Liz Hurley joins cast of US show ‘Gossip Girl’

Liz Hurley, gossip column perennial, swimsuit designer and girlfriend of Australian cricketer Shane Warne, is to join the cast of the US teen drama series Gossip Girl, prompting the show's young audience to ask: 'She acts as well?'

Er, well, yes, sort of....

It's seven years since Hurley was last seen in a movie role - Method, in which she played a serial killer - while her last TV outing, as a villain in a new version of Wonder Woman, fell through when the show was rejected by NBC in May.

Hollywood's institutional sexism is often behind a mid-career dip for female actors - Hurley was 46 last month - as they pass from youth into middle age, but even Hurley's fondest friends can't claim she was ever more than a passable comic foil.

The career highs of Bedazzled, the so-so remake of the Peter Cook classic, and Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me are long behind her, as are the accompanying reviews. "There is nothing so unsexy as bad acting," wrote Jason Solomons in the Mail on Sunday, reviewing Bedazzled in 2000. "She garbles the words and rushes through the jokes as if she just can't wait to try on another outfit."

Happily, the producers of Gossip Girl don't seem to be too bothered about her acting skills, telling the media her "sense of humour, intelligence and beauty fit the GG world perfectly". ·