Reports of drama on the set of "Brothers & Sisters" began surfacing during cast member Balthazar Getty's affair with British actress Sienna Miller last summer. You'll recall they were caught, by paparazzi, cavorting on the Amalfi Coast with her topless and him a married man, now separated. The scandal is said to have caused Getty's castmate Matthew Rhys — who used to date Miller — to stop talking to him.

But the show's Emily VanCamp paints a different picture. She claims they never let personal issues get in the way of work.

"I think in this business there will always be rumors and people talking. Sometimes it's positive, and sometimes it's negative," notes the former "Everwood" star. "I, for one, try to steer clear from that because I don't want it to affect my work, and I think we all have that perspective. We just let people say what they're going to say, and we just have to go in and do our jobs. That's all we can do. You can't really control what people are talking about."

Not only does VanCamp stay out of drama on set, but she's also adamant about keeping it that way in her personal life as well. After all, we never hear reports of the 22-year-old partying with the rest of young Hollywood.

"I think it's really important to keep your personal life personal. I wouldn't want to become known for what I do in my personal life. Plus, it's probably because I'm incredibly boring," says the Canadian actress with a laugh. "L.A. is certainly not like my hometown or anywhere else I've ever lived. I choose my friends wisely out here, and luckily, I have the most amazing group of friends. All of them aren't in the industry. It's just a very normal group of people. We don't really go to Hollywood clubs. I like to stay home and have dinner parties and watch movies. If we go out, it's to a local pub usually. Going to the L.A. popular places tends to make me sad. I don't really like it."

REALITY GAVE THEM A ROLE: Rapper Coolio tells us one of his reasons for doing the Oxygen reality show "Coolio's Rules" is to help his son, Artis, get into the business — but he'd much rather his teenaged son not follow in dad's footsteps.

"The show is good for business because I've got a new record out called 'Steal Hear,' but it's also good for my son because he wants to be in the business," explains Coolio, who goes on to say his 18-year-old son is already rapping at a much higher level than Coolio was at his age. "I would have rather my son go to Yale or Harvard, but he's got to do whatever he wants. I remember somebody telling me, 'Hey, look here. Ya'll doing all that rap s—- running around here broke. I got a job. I work for the school board.' Guess what? He don't work for the school board no more. I'm still rapping!"

GOING DEEP: "My first reaction was, it scared the bejeezuz out of me," says Clare Carey of her role in Starz' series version of "Crash." "I felt the character was very similar to me emotionally — and I had to deal with kind of all my biggest insecurities and self-doubts. It always felt emotionally treacherous. At the same time, though, it's always more interesting to me to go to a deeper level emotionally, so I was excited."

Playing a woman under multiple pressures, including the fact her husband (D.B. Sweeney) is on the brink of financial ruin, she feels her storyline "deals with where we have gone wrong with the American family. Where we have gone wrong having not enough emphasis on loving each other and having compassion for each other. In this family, everyone pays a high emotional toll." She adds, "Hopefully that resonates with people in a way that won't scare them off."

SOMETHING TO SMILE ABOUT: Dentist to the stars, Dr. Bill Dorfman, who has appeared on "Extreme Makeover," "The Janice Dickinson Modeling Agency" and Dr. Phil's "The Doctors," tells us reality TV has been nothing but good for business. "We get tons and tons of patients because of it. If you see a doctor on TV and you like the way they treat their patients and the work they do, then it's kind of an easy sell," notes Dorfman, who says breaking into TV has been an unexpected treat in his life. "Look, I always knew I'd be a dentist. I never expected all of this other stuff would happen," he admits. "It's fun. I mean, come on, drilling teeth every day. You've got to break it up."

With reports by Emily Feimster.

To find out more about Marilyn Beck and Stacy Jenel Smith and read their past columns, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.

COPYRIGHT 2008 MARILYN BECK AND STACY JENEL SMITH

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