Throwing Dwayne Johnson across a room isn’t easy.

Andy Fickman learned that the hard way. The director of Race to Witch Mountain, out today, searched for weeks to find an actor who could toss the 6-foot-4, 250-pound hulk across a stage.

“You wouldn’t believe how far down we had to go into Central Casting to find someone big enough to rough Dwayne up,” Fickman says. “We were shopping for thugs. Finally, we just told Dwayne that when the actor grabs him, he may have to leap a little.”

That, Johnson can do.

Yet he finds himself moving toward a brand few would have thought possible five years ago: family-film star.

He has given up wrestling. He no longer goes by “The Rock.”

Instead, he has been starring in family-geared movies such as 2007’s The Game Plan and last summer’s Get Smart. He appeared in the Disney Channel’s Cory in the House and is hosting Nickelodeon’s Kids’ Choice Awards on March 28.

After Mountain, a reboot of the 1970s Disney franchise, he’ll star in the kid-friendly comedy Tooth Fairy and the animated Planet 51, both due in November.

And he’s making no apologies to fans who still remember him best for cracking folding chairs over opponents’ heads.

“When a family film is done well, there’s a character that every member of the audience can relate to,” he says during a break from shooting Mountain on the Disney lot. “I want to be one of those guys. I never wanted to be pigeonholed as the athlete who acted or the wrestler who did action movies.”

It’s understandable that Johnson works to shake the jock-turned-actor mantle. Few athletes have made a successful leap from sport to film.

Mountain could be a measure of just how far Johnson, 36, has come from his days as a football star and a wrestling icon. Game Plan and 2006’s Gridiron Gang kept Johnson in a sports setting. In Mountain, Johnson plays a cabbie who discovers two alien children on the run from extraterrestrials and government agents.

Like many of Johnson’s career decisions, he took the role largely because few could picture him in it. In college, he approached the University of Miami because they didn’t openly recruit him. He almost got the part in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory before director Tim Burton gave the role to friend Johnny Depp.

“If you tell me there’s something I can’t do, I’ll want to do it even more,” says Johnson. “Especially when it comes to entertaining. I knew early on that I wanted to entertain in some form. And I knew I would work as hard as anyone to do it.”

Wrestling with success

He wasn’t always a man with direction. Born in Hayward, Calif., Johnson moved often with his family as his father, the acclaimed wrestler Rocky Johnson, worked the local circuits.

By the time his family moved to Hawaii, Johnson was a problem kid. Arrested multiple times for theft and fighting, Johnson says he drifted until he discovered football. He earned a scholarship with the Hurricanes and played with NFL greats Ray Lewis and Warren Sapp.

Johnson played briefly with the Calgary Stampeders of the Canadian Football League, though he made so little money that he accepted a free mattress thrown away by a flophouse.

When a back injury ended his playing career at 24, Johnson slipped into depression and moved back in with his folks. “That was a defining moment for me,” he says. “That’s when I decided I’d train to be a wrestler.”

Long before he was asking fans at a packed Madison Square Garden if they could “smell what The Rock is cookin’,” Johnson was living a life similar to Mickey Rourke’s has-been athlete in The Wrestler.

Johnson moved to Nashville and made $40 a day wrestling in tiny circuits before as few as 25 people in vacant barns, used car lots, anywhere you could fit a ring. He lived off grits and eggs at the Waffle House and put 1,500 miles a week on his Isuzu Rodeo driving from event to event.

“I wasn’t making any money,” he says. “But I loved it.”

He corrects himself. “Well, I loved most of it. The entertainment part. But I saw these guys addicted to drugs, struggling to make a living, working well past their prime. I decided I wasn’t going to be that guy.”

Within a year, he was with the World Wrestling Federation (now World Wrestling Entertainment). Johnson, who is half Samoan and half African-American, would win seven WWE championships with moves like “The Samoan Drop” and “The People’s Elbow.”

“That was my first taste of acting in front of a big, live audience,” Johnson says. “I didn’t want to be the biggest wrestler out there, or the loudest. Just the most entertaining. I had found what I wanted to do.”

But Johnson knew that wrestling, like football, was a career with an expiration date. He approached WWE head Vince McMahon about branching into TV. He made an appearance on short-lived show The Net, followed by cameos on That ’70s Show and Star Trek: Voyager.

When he made his film debut in 2001’s The Mummy Returns, he had found a new career. He hired an acting coach and rented virtually every movie by Harrison Ford and Clint Eastwood.

“Those were my models,” he says. “Guys who could be tough but self-deprecating, who weren’t afraid to make fun of themselves. And who can act in virtually any genre.”

In retrospect, Johnson says, acting could have been his first career choice. His mother, Ata Johnson, still has tapes of her boy as an 8-year-old, reciting dialogue from his favorite movies, Silver Streak and Stir Crazy.

When he wasn’t quoting Richard Pryor or Gene Wilder, Johnson was mimicking Elvis Presley — hip shakes and all.

“The first time I met Dwayne, I was a little nervous,” says Fickman, who also directed Johnson in Game Plan. “Here comes this huge guy who sits next to me, leans in and asks what I think of Elvis Presley. He might as well have asked me what I thought about beer nuts, I was so caught off guard.”

High Pitch Mike has his own website! Howard Stern’s writer/producer has quite a fan following. Check out High Pitch Mike in the lie detector video below.

High Pitch Mike is a writer and producer for The Howard 100 News Team and recently came out of the closet.

Today it was revealed that High Pitch Mike has his own website and you’ll never guess the name: HighPitchMike.com.

High Pitch Mike and Artie Lange are always at each others throats, and it is pretty darn funny.

High Pitch Mike officially came out of the closet on The Howard Stern show on December 1, 2008. Here’s what he said his MySpace Page:

“Earlier today, on the Howard Stern Show, I came out of the closet publicly. Something some of you, many of you might have suspected. Yes, I am gay. No longer am I ashamed of how I was created. Being gay is not a choice you make, And while some of you may question why I lived in the closet, through high school, college, and my career – let me put it very simply with 2 answers: 1) my mother told me years ago she would disown me if I was gay. 2) the bigoted society we live in where we celebrate that we are so open-minded that we can elect a black President, on the very same day gays and lesbians have their rights to marry revoked in California. Looks like the civil rights movement still has a ways to go.”

Star magazine is reporting that something illicit might be going on between Brad Pitt and one of their many nannies. As you can imagine, Angelina Jolie is said to be less than pleased. The tabloid has an exclusive scoop that indicates all may not be well in the Brangelina household.

“Angelina flew into a jealous rage when she walked past the open bedroom door of 8-month-old twins, Knox and Vivienne – and didn’t like what she saw! And it’s not surprising, for Brad was on the bed, rubbing the back of a pretty young nanny! Angie got so mad she slapped Brad and fired the girl on the spot,” a source told Star.

If this is even remotely true, could Brad really be that foolish? Did he learn nothing from Ethan Hawke and his wandering eye?

Jennifer Aniston and John Mayer have broken up again! Aniston and Mayer were seen together at the Oscars posing for photos, looking very much a couple. But their reps confirm they have ended their relationship again. Read more below.

The couple looked great together at the Academy Awards while posing arm-in-arm for photos. There have been rumors of marriage even, but Jennifer went to Europe promoting her latest movie Marley & Me and John Mayer stayed in Los Angeles.

Days after Jennifer Aniston returned, they broke up!

“They had some disagreements and decided to not continue to see each other,” says one source. “Jen is moving on with her life like she always does. She seems happy.”

Another source has said John Mayer broke up with Aniston after she returned from Europe.

Guess we’ll find out soon who actually broke up their relationship. Who do you guys think called things off?

Stupid Celebrities has just received word that the Kardashian sisters will be posing for Playboy.   According to Ryan Seacrest’s KIIS-FM morning show, the three sisters (Kim, Khloe and Kourtney)are going to possibly be featured in an upcoming issue of the famous nude spread magazine-

“Is that true that you’ve been offered a nude layout?’ Ryan’s co-host Ellen probed the Keeping Up With the Kardashian starlets. “…I thought Playboy wanted to do all the sisters now that Kim’s done it.”

While effortlessly playing dumb, Khloe — who recently shed 20 lbs from her robust figure — said she would “love it.” No surprise considering she recently bared all for a PETA ad.

Added Kourtney: “We could be the new Girls Next Door, the brunette version.”

I am going to be looking forward to this photo spread,  i’m sure many of you will be as well.

Will you guys be picking up your copy of Playboy with these Kardashian girls showing off their bootilicous bods?

Want some new jewelry? Want a help a great charity? Then keep on readin’!

Actress Camilla Belle is lending her support to H.E.L.P  – a non-profit agency established in Malawi aiming to make a difference by giving kids hope, education, love, protection and the opportunity to make their dreams become a reality.

H.E.L.P. has teamed up with the Lori Leavitt Collection to re-launch the jewelry firm’s What Love Means campaign, which donates all profits from its Panthera Collection to the children of the impoverished nation. Sounds pretty great, right?

To help promote the campaign, Belle will wear pieces of the African-inspired jewelry in new advertisements like the one you see pictured here.

Prices for the collection range from $98 to $2,050 and are available online at HelpMalawiChildren.org.

So go check out the collection and help an impoverished nation get some much need H.E.L.P.

After saying that a dinner with the Obama family is her favourite dream, “Pretty Woman” Julia Roberts has now revealed that she has a huge crush on the entire first family.

“I have such a White House crush happening right now for all four of the Obamas!” Julia Roberts declares in an interview with the US TV show The Insider.

Making no attempt to hide her admiration for Barack Obama, Julia Roberts admitted that not only does she have a huge crush on the 44th and the first African-American president of United States, but also loves his wife Michelle Obama and their two young daughters, Malia and Sasha.

Academy winning actress Julia was all praise for first lady Michelle Obama, saying “She seems to be a person who is really authentic and shows who she really is.”

Julia had earlier proclaimed that the Obamas would be at the very top of her invite list when she planned her dream dinner party, even promising to cook “a big chicken tagine with figs and apricots” herself for the first family.

Angelina Jolie is hunting for a $20 million necklace to wear to the 2009 Oscars this Sunday night.

According to OK!, the actress has bounced to several leading New York retailers in search of the perfect piece of jewelry to don for her big night.

Angelina is nominated in the best actress category for her role in the 2008 Clint Eastwood film Changeling.

“She’s been driving all the high-end jewelers crazy,” one unnamed source chuckles. “She’s looking for the impossible.”

“She really wants it to be a show-stopper and is making sure that she is the one everyone has their eyes on this Sunday.”

The 81st Annual Academy Awards will be broadcast live on ABC @ 8PM Sunday night.

Angelina Jolie walked the red carpet at this year’s British Academy of Film and Television Arts Awards, hand-in-hand with Brad Pitt.

Sorry, ladies, but Pitt isn’t shown in this picture.

Jolie’s unusual outfit is, however, as the actress rocks a combination dress/pants that only she could pull off. At least that’s how we feel about it.

What about you?

The Jolie-Pitt girls are on for an A-list playdate with Suri Cruise.

Katie Holmes has reportedly invited Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie’s daughters Zahara, 3, and 2-year-old Shiloh to a tea party with her daughter Suri, who is also 2.

Katie and Angie, who will be filming separate projects in New York City in the next few weeks, hope to introduce the girls while both families are in the Big Apple.

“Katie told Angelina she just knew Suri and Shiloh are going to get along fantastically well and Suri is already getting into the idea.”

“It’s something she’s wanted to do for ages,” an unanonymous pal tells OK!. “Because of security reasons, Katie can’t have just any child over to her home. But with celebrity tots there’s no problem.”