This accompanied the picture (but is too small to read on the picture)

"I like being naked," says Erik Palladino, 32, of his preferred mode of taking to the water.  "I like running around naked. I like the freedom of it." Palladino, who plays the equally self-confident Dr. Dave Malucci on NBC's ER and was in U-571, grew up in Yonkers, New York, the son of a heating contractor and a schoolteacher. Inspired by Robert De Niro in Raging Bull, he majored in theater at Marymount Manhatten College.  A VJ gig on MTV and a load of TV roles came before ER called.  This summer Palladino will be filming Finder's Fee with James Earl Jones in Vancouver.  Back home in Hollywood, he has expanded his skinny-dipping opportunities with the purchase of a new house and pool.  "My next-door- neighbors can see [me] when they're on their upstairs patio," he says, "but I don't mind if they get a quick glimpse."  

 

*photograph by Kenneth Willardt