Male fans of Gossip Girl be warned: Chace Crawford is onto you.

“I’ll be out on the golf course, and some guy will come up to me, sort of sheepishly and be like, ‘Hey, my wife really loves the show,’” says Crawford, who graces the cover of VMAN magazine’s first winter issue. “And I’m like, ‘C’mon man, you love the show.’”

Whether from male or female fans, Crawford, 23, says he’s enjoying the attention. The only drawback to fame? Attention on his own personal life.

“There’s a lot of speculation with no reality to it, complete fabrications about my private life. It’s just comical,” he says. “I let it roll off my back.”

Source:People.com

Things have gotten a little more gossipy for Gossip Girl heartthrobs Chace Crawford and Ed Westwick - but then, the two guys know the territory.

“I just laugh them off,” Westwick told PEOPLE about the discussions heating up the Internet - questioning the nature of his and Crawford’s relationship.

“What are you going to do?” says Westwick. “People who know me and Chace and the cast know that we are all great friends. And that’s the extent of it all. Those things that go around are just amusing to us, really.”

“I thought he was going to be here, said the birthday boy. “I was hoping he would make a show.”

Despite the cast’s non-appearance at the bash, they did send Westwick birthday presents, didn’t they?

Well, no.

“They haven’t gotten me anything, just a ‘Happy Birthday’ and a smile,” Westwick said good-naturedly. “They’re a terrible bunch, aren’t they?”

His family did much better: “I got a really cool, rare whiskey bottle from my cousin.”

As for Gossip Girl, filming has moved from the city to the beach. What can viewers expect? Promises Westwick, “Debauchery and warm weather.”

While Chace Crawford’s Gossip Girl character Nate Archibald may hit all the New York hotspots, in real life the actor plays it cool - especially when it comes to first dates.

“The ideal, I think, when you’re starting out, is something low-key, like playing the %26#91;Nintendo%26#93; Wii, ordering in pizza and then grabbing a beer,” Crawford, 22, told PEOPLE at Wednesday’s launch of the Stoli Hotel in Manhattan.

But come time to step out, the actor says he’d take off “to a concert in Central Park or an NBA basketball game, if she likes sports.” (His teams of choice? “The Dallas Mavericks and the Dallas Cowboys - I’m a Texas kid!”)

“Part of me being single is focusing on my work right now,” says Crawford, who joked, “I’ve been dating my gym bag for a while now.”

When in a relationship, though, the Gossip guy finds himself getting creative in the gift department.

“I like to do artwork and draw,” he says. “I did a big beautiful drawing - and it was very meaningful to %26#91;my girlfriend%26#93;, and she loved it … that’s the kind of stuff that I like to do.”

• Reporting by STEPHANIE RYGORSKY

Surrounded by beauty queens at the Miss USA Pageant on Friday, Gossip Girls’ Chace Crawford only had eyes for one woman: Miss Missouri.

Of course, Miss Missouri is Candice Crawford, Chace’s sister, a 21-year-old blonde beauty who dazzled judges deep into the competition.

But despite a public endorsement from her famous brother, Candice Crawford fell short in her bid to become Miss USA in Las Vegas - that honor went to Miss Texas Crystle Stewart.

While the TV star wasn’t wearing an oversized pin on his lapel like the rest of his family, Crawford’s support was more vocal. When it was announced that

his younger sister made it to the Top 10, Crawford threw his arms in the air, stood up and shouted in celebration.

Underwood.

Judging from Friday though, Crawford will have no trouble finding women. After sitting in his seat in the lower section of Planet Hollywood Hotel’s theater, lines of women began forming with girls hoping to get photos with the star. He obliged until the show began.

Crawford wasn’t the only celebrity in attendance, however. Judges for the event included Joey Fatone, Heather Mills (who was booed by the crowd upon her introduction) and Project Runway winner Christian Siriano.

Prior to the event, Siriano told PEOPLE: “I’m going at it from a very

fashion point of view. Obviously the evening gown and swimsuit portions are very important, so who better to judge that than someone who is actually in fashion?”

Yes, he’s dreamy. But Gossip Girl’s Leighton Meester is shooting down talk of a romance with costar Chace Crawford.

“For the record, not true!” she told PEOPLE at the Monday night at The Help Group’s Annual Teddy Bear Ball, where CW head honcho Dawn Ostroff was being honored.

But the brunette, 21, does admit that Crawford is one of her favorite costars. “I’m really close to Chace,” she said. “We’re really good friends. %26#91;Along with%26#93; Nicole %26#91;Fiscella%26#93;, who plays Isabel on the show. We’re all just really happy people. We have the same views on life.”

Lively, for one, says she’s sick of all the, well, gossip. “The biggest thing I’ve noticed is they kind of want everybody to be their character,” the 20-year-old said. “Like Leighton %26#91;dating%26#93; Chace, and me and Leighton hating each other. Those are our characters on the show - that’s not us in real life.”