Hot for teacher

In spring 1994 I was in New York working on Burton on Burton when a friend of mine invited me along to an early screening of the new Jim Carrey film. It was a work in progress, with many of the special effects still to be finished. Even so, I loved it. I had seen Carrey in Ace Ventura: Pet Detective but I hadn't expected to enjoy The Mask quite so much.

Partly that was because of the presence of Cameron Diaz, a young lady I had no prior knowledge of, and didn't even know her name once the film finished, since there were no credits. But her entrance, in the bank, in that red dress, was the stuff that makes a career, and it burned itself on my brain.



I interviewed Diaz a few months later for Empire and then spent some time with her a couple of years later when she came to London for the second Empire Awards after having starred in Danny Boyle's A Life Less Ordinary. (At the inaugural awards, Boyle had asked me what he could do to help the following year, and I'd said, "Help get Cameron Diaz to come." And he did.) Since then she's remained one of my favourite actresses, even though her choice of roles hasn't always been the best.

Still, I mention all this because I notice in Variety that Diaz has signed on to star for director Jake Kasdan in "raunchy comedy" Bad Teacher and because it's reminded me that I have yet to see her in Richard Kelly's The Box.