John Denver?
Great songwriter, great singer…mediocre pilot.
Yeah, but why? I have never heard that either Paul Newman or Tom Hanks have cheated on their wives. Not that they would have told me or anything. 
I’ve never heard that either. Granted, I don’t really follow celebrity gossip and a lot of Paul Newman’s career (and marriage) happened before I was even born but what I have seen usually touts both of their marriages as uncharacteristically stable and scandal free by Hollywood standards.
Michael J. Fox
Haley Joel Osment.
As a proud connoisseur of the pun, good sir, I hereby present you with this.
While I don’t know if he qualifies as a “celebrity” in the same thread that mentions stars like Dean Martin and Clark Gable, Curt Smith of Tears For Fears is known for being an extremely personable guy. Until very recently (when the band’s reunion album/tour began occupying most of his time), he would personally respond to all of his email, and you could occasionally catch him on AIM for a chat. Despite the fact that he is notedly uncomfortable with the idea of “being famous”, I’ve never heard any reports of him being unkind to fans.
How about Andy Warhol? I haven’t heard much, but I was impressed by what I heard. His “superstars” were people that society wanted nothing to do with, but he took them in and was like a father to some of them. He also would volunteer in a soup kitchen.
Well, he ain’t had a lot of time to rack up scandals. Just wait until he hits puberty!
Heeeeheee…although actually, I believe the dogs have always been male, for the most part.
I’d guess NOBODY makes Brigadier General in the USAF without being ten sorts of badass, not even a movie star. After all, this was in the period in which “megadeaths” was coined.
Actually, he’s 18. And it’s not just an absence of scandalous reports; I’ve heard a lot of people talk, unprompted, about how charming and polite and unpretentious he is, and of his Doper-worthy intelligence. For instance, last summer I think it was, he was at an Eisley concert, waiting in line with the hoi polloi, and at one point, asked the people he’d been chatting with if they’d mind holding his place in line because he wanted to go to Starbucks, and while he was there, could he get them anything? Imagine Lindsay “Don’t treat me like I’m some ordinary person!” Lohan doing that.
Years ago, “Stuttering John” Melendez from Howard Stern’s show crashed a book-signing event that Fred Rogers was doing for kids, and started asking the usual stupid/embarrassing questions. A usual, the whole idea was to get a celeb to blow up, get angry, act like a jerk, and expose his “true” ugly self.
Rogers never took the bait. He remained totally calm and polite, to the point that Melendez himself seemed to be embarrassed and ashamed of himself for intruding.
Obviously, we can’t know for sure that our favorite celebs have no skeletons in their closets, but Rogers certainly SEEMS to have been exactly the person he portrayed on TV.
Family man Michael Landon left his first wife and cancelled an adoption of a boy in order to marry his second wife. After twenty-odd years with #2, he started an affair with the actress who played his daughter Mary’s stand-in on Little House, then divorced #2 to marry her.
Of course, maybe there’s nothing wrong with that.
She also managed to survive the whole John Hinckley thing with amazing dignity. And she’s a Yale graduate.
Both Ron Howard and Jodie Foster were child actors. I wonder if they saw how some adult actors act in private and thought “Whatever happens, I’m not going to be like that.”
Brooke Shields can be added to this list.
Michael Moore actually spends a fairish amount of time up in this neck of the woods, and from what I’ve heard, he will cheerfully discuss politics with anyone, no matter what they believe, even if they spend all their time shrieking at him about how wrong he is. I’ve never engaged in a debate with him myself, but I’ve run into him a couple of times, and he’s always come across as a nice, normal guy.
IIRC there was an Atlantic or Esquire article on this some years ago. The synopsis seemed to be that she was an incredible PITA, insanely litigious, and her level of expected compensation for the amount of work she had actually done as a relative amateur, was orders of magnitude beyond that of normal professionals. The settlement she got (and later fought over) was basically palimony “go away” money.
Tom Hanks met Rita Wilson while they were filming Volunteers…Hanks was married at the time, albeit unhappily. He talked about it in a recent article in Esquire…I think it was the June 2006 issue.
Having a marriage that didn’t work out? Certainly doesn’t make him a bad person–just human like the rest of us.
Fran Drescher is another one that comes to mind–She has survived an awful rape and helped caught the two serial rapists, and ovarian cancer. And the late Gilda Radner, who is described by everyone who worked with her as a “sweetheart.”
Her husband, Gene Wilder, should should be mentioned too. Not only does he seem to be an all around nice guy but he also helped found Gilda’s Club in her honor.