Before landing his grooming-expert gig on Bravo's Queer Eye for the Straight Girl (Wednesdays at 10 pm/ET), Robbie Laughlin was just another struggling actor. Sharp-eyed TV aficionados may recall the 33-year-old pretty boy — who appeared last year in AMC's Gay Hollywood documentary — from his many guest-star gigs. In fact, Robbie almost scored his big break way back in 1994, when he did an episode of Family Matters that went terribly wrong. We'll just let him tell it...

"I was Steve Urkel's school nemesis, Dexter Thornhill," Laughlin tells TV Guide Online. "It was supposed to be a recurring role and I was really happy. It was really funny and I had such a great time doing it. Rumor has it Jaleel White, who played Urkel, was a little jealous of the attention I got and I never recurred again.

"The writer who wrote my part was fired as well, from what I understand," he goes on, chuckling. "That's what folklore says. Jaleel and I have never talked since."

Laughlin's illustrious pre-Queer career also includes other smaller but memorable roles. "On Cybill, I played a vapid, vacant, stupid model," he recalls, "and on Caroline in the City, I played a drag-queen prostitute, which was fun — and not far from life!"

When you have as distinctive a screen presence as Samuel L. Jackson, it's difficult not to get typecast in certain kinds of roles. But the 56-year-old actor has managed to circumvent lazy casting agents.

"This movie" refers to the new sports drama Coach Carter, which hits theaters on Friday. Based on a true story, it follows a no-nonsense high school basketball coach named Ken Carter (Jackson), who locks his undefeated team out of the gym until they improve their grades.

To prepare for the role, Jackson spent some time watching b-ball with the real Carter. "I actually first met him at a high school basketball game," he remembers. "We sat there and watched the game and commented on the players and talked about his philosophy while he was trying to make his kids go to class.

"What happens with some of these kids is they become special, to the point where they get scholarships to play college basketball and someone needs to be there to emphasize the fact that they need to get that education," Jackson explains. "Last season, out of the 72 teams that were in the NCAA basketball tournaments, only two of them had positive graduation records. You've got thousands of kids who play college basketball and there are only 300 slots in the NBA. So it's important you take advantage of the fact you've been given a four-year education."

Next up for Jackson is In My Country, in which he stars as a journalist who travels to South Africa to cover the Truth and Reconciliations Committee. Along the way, he romances a poet played by Juliette Binoche. "I've never gotten to have a real on-screen romance with anybody and they told me I'd be having one with Juliette. I was like, 'I can do that'."

And, of course, he's also appearing in the final chapter of the Star Wars trilogy. Can he offer us any hint of what to expect? "Sure," he says with a straight face. "It opens on May 19."

How's this for a Hollywood believe-it-or-not? Cellular and Phone Booth scribe Larry Cohen is phonophobic.

"Telephones are the scourge of modern existence," Cohen tells TV Guide Online. "They bring this voice from nowhere into your life — that can be frightening. Anybody can call you.

"When I start to work on a script," he adds, "I take the phone off the hook and put it in a drawer until I'm finished working. I don't want my train of thought interrupted. Now that everybody's got a cell phone, there's no privacy or peace... [there's] people on phones in the car, in restaurants, even in public rest rooms! That's why I don't have a cell phone — I'm afraid someone might call me."

The 66-year-old veteran writer and director, whose maverick movies include the killer-baby picture It's Alive and The Stuff (about a lethal low-cal dessert), has a knack for finding the dark side of everyday things we take for granted. He hasn't yet worked up a script about T-Mobile Sidekicks, iPods or PDAs, but he's considering it. "They're a little too high-tech for me," he admits. "When I learn a bit more about the way those other things operate, I'll probably get around to them."

In the meantime, he's scripting two other telephone-related thrillers, one involving FBI wiretapping and the other about an answering machine that records murders. During his off time, he's busy cursing those pesky telemarketers who always catch you at exactly the wrong time. How about a movie about a serial psycho who targets them? "That would be a good idea," he wryly agrees. "Everyone would sympathize."