BIG MEN ON CAMPUS
Celebrities, they’re just like us! They have kids. They’re responsible parents. And apparently, they take their children on campus tours of Northwestern. That’s the case for Tom Hanks and Peter Gallagher (if you’re unfamiliar, he’s the blue-eyed, bushy-browed Sandy Cohen from The O.C.). Maybe Meryl Streep recommended the school? Her daughter, Mamie Gummer, graduated three years ago.
Either way, word spread fast when Gallagher was spotted in T.I. Monday shopping for scholarship with his son. “People were all abuzz because he was just so handsome,” says Communication senior Carly Ciarrocchi, who sprinted from the Vertigo office in Norris when she got the news. When another student approached him in the halls, Gallagher stopped and chatted. Hanks was seen making the rounds on a private tour Tuesday, along with wife Rita Wilson, and one of their sons, presumably 17-year-old Chester Marlon Hanks. Students say Hollywood’s favorite everyman was low-key in a three-quarter length coat, facial hair and a pair of black, round-rimmed spectacles. Weinberg Freshman Michelle Chou caught sight of the Oscar-winner in the library. “Hanks wasn’t paying attention. He was straying,” she says. “The wife was really interested and the kid was looking at the scenery.” Other students say Hanks popped into a film class to ask “You guys having fun in here?” before quickly disappearing.
Some were fortunate enough to see both. Communication junior Jonny Gomez caught a glimpse of Gallagher on Monday before having a close encounter with Hanks the day after. After sleeping through his alarm, he tried to get into T.I. through a locked sidedoor. Lo-and-behold, the door opened and Hanks was standing in the doorway. “I kind of stick out my hand and he shakes (it) and I’m kind of dumbfounded,” he says. “And I go, ‘um, I kind of gotta go to class.’ And I ran off. He didn’t look like some movie star walking around campus… (just) a very well-dressed dad.” In both cases, the campus’ public relations team seemed to be caught off-guard. “Tom Hanks, the movie actor?” asked Chuck Loebbaka, director of print media relations, when The Weekly called him. If he did have any information, Loebbaka added, he wouldn’t be able to share it. After all, that’s what blogs are for.
BODY WASH BANDITS
If you were looking in the toiletries section at CVS and wondering where all the Dove bodywashes were, you should have checked behind the counter. There they were, right next to packages of Nicoderm CQ and Marlboro Lites, being kept safe from a rash of soap stealers. “I guess they needed it,” said one clerk who told The Weekly the manager decided to place the product behind the registers. She added that the thefts eventually wore off and the products were restocked on the shelves. She pointed in the direction of aisle two, where there was a full array of products branded with a security label and a number to call “if found at other outlets.” Dove’s line of CreamOil lathers, scented with “jasmine and vanilla” and “cherry blossom and almond,” were all there. Did they ever catch the shoplifters? “A few times,” the clerk said. And were they sorority girls? “No, they weren’t.” Then who? “People in need.” Of what – exfoliating?
IS THIS FAKEBOOK?
Lately, the administration seems to know every time an underclassmen coed has a cocktail. Are they eavesdropping at Lisa’s? Are they reading Greek listservs? Are they lurking on Facebook? Accept requests cautiously-paranoid students have wondered recently whether administrators are gaining intel by peeping their profiles, disguised as new friends. Specifically, one Gabbie Parella of St. Louis has raised eyebrows by friending Wildcats who apparently don’t know her. While 23 friends of her 1,040 go to NU, some have rejected her advances, worrying who is on the other end. (Job recruiter or NU beer police, it wasn’t worth risking their seeing that red cup in your Facebook photo.) One NU student even reported Parella to Facebook authorities as a “fake person,” yet her page is still active. Maybe she’s a transfer.
