It was (apparently) ten years ago.
I was watching TV and saw a movie preview. Playing God, some cheesy-looking thriller with David Duchovny, Timothy Hutton … and oh my god, the sexiest woman I have ever seen in my life! Those LIPS!
She’s been #1 on my celebrity freebie list ever since. (Yes, even now that she’s way too skinny.) Go Team Jolie!
Who’s your biggest celebrity crush, and more important, what sparked the obsession?
Jake Gyllenhaal’s performance in Brokeback Mountain, coupled with some…detailed (read: dirty) dreams and waking fantasies make for one hell of a crush.
Jennifer Connelly riding the coin-operated mechanical kiddie horse in Career Opportunities, bouncing up and down in that tight white top. I had a crush on her for almost 15 years, between that movie and The Rocketeer, where she essentially played pin-up queen Bettie Page with a different name.
This is really going to date me.
My celebrity crush was John Denver. I was a teenage girl. At that age, crushes are all about “love,” not sex.
I’m a WV native. “Take Me Home, Country Roads” had practically become the state song. Denver was not a super-mega-star then, and he came to Charleston to perform a free concert on the lawn of the state capitol. A friend of my older brother handed me his 35mm SLR camera and asked me to take pictures. I didn’t know WTF I was doing, but I remember getting an amazing photo of John Denver, with the WV hills in the background. I’m pretty sure I shook his hand. Maybe.
After that, I used to sit and listen to the LP of “Poems, Prayers and Promises” with tears running down my face. I was convinced we were soul mates, tragically separated by distance (and age, and the fact that we didn’t know each other.)
I made as much fun of him later as lots of my contemporaries did. But I was genuinely saddened when he died.
Star Wars. Harrison Ford/Han Solo.
Until the movie “Atame!” (aka: Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!) Where I first saw Antonio Banderas.
I actually had a big realization recently when watching an interview with Ford. He’s moved off my list.
(He’ll always be hot, but not on my freebie list anymore.)
Jenny McCarthy when she was the centerfold in 1994. I was 18 and just starting to figure out the whole girls thing and she just flattened me. Had the whole stereotypical poster on the wall thing going in my bedroom at my parents house. She started hosting Singled Out when I was in college and that was basically required viewing at the start of the Reality TV era.
It’s all one giant cliche for certain, but the Playboy centerfold was probably my first celeb crush. Certainly the one that inspired the most wistful daydreaming and locked bedroom door moments. Before her I was especially interested in photos and posters of Heather Locklear, but I’m not sure a crush is the word I’d use. It helped me figure a couple thing out though!
More recently I remember watching Serendipity, a largely forgettable movie, and being completely transfixed by Kate Beckinsale. She wasn’t glammed up and she wasn’t ever really dressed revealingly, so in a way she felt like my first sort of grown-up mature non-testosterone fueled crush. She was just adorable and I think the only reason I could enjoy watching that movie was because I totally could feel how John Cusack’s character was feeling. Talk about painful!
Something like 10 years ago, my dad knew Caroline Rhea’s father for a time, and managed to get a signed picture from her. I never got the chance to meet her, but man did I fantasize about doing so. She was still in her stand-up days before she was tapped for Sabrina the Teenage Witch, and she was cute as hell back then. Still is, but she’s a little more…motherly now.
Growing up, it was Tiffani Thiessen, due to Saved by the Bell, of course.
Currently, I’m not sure. I’ve got a few smittances but nothing that’s really a crush: Al Pacino in The Godfather trilogy; Johnny Depp in Chocolat; Matt Damon in pretty much every movie I’ve seen him in; Edward Norton the same as Damon; Alysson Hannigan in Buffy the Vampire Slayer; Jena Malone in Saved!; and Natalie Portman in, I think, Star Wars: Episode II.
Oh! Duh! Salma Hayek! My first exposure to her was in Fools Rush In, a late nineties comedy film with Matthew Perry. I thought she was gorgeous even then, years before she really hit it big and I still think she’s the most gorgeous woman alive.
My biggest celebrity crush?
Audrey Hepburn, back around 1984 when I was 18, I saw Roman Holiday for the first time and I fell in love with the young Princess in the movie.
I took unrequited love to a new level, not only was she out of my league, but she was out of my time.
Sabrina, Funny Face, Love in the Afternoon, Paris - When It Sizzles & especially Breakfast at Tiffany’s cemented my crush.
Jim
My experience was similar to What Exit?'s. I was a pretty quiet child, mostly kept to myself and my books. One day, due to a lack of reading material mostly, I happened upon an episode of “The Dick Van Dyke Show” and was in love from that moment on. I rushed home from school every day just to see it. My mother caught me watching it and asked why on earth I was watching such an old show. Of course, I knew it was old, it was in black and white afterall, but I never guessed how old. It wasn’t until my mother showed me an episode of “Diagnosis Murder” did I finally realize my secret crush was actually my grandfather’s age. I still find him to be charming and handsome in those old episodes of DVD, and watch them whenever I happen upon one.
Oh, hey! I know Caroline Rhea’s father! He’s very sweet.
This is what I thought of immediately when I read the thread title.
Chris Jansing, MSNBC daytime anchorperson, won my heart the minute I first saw her and still has it.
My long-standing celeb crush on Vivian Campbell started when I saw him in the vid for “Rainbow In The Dark” on late night TV, and then saw a short interview with him right afterward. Those eyes, that accent…I was dead.
And with a movie career.
But yeah, if I still had much of a crush on Connelly, those two moments would be a large part of the reason why. (I now think she’s pretty, and a good actress, even sexy, but she doesn’t still click with me the way Jolie does, or the other denizens of my hypothetical freebie list.)
I swear I don’t (usually) search out threads on the board to talk about him… they just find me. 
Still, as probably the whole universe now knows, it’s Alice Cooper. It started almost 2 years ago after seeing this picture of him sitting in an elevator, legs akimbo with his ever present beer (this was early 70s sometime) and these great cowboy boots. Then you add that hair and that look he gives, I was hooked and that was knowing pretty much nothing about him him beyond Poison. Anyway, I’d take young sweet Alice, hot mid-80s Alice and current Elder Statesman Alice. He’s just got the perfect mix of adorable, intelligent, hilarious, talented and bad ass. Dear Og, there just isn’t anymore to ask for.
Anyone wanna give up their soul so that I can have a chance? I figure if I offer a two-for-one special, I might just be THE winner. 
Hell, I’d even settle for simply one night.
< insert halo here >
Meg White of the white stripes. It’s all in they way they bounce while she plays drums.
Joan Cusack in Addams Family Values - such evil! In such a cute white dress!
nm
Boy, they do, don’t they!