ith the Tuesday release of actress Claire Danes' book, My So-Called Sex Life a new wave of attention has been focused on the damage young actor and possible space creature Leonardo DiCaprio is doing to the lives of Hollywood's young actresses. When this reporter spoke recently with Danes, she was in a near-catatonic state.

 "I just want everybody to know that Leo and I didn't DO anything on the set of Romeo and Juliet. We were just in the same movie together. Hell, most of our scenes were filmed separately, it was all camera tricks that made it seem like we were in bed together, I swear! Somebody, please sleep with me!" said Danes, bursting into tears.

This pitiful scene is being repeated all across Tinseltown as young actresses who've shared the screen with DiCaprio find that men now fear to touch them. Some even cross the street to avoid them, sometimes against swift traffic. This reaction seems to be genetically ingrained in the male sex, an unspoken knowledge that something is not quite right with the young actor, and that even the slightest contact with him leaves a woman strictly undateable. This Curse has extended even to girls who sat in the same classroom with DiCaprio in grade school and singer Alanis Morissette, who once stated in an interview that her astrological sign was Leo.

Most women seem to be strangely immune to DiCaprio's nauseating effects. Some even claim to find him attractive, a tendency that baffles psychologists and medical doctors alike.

"It is my professional opinion that DiCaprio exudes toxic pheromones from tiny ducts behind his ears," noted neurologist P. William Clydesdale commented on the phenomenon. "These pheromones act to confuse the female's neurological systems, resulting in a dizzy sense of confusion and impaired reasoning. As to why these pheromones do not effect the males of the species, my educated guess is that the average male's desire to pop DiCaprio's head like a blister results in increased levels of endorphins in the blood stream, which counteracts the pheromones."

An accurate assessment of how many young careers have been ruined by the Curse of DiCaprio cannot be made, since County health officials have been unable to find any male subjects who can name any films other than Titanic in which DiCaprio has appeared.

DiCaprio's co-star in Titanic, actress Kate Winslet, was very direct when asked how the Curse has effected her career: "No talk. Eat now."

There is a bright hope on the horizon, however. Recent reports have indicated that actress Chloe Svengali is the first documented female to be immune to DiCaprio's insidious pheromones. She has vowed publicly to track down all actresses in upcoming DiCaprio projects, in an effort to warn them before they make any terrible mistakes.

ASA scientists met with a crack team of cultural anthropologists in New York today to discuss the trend of 1980's revivalism, a fad now determined to be a serious threat to the survival of the human race if not brought under control within the next seven years.

"I'd say we've got five years, seven at the outside, before we devolve into marrow-eating cave people once again. Should this trend continue unchecked at it's current rate, the human race is whipped, and whipped good," commented Daniel Furgelman, cultural director for the Smithsonian Institute.

"And if I hear 'Come On Eileen' one more time, I'm going to fucking puke," added Furgelman.

Spin Magazine columnist Kirk Jaded explains the phenomenon:

"It started, of course, with the 80's themselves. The culture of the day was not a threat at the time since it was confined safely to the actual decade of the 1980's. Only later, in the mid-90's, with the advent of Rhino Records' "Awesome 80's" CD collection, did the cultural zeitgeist begin to pull a massive U-turn and head back to it's unfortunate past. Cover versions of 80's standards by irresponsible alternative groups like Save Ferris, Marilyn Manson, Hole and Reel Big Fish only compounded the problem, fooling an entire generation of young music fans into thinking that the 80's were actually, as the youth are fond of saying, 'cool'. This has sounded a death knoll for one of the greatest civilizations ever to walk the face of the earth."

Today's meeting of the CFGOI (The Committee to Fucking Get On With It) was to act as a think-tank to develop means of turning around the current trend. Demonstrators picketed in front of the Committee's headquarters, most of whom admitted to being VH1 stockholders. Documented proposals included Public Service Announcements from prominent 80's figures like Kirk Cameron and Howard Jones to warn kids of the dangers of thinking the 80's were cool, the silencing of Mexican radio and constant airings of the television programs "Mama's Family" and "Small Wonder" in America's classrooms.

"Education is the key," stated Manley Farber, the committee's loudmouth. "If we bring enough kids into actual contact with Boy George, we may just have this thing licked."

Once upon a time there lived a happy boy named Peter. Peter had his very own dog and often he would teach it neat tricks like fetching the paper and playing dead and frightening off the Internal Revenue Service Officials. Peter loved his dog very much and he named it Brownie because it was the same color as as his mother's yummy nut brownies, and also because it was short for the dog's royal name: Brownsworth Von Hogglshmilenickinshtoffer III esq. Ph.D. One day, Peter and his dog were taking a walk along the scenic trails of a burnt down strip club when they happened to find, buried amongst the burned G-strings and charred ash of fishnet stockings, a big red wagon! Apparently some of the fetish night enthusiasts had failed to rescue the wagon from the town's furious firebombing.

Peter studied the wagon. It was old, and rusted, and smelled of latex, but it was just the right size for him and his trusty dog, Brownie. So the two hopped into the wagon and rode off, on an adventure like none they had seen before, give for the time they escaped Nazi occupied France while transporting illegal narcotics for a white slave trader with an extra arm and a bevy of exotic women.

Along the road, they discovered a small hole in the dirt which appeared to lead down into a cavernous lair of pirate's gold that was guarded by many treacherous booby traps. But Peter realized this was only the plot to "The Goonies," so he decided to instead investigate the creepy house on the end of the block which everyone claimed was haunted. (Of course, the whole block wasn't haunted, just the house)

He climbed out of the wagon, Brownie nipping lightly at his heels, and began to make his way through the creepy and spooky graveyard in front of the creepy and spooky house towards the creepy and spooky front door where the creepy and spooky doorknob reflected creepy and spooky reflections of the creepy and spooky sun. "Stop nipping at my heels, Brownie!" Peter called out, disturbing the creepy and spooky silence. "It's very creepy and spooky the way you do that nipping."

His hand went to the doorknob, trembling with fear and apprehension. Luckily, Peter's steady hand stopped the doorknob's trembling, and with a turn, the door creaked open. Spider webs clung to the wooden door and Peter warily peered into the darkness. From inside he heard a faint moaning, like that of a toilet that is clogged with Roget's New Thesaurus and being flushed with the lid down.

He leaned forward, curious what that groaning was and also because Brownie was trying to hump his leg. In the distance, deep inside the house, he heard the sound again. And then, he made that bold first step into the house. Beads of sweat began to form on his eyebrow and make their way down the deep farrows in his cheeks, dribbling past his neck and onto his sternum, the protective bone that joins the ribcage. The ribcage is divided into three parts which, oh, never mind the anatomy lesson. He was scared.

Brownie, seeming to have lost all desire to copulate with his master's appendages, began to search for a good gravestone to urinate on because, well, he's a dog, so we'll just focus on Peter, who by this time has found the top of a staircase leading to the cellar. He slowly made his way down the sagging, wooden steps, as the light began to dim. That moaning became a bit louder with each step. Finally, he was at the bottom, and he turned to see...

a tape deck playing these weird moaning sounds.

Relieved, Peter ran back up the stairs and out the house only moments before the hideous, blood dripping sucker creature from the planet Venus pounced and would have eaten him up. He happily whistled for Brownie, and jumped into his wagon, knowing tomorrow would be another day full of excitement! Good old Uncle Jack had promised to take him to a NAMBLA convention and from what he was told, the people there gave out the best candy and even had free horsey rides! What fun! Peter and Brownie rode off into the sunset, content that all was right with the world, oblivious to AIDS and teenage crime and road rage and presidential sex scandals.

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