Showtime has announced the casting of Puerto Rican actress April Lee Hernandez as Miami Metro’s new detective on season 5 of its serial-killer series “Dexter.” Hernandez joins Julia Stiles, Maria Doyle Kennedy, and Shawn Hatosy as one of the show’s newest faces.

Hernandez, who reportedly refers to herself as a “strong Latina woman (translation: loud & hairy),” is best known for playing tough chick roles, such as that of Eva Benitez (pictured above) in the inner-city-high-school drama Freedom Writers.

In other words, she’s no Julie Benz. But, I wouldn’t worry. If Michelle Rodriguez can clean up this well, there’s hope that Hernandez will surprise us when the show returns in the fall.

“True Blood’s” newest fang-banger Natasha Alam is set to glam our penises in the July issue of Playboy magazine. The 27-year-old actress/model will be featured on the cover and inside in an eight-page spread.

Born in Uzbekistan (try finding that on your RISK board), Alam has been toiling around Hollywood for over five years, guest starring on numerous TV shows, the most memorable of which found her playing a tranny night-clubber on HBO’s “Entourage.”  She also starred in Diane English’s 2008 remake of The Women, in which she kissed and felt-up actress Eva Mendez.

Alam’s role on HBO’s vampire-drama “True Blood,” however, is providing the actress’s career with its biggest buzz. And, for good reason. Alam’s character Yvette, a new stripper at Eric Northman’s (Alexander Skarsgard) Fangtasia nightclub, was introduced to viewers while nude, shackled, and fucked in last week’s season 3 premiere “Bad Blood.”

The scene (opposite Skarsgard) marked her first ever nude on-camera performance.

She tells Playboy:

I’d never done nudity. I had to overcome a few things in my head to do it. Then here comes Alexander Skarsgard. He drops his robe, and he’s not wearing a sock — nothing. He’s just totally out there, walking around as if nothing’s going on. I was like, ‘If he can do it, I can do it.’

Alam goes on to discuss both her acting and modeling careers, lesbian tendencies (she had a girlfriend once), and her former marriage to the Shah of Iran’s grandson.

The July issue of Playboy arrives on June 18 and includes an interview with “True Blood’s” lead vamp Stephen Moyer.

To see Alam strut her stuff in a “True Blood” minisode, go here.

The Warner Bros. promo-machine is hard at work this week as its supernatural-western Jonah Hex arrives in theaters on Friday for a showdown with cowboy Woody and his Toy Story 3 posse. While smart money says Hex will most likely bite the dust, the film may have a shot in the dark in its star Megan Fox.

Fox, whose acting chops are often poo-pooed on by snobby film critics and fat chicks, goes the extra mile in Hex to play sexy, hatchet-wielding prostitute Leila. The 23-year-old stunner even went as far as to wear a corset cinched to give her an 18-inch waist.

She tells MTV News:

At the end of the day, when we would take [the corset] off, though, it would leave these deep grooves, these deep indents, from the boning in the corset and I would have it for like the whole next day.

The whole 24 hours I would be imprinted with the corset because it hurts your ribs.

We got it down to 18 inches, but in the action scenes we loosened it up [to 20-inches] because everyone was afraid I would pass out if we had it that tight.

Originally introduced in 1977 by DC Comics, Jonah Hex is a former Confederacy-officer-turned-outlaw-bounty-hunter looking to earn his freedom by helping the U.S. military stop a diabolical madman and his army of evil.

Jonah Hex costars Josh Brolin, John Malkovich, Will Arnett, Michael Shannon, David Jensen, Natacha Itzel, Brandi Coleman, Michael Fassbender, and Aidan Quinn.

Jimmy Hayward (Horton Hears a Who) directs with an assist from Francis Lawrence (I Am Legend).