Hilary Duff nurtures squeaky-clean image

08/22/2005

Hilary Duff is 17. That is almost as surprising as the fact that she has a pristine reputation in an age of tabloid sleaze.

Add to that credits in a dozen films and her songwriting work on a third pop CD, and the girl seems a modern marvel - for the teen set, at least.

Duff's film career is bustling, and for now she's said goodbye to TV and the long contracts that come along with series work, a telling step for the former "Lizzie McGuire." Duff is juggling major Hollywood productions - including "Cheaper by the Dozen 2," which she recently wrapped - around a recording career and tour.

Duff is one of those multiheaded monsters whose name is solid gold on TV and in movie theaters - and platinum in CD stores. But unlike peers such as Lindsay Lohan, Britney Spears and Jessica and Ashlee Simpson, Duff is not a regular feature in the tabloids.

"Luckily I'm pretty absent from those," Duff said from her Los Angeles home. "Sometimes they'll see me with my boyfriend. And I just read that my sister and I almost burned our house down by trying to toast a piece of toast, which is weird because that never happened.

"I'm not scandalous. I think it's actually embarrassing to be in those, yet some people will do anything to be in those magazines. I'm happy with who I am, and I'm happy with the way people portray me. If it's too normal, than that's their opinion."

Pick through the pages of supermarket tabs and you'll see countless pictures of pregnant Britney walking out of Starbucks, skinny Lindsay stumbling outside a club and flashy Jessica earnestly defending her marriage. And while Duff says she's beyond her beef with Lohan - which supposedly started when they were dating the same boy, Aaron Carter - she still gets in veiled digs at her natural competitor.

"I'd rather be seen the way I am now instead of falling over myself walking out of a club," Duff said.

"It's so avoidable. My peers who are my age who go out and party and are all over the magazines, they do it all for the attention. I go out to clubs sometimes, but I have a totally separate group of friends outside the business, friends who are not actors, and we go out, but we also know there's a front door and a back door, and there's one you don't get seen at. And I don't mean that in a mean way."

No, she means it in a nice way. The same way she diagnoses America's understandable addiction to celebrities and celebrity magazines.

"For somebody living in Middle America that lives a completely normal life with a normal job and normal clothes and normal school and normal family, it seems that these people aren't even real," Duff said. "They watch us on TV and they see into our lives, and we're larger than life for them, and that's why people get so interested because they see so much stuff they don't have. The whole lifestyle and living in L.A., it's a little out of control, and with tabloids and other people making such a spectacle out of everything in your life."

But then comes the kicker.

"I just wish the focus was more on my music and film," she said.

Of course she does, but unless you're 16 or under, Duff's music and film is irrelevant to you and your world. Duff's film credits range "A Cinderella Story" to "Agent Cody Banks" to "The Lizzie McGuire Movie" to "Cheaper by the Dozen."

Her recording career has been dictated by the dollar. She released a Christmas record in 2002 followed by "Metamorphosis," in 2003 and her sophomore album in 2004. She released releasing a best-of compilation - yes, already - with three new songs.

With her second record, Duff started co-writing the material and tackling teeny subjects such as ex-boyfriends ("James Dean," which may or may not be addressing Aaron Carter) and smack-talkers ("Haters," which absolutely addresses Lohan). In "Haters," she rails: "You look so clean but you spread your dirt as if you think that words don't hurt ... You're the queen of superficiality/ Keep your lies out of my reality ... You say your boyfriend's sweet and kind/ But you've still got your eyes on mine."

Again, if you're over 21 and listening to this music then you either have kids or a bad case of arrested adolescence. And Duff knows that. She understands who her demo is.

"It's different and all over the place," she said of her fan base. "It's 4-year- olds with their parents, and it's 23- year-old college students. Sometimes a group of 19-year-old guys in Slipknot T-shirts and Rancid T-shirts shows up, and that's great, but yeah, it's mostly teenage girls.

"Just thinking about the people out there who support and love you is what makes me want to keep doing it all. Despite what you read about how a 50-year-old person is reviewing my CD. My music isn't meant for him."

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