Hilary for President

At 19, most of us are zapping the last of our zits and flicking the lint from our pocket change so we can swing the two-tacos-for-99-cents deal at Jack-in-the-Box. Then again, most us aren't 19-year-old Hilary Duff, the TV/movie/pop/video game/clothing-line/fragrance star.

Duff, best known as the awkward teen Lizzie McGuire of boob-tube and silver-screen fame, rakes in about $15 mil per. She's worked with the likes of Madonna, Steve Martin, George Lopez, and John Cusack. She's released three platinum albums, two of which have hit No. 1. She's been stalked, parodied on Celebrity Death Match, and won Razzie awards for her acting. (Razzie. Bad. Opposite of Oscar.)

But give the girl some love. She's no tabloid train wreck like Lindsay Lohan, and though her music is as fluffy as a designer pancake, the fluff factor has diminished with each album. Somewhere inside Duff's cult of personality is a real talent aching to bust out, and someday she just might do it, à la her contemporary Anne Hathaway, who parlayed roles in flicks like The Princess Diaries and Ella Enchanted into critically acclaimed grown-up fare like Brokeback Mountain and the new Becoming Jane.
Sun., Aug. 19, 7 p.m.