Yesterday I went grocery shopping at one of the Ralph's in my neighborhood. In the soda aisle, I noticed this guy looking rather intently in the area where the Pepsi products were, apparently searching for some hard-to-find drink. He was carrying one of the baskets rather than wheeling around a shopping cart, and it was already pretty full. Although he looked somewhat familiar, I kept moving on to the next aisle and the rest of my shopping.
When I finished, I took a place in a checkout line. There are never enough lines open, so I took the one that seemed to be moving the fastest. And the same guy was again in front of me. As he was speaking to the cashier, I realized how I knew him. He's on every Thursday night on CSI: Crime Scene Investigation. That's right. William Peterson was buying a rather obscene amount of beef and quite a few of those little half-cans of Diet Pepsi. I don't even think the cashier or bagger recognized him. He was just wearing a t-shirt and jeans and baseball cap--the uniform of an off-duty actor in this town. Oh, and the sunglasses, of course.
By the way, this is the same Ralph's where I saw Kyle McLachlin shopping in his pajama bottoms and t-shirt and black leather jacket a couple of years ago; this was just before he started on Desperate Housewives. The Trader Joe's across the street is where I saw Dan Futterman the day before the Oscar ceremony when he was nominated for Best Screenplay for Capote; even unshaven, he's still adorable. Jennifer Beals uses the same dry cleaner I do (and is even more heart-stoppingly beautiful in person, if you can believe it). I also ran into Nicholas Brendan, better known as Xander on the TV series Buffy the Vampire Slayer, in (of all places) the 7-11 nearby and at Mani's Bakery a couple of days later; I began to think we were destined to "meet cute," as they say, but such was not the case, alas. And there's no way I could list all of the people who like to go to the movies at the Grove down the block (the most recent was John Krasinski of The Office). The highlight of celebrity sightings for me, though, was going to see Finding Nemo at the now defunct Beverly Connection cinema and standing in line behind Matthew Perry, Hank Azaria, and Craig Bierko. When the promo for The Whole Ten Yards came on the screens above the concession stand, Matthew Perry turned and asked me (me?!) if I thought I'd go see it. I didn't, of course, but at the time, I assured him that it looked funny--they are all rather insecure, aren't they? I think I was still a bit mesmerized by Bierko's eyes; he's a very tall fellow and quite the looker. The list of celebrity sightings could go on: Mr. Blackwell in the produce section with his partner, Ed McMahon and a huge family in tow at the Beverly Center, tiny little Leeza Gibbons on her way to see The Horse Whisperer (don't ask me why), Doug Savant (when he was still on Melrose Place) shopping for Christmas presents at the Glendale mall, former supermodel and extremely high-maintenance diva Janice Dickinson, Robert Urich shopping with his mom at the Farmer's Market (and almost being stalked by my mother, who had never seen a famous person that close to her).
Now perhaps none of these people is the most famous star in the entertainment business (although I did also sit in the same movie theater as Halle Berry once--also stunning enough to take your breath away), but they are all well-known to a degree, certainly. It's a bit disconcerting to see them doing such normal, mundane things as shopping or picking up dry cleaners or going to the movies. You wonder why they have to get their hands dirty the way we do. It really does, to me, reduce the level of mystery surrounding "celebrity status" when you know that they too need a chocolate fix and have to run to the neighborhood 7-11 in the middle of the night. Or even that they have to stock up on meat products for the week ahead. Yet there is something that sets them apart from us, even when they are engaging in the same kinds of chores and errands we are. I'm not prone to fawning--in fact, other than Matthew Perry, I've never spoken to any of the celebrities I've seen--but there's something about them that allows them to maintain a sense of distance from us even in close proximity. I guess that's what they call "star quality."
1 comment:
Well, I'm not going to be as eloquent as you, my dear, but here's my list. (And I do love lists.)
Vince Vaughn -- at least twice. The first time was at the 101 Coffeshop where swingers was actaully filmed, what a coincidence! The second was at a Royal Crown Revue concert after Psycho had been released. I dared go up and asked an autograph for my friend "Brooke," (okay, I was nineteen! Or twenty! It was the guy from Swingers!) and I mentioned to him that he was good in Rudy, and had he done anything since then? No, I didn't, but his hands were incredibly soft, like a baby's face, and his leather jacket felt like butter. We weren't suprised when later in the evening we saw him hanging out with his buddy John Faverau who we saw dancing and was really sweaty.
These are all the people I've seen at the Beverly Jerry's Deli:
John Voight -- we sat right across from him on Christmas Day.
John Lovitz
Andy Dick
I don't know if their subsequent fight had anything to do with corned beef, but we didn't see them there at the same time.
Seen at the Beverly Center:
Queen Latifah
Ethan Embry
John Corbett
Moesha
Ozzy Osbourne (Rode in the elevator with him at the height of The Osbourne's fame. He seemed fragile.)
I've seen Elijah Wood twice at concerts. The first was at a White Stripes show at the Greek: I was letting this two super short guys go by me after the lights had gone down, their seats were like two down from me and I was thinking, gee, these short guys have nice clothes on. It was Dominic Monahan and Elijah Wood. As we were leaving after the show, Elijah got bombarded with girlie fans, and all of them going "I'm such a fan!!" and I, being the LOTR loyalist, already knew that Monahan had played Merry, so I said, Dominic? and he shook my hand, and I said, I'm your biggest fan! Like the others were saying about Wood, and then I was all, oh, I'm just kidding. I don't think he thought it was that cool. Movie stars are so intimidating! Then a couple of weeks later I was at a small show at the El Rey, and Wood and Monahan come in with a drunk girl entourage, and I was like, hmm.
Todd and I were shopping at Fred Segal and Todd was in the men's section, and I went to the bathroom there, which is a mirrored door that you wouldn't normally think was a bathroom. So I make a beeline to this mirror and literally almost bump into Usher. I think we touched, actually. He was scared, because he didn't know it was a door, and then he felt stupid when I was like, whatever, I'm going to the bathroom, freak. Todd told me later that it was Usher, and was astounded that I didn't notice him and his entourage and his giant bodygaurd. Hey, it's L.A. It's all the same to me.
Mischa Barton and Brandon Oil Guy at the movies at the Grove.
Sean "Puffy" Combs, like three times out and about.
Debbie Harry shopping on Melrose.
Winona Ryder shopping at Ardvarks on Melrose. (I was starstruck! She was right by me! Inner squeal!)
Todd was at a function for Land Rover in L.A. and started talking to this guy and felt really familiar with him, and was talking with him for half and hour. On his drive home he realized that it was Gary Oldham!
We sat at the table with Merv Griffin when we went to the re-opening of the Cococut Grove at the Beverly Hills Hotel. (Swing days) We told Merv that we had gotten engaged and he took my hand and bit the diamond on my ring.
Shook hands with Arnold Schwarzinegger at the Irvine Spectrum (we just happened to be there when they were showing a special screening of the Terminator 3, before he announced his plans for office, and later we were like, yeah, the natzis that run Irvine are a good force to have on your side in governor's race). He's very orange in person.
Todd happened to be on the lot at Paramount one day and saw Angelica Huston and Christina Ricci going to set in full costume, and went on the Cheers! set, which turned into the Fraiser set.
Lastly, I was at a show at the Troubador and Elishah Cuthbert was there, and she was standing in my way, I moved her with my arm. Okay, I moved her kind of hard. She was in the traffic zone! (the line of space from the bar to the bathroom.)
Oh, and Woody Harrelson at a P.J. Harvey concert. Flea (of the RHCP) was there as well.
Oh, and I can't forget that during one of the myriad times CSI has been filmed in or around my building, Todd went out by the set with his big Cannon EOS and David Carouso MOTIONED HIM OVER and was all too ready with a wallet sized double sided headshot autographed in his COSTUME POCKET!! That was the funniest of all.
Oh! and most recently I was at this little restaraunt across the street from the Arclight, I think it was called The Cat, or Little Cat, or something, and America Fererra was there. She's actually like 4'11 and not all that fat, and really really pretty.
You can't help but trip over movie stars in this town. And Vince Vaughn was my first and last autograph.
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