Jake Gyllenhaal's culinary skills are legendary. One can barely think of such foodstuffs as pickled onions, starbursts, strawberries, cilantro, risotto, iPads and meatballs without thinking of Jake. In fact, he is one of the few people in the public eye who would be able to construct a plate of food and a piece of garden furniture from the same ingredients. This week, Jake appeared on The Chew, cooking alongside old friend and TV cooking partner Mario Batali. If you live in the US you can watch the clip here. Wouldn't it be great if internet files could be freed from borders?
Update! As you can see, there is now a version for us all. Thanks so much to Stephanie!
Thank heavens for IHJ. Looks like Jake's beard is coming on a treat. Anyone with a beard like that who eats spaghetti is a brave man (or woman, I don't want to be sexist).
Jake appeared on the Leonard Lopate radio show this week with fellow If There Is... cast member Brian F O'Byrne. I'm delighted to say that the interview is now available to listen to.
And finally...
Jake's charity work for New Eyes for the Needy (as well as his love of food) is being recognised on 29 October by a celebratory dining event that you can go to as well if you live near NYC and have $500. Not only does the money go to a good cause, but you can also see Jake, as well as Peter, Maggie and Top Brit Scout Bear Grylls, and, one hopes, get some good nosh too. Details are all here.
If any of you go, please remember to bag me some pudding.
There is also another one of those famous Jake auctions.
Apologies for the lateness of the post today. It took a while to dig out the blog from under the piles of chocolate wrappers, whiskey bottles, paper hats, cranberry sauce, double cream and nut roast but I found it in the end. I hope everybody had a good day yesterday and is today enjoying the recovery. But no rest for Jake Gyllenhaal. Jake has to finetune his fitness prowess in order to wage ping pong war on some of the legends of table tennis - Mario Batali and David Schwimmer.
On 13 January, Jake shows that he continues to support writing programmes for the young by participating in the charity 826NYC's 'Star-Filled Table Tennis Tournament to Raise Money for its Free Writing and Tutoring Programs for Children' at SPiN New York. And anyone can pre-register for one of 36 places available at the tournament and 'the more funds you raise, the better chance you have of paying your way to a trophy—and playing one of our ping-pong pros (New York Ranger Sean Avery, chef Mario Batali, author Dave Eggers, actor Jake Gyllenhaal, actor Catherine Keener, actor Mike Myers, actor David Schwimmer, New York Times crossword editor Will Shortz and author Sarah Vowell)!' Full details here.
You also know what this means? A renewed outbreak of Paddlegate is assured as we see Jake wield the bat once more. Oh yes...
This Christmas, we have had our first proper look at four of the five sets of Prince of Persia lego that we will be spending considerable amounts of 2010 playing with. Who needs PoP in 3D when you can go home and reenact your favourite scenes. Not only do we have camel lego, we also have bare-chested ostrich-racing Jake Gyllenhaal lego. I don't know how I managed without it. The five sets are 'The Ostrich Race', 'Battle of Almut', 'Quest Against Time', 'Fight for the Dagger' and (not pictured) 'Hassasins Hide Out'. I'll take the lot and, before you know it, I'll have my own Pinewood Studios, complete with escaped scorpion lego.
Includes pictures from links and IHJ. Thanks to BBMISwear for the ping pong heads up!
The first time I saw Jake Gyllenhaal I couldn't believe that he was even more stunning in real life than in photographs or even on the silver screen. But he was. And it wasn't a fluke. Each time it hit me anew. It turns out I'm not the only to insist that there is a radiance about Jake that will always make him stand out, even among other movie stars (and I have seen a few for comparison - including Brad Pitt when he was over in the UK filming a few years ago). Lawrence Toppman, the movie critic for The Charlotte Observer has listed the movie stars that have made the biggest impression on him for a range of reasons and Jake is there as the 'most stunning'.
'Most stunning: Jake Gyllenhaal. Virtually all actors look better onscreen than in life. Gyllenhaal, chiseled and magnetic, is a rare exception. His female counterpart would be the jaw-dropping Bryce Dallas Howard.' Others include 'Most thoughtful: Ang Lee. The soft-voiced, slow-spoken "Crouching Tiger" director wasn't afraid to look into his past or his psyche to figure out why he has one of the most diverse, satisfying bodies of work in film.' By contrast 'Most stuck on himself: Ben Kingsley. Insisted on being called "Sir Ben" and explained in finicky detail the differences between being a classically trained actor and an actor with classical training. Not exactly Gandhi, eh?'
So without doubt (and no bias here, of course..), Jake is the most stunning of film stars, but what is he like? At the very beginning of March, the LA premiere of Zodiac took place behind closed barriers at Paramount Studios and without the presence of Jake. But, even in NYC, Jake may have felt his ears burn. In the first video (which also features interviews with John Carroll Lynch, Chloe Sevigny and others), Robert Graysmith is asked what he thought of Jake's performance: 'I love Jake's performance! Am I the luckiest man in the entire universe?'
In this second video, Chloe is asked if she kept Jake's character in check: 'I tried. He was really a sweet boy, very young, surprisingly, but he had a great spirit and enthusiasm and professionalism and that's all you can hope for... Not an inflated ego, he was actually very... a really nice boy.'
Dining with the Gyllenhaals
According to a sighting, Jake, Maggie, Peter, Ramona, Naomi and Stephen had dinner together on Christmas Eve at Babbo's in Greenwich Village in NYC. Babbo's is run by family friend Mario Batali who is a big believer in having a family experience around the dinner table while enjoying Italian food (with local, handy ingredients) and fine Italian wines. I should point out that I'm writing this post at dinner time and I have yet to eat...
The desserts at this restaurant are legendary so I've been through the menu and selected my favourite: 'Chocolate Hazelnut Cake with Orange Sauce and Hazelnut Gelato $12'. For main course it would have to be the Grouper but without the pancetta (not a very veggie or fishy menu). The wine philosophy speaks to my heart - it encourages sampling and discovery. And there are almost 2,000 to choose from. The wine list is reason enough to make a reservation - a month in advance, to the day.
And finally...
This picture below is irrelevant but I was reading a review of Chris Rock's current tour of the UK and it reminded me of this photograph.
We all know that Jake Gyllenhaal likes his food, not that it ever seems to put an extra pound on him, and that his particular favourite is Mario Batali, at whose restaurants Jake and Maggie have frequently been sighted. Jake, with various Gyllenhaals even appeared on Batali's TV food show twice during 2003. I remember hearing that he was also on it a third time but I may be wrong. Anyway, you may recall that it was on this show that Jake uttered the immortal lines 'Why is there so much fear in making risotto?' and 'Is it called bench flour because it's made out of benches?'
I've said before that this is a small world and sure enough... Jake's also been in a film with Gwyneth Paltrow whom, it turns out, is another good friend of Batali's and is to co-host a PBS food show with the chef later this year. Gwyneth is to spend much of October and November driving around Spain - she speaks fluent Spanish - with Mario. Gwyneth won't be eating any of the jambon, but it made me wonder if Jake's famous pig quote from GQ might have something to do with Mario's liking of roasting fresh pig for his friends. Just a thought.
Here is the link to the Italian dessert episode of Mario Batali's show which featured Jake, Maggie and their mother Naomi.
And just so I can say yet again 'It's a small world', it turns out that Gwyneth is appearing in the spring in Iron Man as the love interest of the superhero played by none other than Robert Downey Jr. Robert said to Gwyneth: 'Don't you want to be in a movie that people see'. As usual, Robert talks sense but for the life of me I just can't visualise Robert in that iron suit.
Red carpet Jake
Two new (to me anyway!) short videos have turned up which show off Jake to perfection on the red carpet. The first is from the SAG awards held in January 2006, for which Jake was nominated for best supporting actor but lost out to Paul Giamatti of Cinderella Man. In the interview, Jake is asked what he and Heath actually thought about Brokeback Mountain when they saw it all the way through for the first time. They had no idea and Jake says that the way in which other people - ie, you and me - saw the film defined their response. I did like this video, not least because at one point it shows an interview with George Clooney in the corner of the screen which you'll be unable to watch because of the distraction of seeing Jake revel in the whole red carpet experience.
The other interview comes from the New York City premiere of Jarhead and Jake is in an altogether different mood. As the smitten interviewer says 'My heart went pitter patter for the blue-eyed dreamboat', asking how anyone could not fall for the cute Jakey G. Jake seems susceptible to such an approach because he gave her a kiss and told her he would search out that santa hat and put it in the post for her. Mimicking his posing for the cameras, Jake says 'I give everybody a little bit of something.' One of the little poses is Jake's trademark 'tongue sticking out look', which just goes to show that Jake is well aware of the deadly affect of this 'weapon' and that it might not always be done unintentionally.
Wizard World and Dark Knights
It looks like tonight some lucky people may get the first glimpse of scenes from The Dark Knight and maybe even a chance to see some of the cast themselves as director Christopher Nolan will guest on a panel at Wizard World Chicago. The whole event is taking place in top secrecy with anything even the slightest bit electronic banned. Fans will have to line up all day for one of the tickets. I wonder how it went...
