Sunday Surprise

We just love Vincent Gallo. We love that he's an actor/artist/musician, and can pull off that triptych without looking like Ethan Hawke. We love that in addition to selling his art on his Web site, he also sells his spunk for an icy $1 million. And we love that he offers to serve as a male escort to any gal willing to pay his "modest" $50,000 fee: "Heavy set, older, red heads and even black chicks can have me if they can pay the bill," he says on VincentGallo.com. "No real female will be refused."

So, since we're such big Gallo fans, we looked forward to interviewing the star of Buffalo 66 and The Brown Bunny (the one where he gets a blowjob from Chloe Sevigny) about his upcoming gig at the Mission Creek Music & Arts Festival later this month. Imagine our heartbreak when we got this tragic news from the festival's warlords: Gallo won't grant media interviews unless the publication guarantees to put him on its cover. Shit, we thought.

Chock-full of tenacity, we tried tracking down his PR people or an assistant. Surprisingly, he has neither. In desperation, we sent him a groveling e-mail, figuring the great Gallo would never get back to us. But this Sunday morning, as we were coiled on the couch, repeatedly watching the MacArthur Maze melt on KRON 4, we get a phone call from the man himself. Holy shit, we thought.

Unexpectedly friendly and forthcoming, we spoke for a glorious 30 minutes. Well, he did most of the speaking. What with Gallo on the phone and the MacArthur Maze collapsing on TV, we were busy waiting for a unicorn to gallop through the door at any second. And we'd love to tell you what we talked about, but he requested that our conversation be off the record. Shit, again.

Well, Vincent, our chat will have to remain a private thing between us because we won't put you on the cover of our paper. Our journalistic standards are too high to let a celeb — even one we love as much as you — tell us what to do. Who do you think we are? Chloe Sevigny?