Enveloped in black and shooting a tough-girl glare, Christina Ricci is the very picture of confidence on the cover of October's BlackBook magazine. But as the accompanying interview proves, appearances can be deceiving.

Ricci, who was photographed by Yu Tsai, strikes a series of sexy poses inside the Obsessions Issue, grabbing her chest and hiking up the hem of her crocheted, off-the-shoulder dress, and gazing longingly in a strapless number with a flirty, ruffled trim.

But despite the steamy photos, Ricci doesn't think of herself as a bombshell, says "Black Snake Moan" co-star Samuel L. Jackson.



"Some people don't see Christina as a classic beauty, and nobody saw [her character] Rae as a classic beauty," he tells the magazine. "She internalizes that when people talk about other actresses like Scarlett Johansson. But I find Christina's beauty classic in a Raphaelic way, and when she gets dressed up, she's as pretty as any girl in Hollywood - I just don't think she sees herself that way."

In fact, Ricci confesses, she struggled with an eating disorder as a teen. "I had been really anorexic until I was like 16," she tells BlackBook. "They were going to hospitalize me, and I was worried about people force-feeding me through a tube. I didn't want that, so I fought the disease."

Having successfully battled it, 30-year-old Ricci says she has no intention of going back there again. "I remember the overwhelming feeling of hopelessness when I was in the middle of it. My brain had basically become my biggest tormentor," she says. "I'd become afraid of myself."

Ricci's healthy, svelte body is on full display in one BlackBook photo in which she stands defiantly with her hands on her hips while wearing a leopard-print swimsuit. It's certainly not the first time she's gotten attention for wearing animal attire: In 2006, she enraged PETA after posing for W magazine in reindeer fur.

"I'm sorry, but I was being shot by Mert & Marcus," says Ricci, currently making her Broadway debut in "Time Stands Still." "I wore what they told me to wear, and guess what? So would you. But I didn't realize I was wearing reindeer. Of all the things I could have worn, I wore Rudolph."

In related news, check out Naomi Campbell on the current cover of Interview magazine.