People talk 07/18/03

Jolie says work with U.N. has changed her

NEW YORK -- Angelina Jolie says being a goodwill ambassador for the United Nations has changed her life.

"I used to lie there at night and wonder what it was that I needed to do," she tells Cosmopolitan magazine in its August issue. "That's how I stumbled on going to Washington and learning about the U.N. and traveling around the world. It completely changed me."

Jolie, 28, who stars in the upcoming "Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life," says her 2-year-old son, Maddox, is the most important thing in her life. She adopted Maddox from Cambodia last year as her marriage to Billy Bob Thornton was collapsing. The couple divorced in May.

"Before Maddox, when things would go bad, I had a tendency to be depressed or self-destructive or lost, and I can't afford to be any of that now," the Oscar-winning actress tells the magazine. "He has given me strength. I've never known this kind of relationship or love before."

One challenge facing Jolie is figuring out how to tell Maddox about Santa Claus "because I don't want to tell him he exists when he doesn't," she says.

"I don't know about the Easter Bunny either. Maybe I'll have to lighten up."

Jolie won a supporting-actress Oscar for 1999's "Girl, Interrupted." Her upcoming films also include "Beyond Borders" and "Sharkslayer."

Former Iraqi POW honored at awards dinner

MIAMI BEACH, Fla. -- Spc. Shoshana Johnson, a former Army prisoner of war in Iraq, was honored at the NAACP's annual armed services and veteran's affairs awards dinner.

Johnson, who wore her full-dress uniform and a blue walking cast on her right leg, said she plans to make a full recovery from her injuries received after she was shot in both ankles during a March 23 ambush on her unit near Nasiriyah.

"That doesn't stop me," said Johnson, referring to her injury. "I'm still a soldier. I've been back to work and everything like that, and I expect to make a full recovery."

Johnson, 30, of El Paso, Texas, already has received the Bronze Star, the Purple Heart and the Prisoner of War Medal.

Johnson said she had spent some time in Miami shopping with her aunt, who lives in Wellington in Palm Beach County. "I lost a little weight. I want new clothes and I bought some new shoes -- I only get to wear one foot though."

The awards dinner was part of the 94th annual convention of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People in Miami Beach.

Clinton plans to compile cookbook for fund-raiser

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. -- Former President Clinton has called on his celebrity friends to share recipes compiled in a cookbook to raise funds for his library foundation.

The Clinton Presidential Foundation said it will publish the $35 cookbook next month. "The Clinton Presidential Center Cookbook: A Collection of Recipes for Family and Friends" contains 250 recipes from celebrities including Muhammad Ali, Bono, Christie Brinkley, Chevy Chase, Whoopi Goldberg, Don Henley, Quincy Jones, Bruce Lee, Sophia Loren, Mary Steenburgen, Barbra Streisand and Elizabeth Taylor.

The cookbook will be available by mail order and through the foundation's Web site, foundation President Skip Rutherford said Wednesday.

"The recipes are good, but the stories are also good," Rutherford said. "It includes all ranges of Clinton's life."

The cookbook also includes Clinton's recipe for chicken enchiladas; Hillary Rodham Clinton's recipe for chocolate chip cookies; barbecue recipes from McClard's in Hot Springs, where Clinton grew up; and a Kirk Hanlin "Air Force One" recipe for peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.

Hanlin, a former Clinton assistant, liked to make P&J sandwiches while traveling on Air Force One, and Clinton took a liking to them.

-- From wire reports