Her first husband, Sean Penn, was two years her junior.

In fact, offhand, I can think of only one living, working, deserving female film star over 50 who acts primarily in English and has yet to score a single nomination: Mia Farrow.

She had me at Get Real. From the moment I first saw her in that short-lived TV series, something about Anne Hathaway moved me. But the feeling didn’t last long. When Get Real was canceled after just one season (September of 1999 to April of 2000), and Hathaway moved on to the movies, I didn’t think she was destined for any particular brand of greatness.

Yes, video did indeed kill the radio star, at least the unpretty ones creating top-notch pop. I can’t think of one major female hitmaker who has emerged in the MTV era who didn’t have sex appeal or great visuals on her side.

Fantasia Barrino needs help. Last week, when she overdosed on aspirin and Ambien, I was hoping it was just an unfortunate accident, an innocent mix up that wouldn’t result in anything more serious than a brief hospital stay. But the incident has been classified by the Charlotte-Mecklenberg Police Department as a suicide attempt,

Do you know what it feels like for a star? I do. Well, sort of. About six years ago, while maneuvering the rush-hour mob scene in New York City’s Rockefeller Center, I was startled by my first and final fan encounter.

Being a judge on American Idol, prime-time TV’s No. 1 show, is nice work if you can get it. And it looks like Jennifer Lopez won’t be. For weeks, she had been on the longlist of “names” — which, at various points, has included Elton John, Justin Timberlake, Bret Michaels, Harry Connick Jr., Chris Isaak, Howard Stern, Shania Twain, Aerosmith singer Steven Tyler, my pet frog and my late grandmother…

As usual, she’s redeemed herself (sort of) with her follow-up single, “Teenage Dream,” the title song from her new album. It’s a slightly more rock-flavored affair that kind of makes me want to fall in lust and hit the beach (though not necessarily in that order). That said, “Teenage Dream” is indicative of my overall problem with the 25-year-old rising star.