April 18, 2000
Erin Brockovich was big business as usual for Julia Roberts, but it was something else for Aaron Eckhart, who played the husband. It was break-out time.

And that's the reason Eckhart won't be here to start shooting Angel Eyes next month with Jennifer Lopez.

Eckhart was to play the male love interest and Lopez' co-star. Insiders say that the actor's "personal guidance team" sensed, after the release of Erin Brockovich, that he could get more lines and more money in some other project.

Officially, the word is that writer-director Luis Mandoki re-wrote the movie, diminishing Eckhart's part, and forcing the actor to say, 'No thanks.'

Eckhart is reviewing his next career-shaping move and hoping that his performance in the upcoming Nurse Betty does as much as Erin Brockovich did for him.

Meanwhile, Lopez' boyfriend Sean 'Puffy' Combs may or may not visit Lopez here from New York. The rapper has two choices. He can quietly come in and out. Or he can see if he has to apply for a Canadian immigration sort-of-permit thanks to a second- degree harassment conviction and weapons charge stemming from an incident at a nightclub in the U.S.