The 2010 Hot List: Nicki Minaj, 'Jackass 3D,' Elle Fanning and More

Nicki Minaj blew away Kanye West, Rick Ross and Jay-Z on Kanye's "Monster" this fall with her breathlessly careening, 32-bar verse about brain-eating and moneymaking. Her schizoid gifts (on display on her debut LP, Pink Friday, out this month) propelled the Queens native, 25, to the top of the hip-hop heap. After making her mixtape bow, she came under Lil Wayne's warped tutelage and uncorked her inner drama brat (she studied theater in high school), feigning accents, switching personae, upping the thrills. "I don't want to symbolize sex. I don't want to be sexy to boys. But if it's sexy to the girls, it's cute," she says.