Staking a Claim

Gellar's a smooth showbiz pro indeed. She's been at this thing a lot longer than The WB — since she appeared in a Valerie Harper TV movie at age 4. Eleven years later, she joined All My Children as Kendall Hart, the devious, stepfather-seducing spawn of Susan Lucci's Erica Kane. Off screen, according to tabloid reports, it was no love match either. ''It wasn't the easiest of working conditions,'' is all Gellar will say. (That Gellar won a 1995 Daytime Emmy probably didn't help matters with the trophy-challenged Lucci.)

More recently, another report implied that Gellar will pull a Caruso and ditch Buffy. No, insists the actress, who is trying to renegotiate her current deal (which allows her to squeak by on $30,000 per episode). ''I love this show. I know it's launched my movie career. I will absolutely be back next year.'' Good thing, for a Buffy-free Buffy wouldn't quite work. ''Sarah's got that TV-star thing,'' says creator Joss Whedon. ''When you watch, you feel a kinship. You go through what she goes through.''

But her gig as the slayer won't prevent her from squeezing in a handful of other projects. This hiatus, a dark-haired Gellar will shoot Cruel Inventions, a Dangerous Liaisons update; and she just guest-voiced on a future episode of King of the Hill, as Bobby's girlfriend. But she's most animated discussing a fantasy cameo, one on Dawson's Creek. It is, after all, created by Williamson, the man responsible for offing Gellar in her two recent big-screen flicks. "When they have the drunk-driving episode, I want to be the kid who's killed. I'm obsessed. I willget killed." Just not in the ratings.

(Additional reporting by Joe Flint)