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JB- We go from talking about this test to talking about Mother's Day. What a segue. You've done some interesting things for celebrity moms on the list. Tell us about that.
TP- I think what's interesting is that, what I like about celebrity moms and what have you is… I talked to Jennifer Garner the other day. She's one of them and she's fantastic. I like celebrity moms who say, "Look, I have it easier than the average mom in real life, to a certain extent. Which is what Rosie O'Donnell said back in the day -- I've got nannies, I've got money, I've got the opportunity to really, you know, surround myself with everything. A lot of times they won't hire a nanny. I like the fact that they can mix it up. And on the flip side of that, the other aspect you have to deal with the most is -- and all moms do not -- that when they walk out the door there's not a whole host of… a battalion of paparazzi jumping out of bushes. That's something a lot of moms don't have to deal with. The Jennifer Garners and the like are not out there much, in the sense of opening up an envelope and they take their privacy very seriously, and they take what they do very seriously. I've known Jennifer for a long time, and she's a romantic and she's great, solid, as we would say, chick -- you know, back in the day. So yeah, it's kind of fun.
JB- Let's talk about media and it's obsession with celebrities. We constantly see paparazzi chasing -- literally chasing -- down stars. It can be scary, even downright violent, as we've seen with Kanye (West) at an airport. I know you're not really paparazzi, what are your thoughts on the lengths these people are going?
TP- Yeah, there's a huge distinction. Paparazzi is the Italian word for gnat -- a fly that always bothers you. That's kind of what a paparazzi is. We went inside, about a year ago, and wanted to see exactly what happens with them -- who are they, what do they do? And there's an old-school paparazzi that kept their distance and would say, "Hi, Ms. Roberts… like, Julia Roberts. How are you today?" They wouldn't say the things like, you know… they wouldn't say outlandish things to get a reaction. And then there's the new school that started coming out and we've seen what happens. They kind of follow them around. And we saw what a day in the life of Britney Spears was like. We went up on Mulholland Drive, which is only two lanes -- one each way -- on top of a mountain. And we saw these seven SUVs, doors open, guys sitting outside, SUVs running, waiting for anything that looked like her or her SUV to come out of those gates. As soon as they came out, they jumped in their SUVs -- it was crazy, they were going like 60 or 70 miles per hour on the 35-mile-an-hour road around corners trying to catch her. There could have been a family of four coming the other way. It was insane. We followed them -- not at 70 miles an hour - and she went down the canyon, down into the flats of Beverly Hills to go to the dentist. The red lights these guys ran, the danger they put people in was just insane. We wanted to show that. We wanted to give people -- like, you just asked now, What's the difference between paparazzi and TV shows and is there a line that's firm and what's going on? Who buys what photos? We wanted to show what a day in the life was. All Britney was doing that day was going for a dental appointment. And when they got to Century City, which is where her dentist was, they went to an underground parking garage. When they got to the garage entrance there was security there and they stopped the guys in the SUVs. They got out of the SUVs, left them running with the doors open, ran passed the security guards and followed them four flights down to where Britney was getting out of the car to try get a picture of her -- just one picture. How insane is that? And, when we pulled into Century City there was a farmers' market going on, so they almost nailed people there. It's just insane.
JB- It would be almost like being on the set of a Nicolas Cage movie.
TP- It was. We're going along and showing what these people are going through with people following them and what have you. And it was like, "What else can happen?" And I was like, "There's a farmers' market. It was like a movie." Like, you're kidding me. I was nervous and I raced cars and I've raced motorcycles. I was nervous, like, this isn't going to end well. It hasn't on a couple of occasions. There is going to be something that's going to happen in the future and it's not going to end well for somebody.
JB- Shifting gears, when you're not chasing down celebrities -- from a safe distance, of course- - you're helping chase down predators. You do a lot of good work for kids. Tell me about the new cellphone initiative you're involved with.
TP- The Amber Watch Foundation is an incredible foundation that started a couple years ago. Myself and Nancy O'Dell have partnered with them, because every 40 seconds a child is either molested or abducted or taken. It's insane that that happens. So, we initially had watches that would… you could push a little button and you would be able to have an ear-piercing sound come - like a hundred decibels, I think it was -- and then we've now gone onto cellphones and there are ways and programs to alert… the parents can be aware of where the kids are. It's incredible. It's all to save kids. The thing that was find in society is that kids are snatched up all the time. They don't have a way out sometimes and I think that if we can provide breadcrumbs, so to speak, some kids won't get snatched and they do have a device, or we could find them quickly because it's really important to find them within the first 15 minutes and know where they are. So, I think with this initiative, what Amber Watch is doing, and what Access Hollywood is doing in conjunction with that, is really a great thing. I've been with the organization maybe five years now and we've gone from the online stuff which is incredible -- we have the outlook and pamphlets and the "Be Safe" stuff. We go into schools across the country with Amber Watch and we've been actually able to save some kids. Because something the parents don't understand is when your kid's online there are 50,000 sexual predators. I can say one thing, and this is for every parent out there: do not let your kids have computers in their rooms. This was explained to me by someone who poses online as a 13-year-old, and she's 23, works with the police and one day we were with her at noon on a Monday. But 12:17 on a Monday, she had three guys over the age of 35 that wanted to have sex with her. And they knew she was "underage." They told me, if you put your child in a room -- in a bedroom -- with a computer, they can close the door, it's like taking your child to a city park at midnight, dropping them off and saying, "Hey, see you in the morning. Good luck." There may be the romantic couple out late, you know, walking out after dinner hand-in-hand in the park, but you can sure as hell bet there's going to be a predator in there, there's going to be a drug addict and what have you, and you're leaving them. If you do that in their room, you have no idea who's there and these predators are there and they'll look and they're very easy to find your kid. But with our new program that we have through Amber Watch Mobile, it'll really educate everybody. It's called Amber Watch Lookout and you can go to amberwatchfoundation.org and you can go to Access Hollywood and just click on the bottom where you see Nancy and (me). We'll save kids and educate parents and kids.
JB- Those are very important websites to check out - amberwatchfoundation.org. Access Hollywood airs in syndication. Check your local listings. Tony Potts, thanks for joining us today.
TP- Thank you. Always a pleasure.
Tony Potts
The Access Hollywood host talks with JB about paparazzi and keeping kids safe.
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