Rumor has it, the guy's a player

HE'S a Hollywood gossipmonger's dream and a troubled celebrity's nightmare. He's like US Weekly, the Star, the Enquirer and Life & Style all rolled into one sweet yet snarky, sagacious yet salacious gay man. Mario Lavandeira, better known as Perez Hilton, he of the eponymous website, is so popular he is becoming a celebrity in his own right, scoring loads of swag at Sundance and hanging with his "cousin" Paris Hilton at parties.

The regular features on Perez's photo-illustrated website include celebrity gossip, of course, but also "Separated at Birth" photos (a recent pairing: the old Star Jones and the new porky Britney Spears); "Personally Perez," about his celebrity interactions and party hopping; animated shorts (including the hilarious "Dirty Colin," a riff on the infamous Colin Farrell sex tape); and "Wacky, Tacky and True." He is also known for his celebrity nicknames: "Baby Zahara" for Nicole Richie, the Federjerk for Kevin Federline.

Perez started his website in 2004 as pagesixsixsix.com, a play on the New York Post's gossip page, and debuted perezhilton.com in May 2005.

What sets it apart from other celebrity gossip sites, Perez says, is that while other sites have a tone, his has an identity, the "character" he has created. "I also actively and aggressively try to break stories on a daily basis," he says, relying on contacts including friends in the industry and at celebrity magazines, restaurant and shop workers, publicists and celebrities themselves.

Perez came to L.A. to pursue an acting career after graduating from the Tisch School of the Arts in New York and started his website for fun while working a temp job at E!, a position he lost after blogging about a particularly memorable visit to his workplace by Janice Dickinson, the erstwhile big meanie, uber-Botoxed judge on "America's Next Top Model." He still does his website for fun, but with about 600,000 hits daily, it is now his day job, and doubles as a party-invitation and swag magnet.

Perez has made a few enemies along the way. He was once elbowed in the face at a club by a friend of Richie.

Now he's on E! News, has a reality show in development called "Gossip Queen," a book deal and a regular stalker.

"Do you want to hear some gossip?" Perez, 28, asks in a conspiratorial stage whisper as we walk down Robertson Boulevard one recent Saturday. "Allegedly ..." It was a juicy tidbit about Tom Cruise and, sorry, it was off the record.