Crowe’s The Anti-Cruise

This has been a poor news year for Russell Crowe. First there was the thing with the BAFTAs. Then came the news that Crowe had apparently been throwing hissy fits over a bad hair day on the set of his latest movie. Now the Kiwi star's been voted the world's worst autograph signer. Clearly Crowe could take lessons from Tom Cruise, who last night spent hours signing autographs and chatting to fans before the UK premiere of Minority Report. By contrast, Autograph Collector magazine (yes, there is such a publication), chastises Crowe for being rude to fans. 'Try to approach [Crowe] for an autograph nowadays and chances are he'll tell you to either get a life, get a job, or both,' says Autograph Collector's contributing editor Jeffrey Woolf. The magazine has spent the time it clearly has too much of, compiling a list of the film world's best and worst autograph signers. Second place on the bad grace list is given to Britney Spears, who was booed at the London premiere for her film Crossroads earlier this year when she turned up late, ignoring fans who'd waited outside for hours. At the other end of the scale, good autograph signers are US actress Brittany Murphy, Tom Hanks and Billy Bob Thornton. British stars get a mention on both lists with Catherine Zeta-Jones in the bad camp and the UK's own Sir Ian McKellen praised for being one of the best signers.