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The VLT interferometer has been operating since the time of first fringes in March 2001 with a pair of 40 cm diameter siderostats at baselines of 16 and 66 m and, since October 2001, with a pair of 8 m diameter telescopes (UT1 and UT3) with a baseline of 103 m using the test camera VINCI operating in the K band. A fair fraction of its commissioning time has been devoted to observing a number of objects of scientific interest around the southern sky bright enough to allow high precision visibilities to be obtained on a routine basis. A large number of stellar sources with correlated magnitudes brighter than K $\sim 7$ and K $\sim 3$ with the 8 m and 40 cm telescopes respectively have been observed over this time period with limited (u,v) plane coverage. In this paper, we will briefly report on the present status of the VLTI and review the most interesting results on sources such as Eta Carinae, R Aquarii, and a number of Cepheid variables for which the VLTI data allow the establishment of tighter constraints on theoretical models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]