FAVORITE FOURTHS, CONFIDENTIAL: p17
IN HONOR OF Independence Day, we’ve asked celebrities about their favorite — or most explosive — Fourth of July memories. Not surprisingly, a lot of them involved fireworks. “Saturday Night Live” alum Andy Samberg (photo inset) had a mishap with pyrotechnics as an adolescent. “I tried to throw a firecracker and it went off right next to my ear,” he tells Confidential. “I was probably in sixth grade. My ear rang for about a week and I was worried that I’d given myself permanent hearing loss. It got better and I was very relieved.” Actress Amy Poehler says her most memorable Fourth of July didn’t happen in America. “I was in a college exchange program and I spent July 4 in Dublin, Ireland, and very drunkenly had to explain what we were celebrating and did a very bad job,” she laughs. “Entourage” star Debi Mazar’s favorite Fourth was “flying out to my home in Tuscany and watching the fireworks below me. That was fierce, like, ‘Bye bitches.’ I got to see the fireworks from above with my kids.”
Trisha Yearwood, who married fellow country star Garth Brooks in 2005, says that’s when the holiday really became a big deal for her. “When I moved to Oklahoma to be with Garth, the Fourth of July became a big thing,” she explained. “My family would come and everybody in Oklahoma does fireworks. We didn’t really do that growing up in Georgia. You could see fireworks in every surrounding town, so that was pretty awesome.”
Naturally, British singer Ed Sheeran didn’t grow up celebrating Independence Day, but he spent the last three of them at pal Taylor Swift’s, alongside her squad, and says, “They’ve all been great.” Colombia native John
Leguizamo, who grew up in Queens, fondly remembers America’s bicentennial bash in 1976.
“That was amazing, Man,” he says. “You saw all New Yorkers come from every part of every neighborhood to be together in Central Park as one. That was unity and inclusiveness, it was a beautiful time — something we need in America desperately right now.”
Tony winner Sutton Foster was in Washington performing “Les Misérables” one year and remembers going to the White House to watch the fireworks.
“I got to shake President Clinton’s hand and I was eating an ice cream pop and my hands were covered with chocolate and I was like, ‘Hello, Mr. President!’ It was incredible. It was such a great moment.”