People

Rocking the vote

Selma, Ala. — Actress Drew Barrymore toured Selma, the birthplace of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, as part of a documentary she’s filming on the importance of voting.

The actress visited the National Voting Rights Museum on Thursday before traveling 20 miles to the tiny community of Suttle, where she met with children involved in youth leadership.

Barrymore and her crew taped interviews with state Sen. Hank Sanders and his wife, activist Faya Rose Toure, at the youth leadership center.

Barrymore, 29, said details of her project would be announced later.

Not so busy

Williamsville, N.Y. — John Stevens, the red-headed crooner who was ousted from “American Idol,” returned to high school Friday and said he was still hoping for a record deal.

“As of now, I’ve received no offers besides just singing at weddings and other local events,” he said.

Stevens, 16, looked slightly embarrassed as Williamsville East High School Principal Neal Miller declared Friday “John Stevens Day” in front of 1,000 students at an assembly.

“Sing us a song, Johnny!” a few students shouted. He smiled but didn’t oblige.

Since being voted off the Fox television talent show about two weeks ago, the lanky teenager has crooned with Regis Philbin, bantered with David Letterman and come face-to-face with look-alike Conan O’Brien

Speaking of high school

Los Angeles — Nia Vardalos has a theory about the popular kids in high school.

“I have this theory of life that there are four popular people in high school. And then there are the rest of us,” she told reporters recently, according to AP Radio.

Vardalos, writer and star of “My Big Fat Greek Wedding” and “Connie and Carla,” said she wrote for the outcasts and the underdogs.

“I write movies for the rest of us, who never peaked in high school. And for the people that did peak in high school and then realized later that it’s all downhill, welcome to the movie as well.”

In “Connie and Carla,” Vardalos and Toni Collette star as lounge singers who go on the run after witnessing a murder and hide out as drag queens at a gay bar.

Back in the saddle

Atlanta — Jane Fonda, who recently came out of her 14-year retirement from acting, says shooting a movie is a lot like sex.

“How to do it just comes right back,” she said Thursday at a party for patrons of the Georgia Campaign for Adolescent Pregnancy Prevention.

Fonda will appear in the film “Monster-in-Law” opposite Jennifer Lopez, playing the difficult mother of Lopez’s fiance.

Fonda, 66, last appeared in the 1990 film “Stanley & Iris.” She retired from acting after marrying her now ex-husband, media mogul Ted Turner.

Other guests at Thursday’s event included singer Kenny Rogers and his wife, Carolyn, and former Atlanta Mayor Andrew Young.