When The Blair Witch Project became the monster hit of 1999, Heather Donahue naturally thought she'd be able to write her own ticket in Hollywood. Alas, for a while there, the only ticket she got offered was one straight outta town!

"I was sort of counted out before I even had the chance to show up," she tells TV Guide Online. "All my life, I wanted to be an actor, and then all of a sudden, it wasn't entirely clear that anyone was going to let me be an actor... [because the movie's marketing execs] kept telling people that [the thriller's unhappy campers] weren't actors but were really in this [scary] situation. That wound up being very damaging to the cast."

Ever since, the University of the Arts (Philadelphia) grad has worked double time prove that she was more than a contestant in an especially creepy installment of Fear Factor. (She even slummed it in the Freddie Prinze Jr. clunker Boys & Girls — how's that for suffering for her art!) However, tonight's episode of Steven Spielberg's Taken (airing at 9 ET on the Sci Fi Channel) brings her right back to the realm of the fantastical — kicking and screaming all the way.

Copping to a "paralyzing fear of the genre ghetto," Donahue says with a laugh that her fondest wish is to land a part someday that will do more for her than "solidify my position at the next 10 Comicons." For now, though, "there are those pesky bills to pay. And if you're going to stick with the old genre standby, the fact that it's 'Steven Spielberg Presents... ' makes it a much easier almond-eyed pill to swallow."

Plus, the 27-year-old knew instinctively how to play conniving alien kidnapper Mary Crawford; she's had a lot of practice with that "type," after all. Off duty, she brings to mind the fast-talking funny ladies of Tinseltown's Golden Age, yet prickly femmes fatales "have become something of a specialty of mine," she acknowledges. "I've even gone ahead and dyed my hair dark since clearly I only play diabolical, evil bitches — or at least really grating bitches. No matter what, the bitch through line kind of sticks.

Woof! Winona Ryder ain't the only celebrity in the dog house these days. Last week, Sharon and Kelly Osbourne never showed up at their own book party for Bark at the Moon: The Official Osbourne Pet Book (Pocket Books). An art gallery in West Hollywood was crammed full of stars and their pets — from Backstreet Boy A.J. McLean and his bulldog, Tank, to Survivor vixen Jerri Manthey and her dustmop, Gidget. But Ozzy's ladies were no shows. What gives?

Turns out, the overbooked Sharon was at the VH1's Big in 2002 Awards, where she accepted the "Strange But True" trophy for MTV's The Osbournes. Her guests were disappointed, but supportive due to the matriarch's medical condition. "I would love to meet the Osbournes," said American Pie starlet Shannon Elizabeth. "Sharon's a great lady. But she's only got a few good hours in the day right now, and she's got to take care of herself. That's what's important. She comes first."

Later, one gossipy guest — who dressed his teacup poodle in a blue Burberry cap! — told Party Boy: "You just missed David Faustino from Married … With Children. He left early because his big brown mutt was dragging him across the floor. It kept getting frisky with some of the other dogs!"

Nicole Kidman's astonishing resemblance to Virginia Woolf in The Hours had even her co-stars seeing double. But it wasn't the famous literary figure that Miranda Richardson saw when she looked at Kidman. "She reminded me of a girlfriend of mine," laughs the two-time Oscar nominee. "I was like, 'Oh my God, it's Kate.'"

Richardson — who plays Virginia's sister Vanessa in the highly anticipated film (opening Dec. 27) — believes all the identity confusion worked to her advantage. "I suddenly saw somebody that I had a very particular affinity with," she says, "[which] was good for the sibling thing."

Of course, the sisterly bond between Virginia and Vanessa in The Hours can hardly be called traditional. For starters, in one of the movie's more ambiguous moments, the duo share a passionate smooch. Laughing, Richardson says Kidman was a "fabulous" kisser, adding that the shocking liplock "didn't go on long enough."