Celebrity crush: Rashida Jones (revised)

This week's revised entry features a co-star of Parks and Recreation and former The Office cast member. Amazon and iTunes links follow. Any affiliate payments earned from your purchase or rental will help pay the hosting fees for my podcasts, so please consider clicking.

Name: Rashida Jones (images | Web site | Twitter)
Hometown: Bel Air, Calif., though her Wikipedia entry doesn't specify whether the Fresh Prince lived in the same neighborhood.

Rashida was probably destined for fame. Her father is Quincy Jones -- one of the most acclaimed composers and producers in American popular music. Her mother is actress Peggy Lipton -- a bombshell in her days on The Mod Squad who still turned heads in the late 1980s on Twin Peaks and even today looks better than either you or me, most likely (definitely better than me).

With her sister, designer Kidada Jones, and their
dad, legendary music producer Quincy Jones.

Her dad's African-American, and her mom's Jewish of Russian ancestry. Jones is an observant Jew and was raised in that faith, but she's explored Hinduism as well in the past. She majored in religion and philosophy at Harvard University, but she also found time to sing and perform in plays. AND she created Frenemy of the State, a comic published by Oni Press with writing from the husband-wife team of Nunzio DeFilippis and Christina Weir (whose work I adore), making her my kind of woman.

Best Known For: Jones co-stars on the NBC sitcom Parks and Recreation and previously co-starred in season three of The Office (with a guest appearance or two afterward). She also played the fiancee of a character played by Paul Rudd in the bromantic comedy I Love You, Man, and she was part of the ensemble case on TNT's short-lived cop drama Wanted.

She's also done some singing -- contributing backing vocals to the Maroon 5 songs "Not Coming Home," "Secret" and "Tangled" on their debut album Songs for Jane and "Kiwi" on their follow-up It Won't Be Soon Before Long, among other projects.

With her mom, actress Peggy Lipton.

Humble Beginnings: Jones' acting debut came in the TV miniseries The Last Don, based on a Mario Puzo novel. A two-season stint on the Fox drama Boston Public (she was in 26 episodes total) got her some big-screen work.

Modeling work includes TV commercials for The Gap, and she served as an editor and writer for Teen Vogue.

Obligatory Edgy Stuff: Other than some candid sexual talk in I Love You, Man and the occasional obligatory photo shoot that bares a little skin -- but never a whole lot -- she's kept a pretty clean image. She was topless from the back in an episode of Wanted, and that's about it.

Well, there's the fact that she openly dressed down Tupac Shakur after he'd made some disparaging remarks about her parents' marriage. One magazine referred to her making him quake in his boots in an open letter. They became friends, though, and he was engaged to her sister before he was fatally shot.

There's also the fact that she almost became a lawyer. But the O.J. Simpson trial caused her to become disillusioned with the legal system, so she turned to acting instead. The bar's loss is our gain.
Why Ye Olde Podcaster Likes Her: I suppose I first noticed her on Boston Public, but Wanted and The Office were the first places I really remember watching her with great interest.

To be honest, Wanted wasn't that great a show -- it had good actors, but the writing and execution were too much an attempt to mimic The Shield and similar shows. Jones was probably miscast there, though she did the best she could with what she had. (As she did with the Fox sitcom Unhitched -- easily one of the worst TV shows of the past decade, despite her and Craig Bierko's undisputed talents -- in between her droll NBC comedies. She was adorable, but ye gods, that show was awful.)

Now, putting her on The Office as a stumbling block to the romance between Jim and Pam -- that was a stroke of genius, especially when the writers DIDN'T do that thing where her character was an evil bitch whose over-the-top villainy made all the viewers throw things at the television whenever she appeared. No, you grew to like Karen, so that you felt bad for her, even is Jim and Pam's eventual relationship made you happy (at least that was my experience). And that's as true to life as you can get. Sometimes -- a lot of times -- people get hurt on someone else's road to Happily Ever After.

Plus, she's an active campaigner on behalf of Democratic politicians. She stumped for John Kerry in 2004, before the election was stolen through a crooked electoral system in Ohio. And in 2008, she and fellow celebrity crush Kristen Bell visited college campuses to discuss the candidates and encourage voter registration.

She also did a video for Funny or Die with Natalie Portman (featuring them playing with puppies, and no, that's not a euphemism, as a discussion of global economic problems).

(Hottest. Get-out-the-vote effort. EVER.)

Film and TV-movie credits: The Muppets (Amazon | iTunes) * Friends With Benefits (Amazon | iTunes) * The Big Year (Amazon | iTunes) * My Idiot Brother (Amazon | iTunes) * The Social Network (Amazon | iTunes) * Monogamy (Amazon | iTunes) * Cop Out (Amazon | iTunes) * Fight for Your Right Revisited (Amazon | iTunes) * I Love You, Man (Amazon | iTunes) * Brief Interviews With Hideous Men (Amazon | iTunes) * Role Models (scenes deleted but on Blu-ray) (Amazon | iTunes) * Natalie Portman and Rashida Jones Speak Out (Web video) * Prop 8: The Musical (Web video) * Life in Flight (Amazon | iTunes) * Reno 911!: Miami (music only) (Amazon | iTunes) * The Ten (Amazon | iTunes) * The Baxter (music only) (Amazon | iTunes) * Little Black Book (Amazon | iTunes) * Strip Search (scenes deleted) (Amazon | iTunes) * Death of a Dynasty (Amazon | iTunes) * Now You Know (Amazon | iTunes) * Tupac Shakur: Thug Angel (Amazon | iTunes) * Full Frontal (Amazon | iTunes) * Roadside Assistance (Amazon | iTunes) * If These Walls Could Talk 2 (Amazon | iTunes) * Rocky Horror 25: Anniversary Special (Amazon | iTunes) * East of A (Amazon | iTunes) * Myth America (Amazon | iTunes)

Musical work (alphabetical by album title): The Baxter soundtrack (Amazon | iTunes) * It Won't Be Soon Before Long by Maroon 5 (Amazon | iTunes) * Monogamy soundtrack (Amazon | iTunes) * Reno 911: Miami soundtrack (Amazon | iTunes) * Rocky Horror 25: Anniversary Special (Amazon | iTunes) * The Rose That Grew from Concrete (Tupac Shakur tribute, various artists) (Amazon | iTunes) * Songs About Jane by Maroon 5 (Amazon | iTunes) * The Ten soundtrack (Amazon | iTunes)
Voice work: Vamped Out, season 1: "Hungry Hungry Al" (Amazon | iTunes) * Robot Chicken, season 4: "Tell My Mom" (Amazon | iTunes) * Q: The Autobiography of Quincy Jones (audiobook) (Amazon | iTunes)
Music videos: "Be Gentle With Me" by The Boy Least Likely To (Amazon | iTunes) * "Long Road to Ruin" by Foo Fighters (Amazon | iTunes)
Written work: Frenemy of the State (comic book) (Amazon) * Q: The Autobiography of Quincy Jones (contributor) (Amazon)

TV and Web series credits: The Office, season 7 (Amazon | iTunes) * Parks and Recreation, season 3 (Amazon | iTunes) * Parks and Recreation, season 2 (Amazon | iTunes) * Parks and Recreation, season 1 (Amazon | iTunes) * The Office, season 5 (Amazon | iTunes) * Web Therapy, season 1 (Amazon | iTunes) * Unhitched (Amazon | iTunes) * The Office, season 4 (Amazon | iTunes) * Wainy Days, season 1: "A Woman's Touch" (Amazon | iTunes) * Saturday Night Live, season 32: "Rainn Wilson/Arcade Fire" (Amazon | iTunes) * The Office, season 3 (Amazon | iTunes) * Wanted (Amazon | iTunes) * Stella: "Pilot" (Amazon | iTunes) * NY-LON (Amazon | iTunes) * Chappelle's Show, season 2, episode 4 (Amazon | iTunes) * Chappelle's Show, season 1, episode 5 (Amazon | iTunes) * Boston Public, season 2 (Amazon | iTunes) * Boston Public, season 1 (Amazon | iTunes) * Freaks and Geeks: "Kim Kelly Is My Friend" (Amazon | iTunes) * Mario Puzo's The Last Don (Amazon | iTunes)