The It List (Entertainment Weekly)

06.25.99

Scott Speedman

Age: 23

Why him? It's easy to see why Felicity Porter stalked him across the country last fall. Not only does the London-born Speedman have a face that would make Narcissus jealous, but as Ben, the hunky screwup on The WB's "Felicity," he displays such a laconic vulnerability that by season's end viewers were ready to follow him anywhere too. He's further boosting his budding sex-symbol status by winning the role vacated by Brad Pitt (some say both on screen and off) in the upcoming karaoke comedy, "Duets," costarring Gwyneth Paltrow. "It was intimidating," says Speedman of replacing Paltrow's former beau. "But it was a good role for me."

Work habits "On ["Felicity"'s] soundstages I like to take off and run around before they roll the cameras, just to wake up. They get frustrated because they can never find me. But by the end of the year they got it down to a routine: They'd ring a bell, and I would run in right before they yelled, 'Action!'"

Can't work without "Coffee. Sometimes a triple Venti latte from Starbucks."

Unlikely source of inspiration "I walk a lot...up and down the street with my Walkman on at weird hours of the night. I don't know why. Nobody walks in L.A."

Who'd star in his biopic? "James Van Der Beek."

Next? Playing an ex-priest-turned-cab driver in "Duets," and "Felicity"'s second year. And, for the record, not even he knows the answer to the season's best cliff-hanger: Ben or Noel? "I have no idea [who Felicity went with]. Honestly," says Speedman. "I went and asked, and they wouldn't tell me--or they didn't know." Guess who we're rooting for.