I met...

[grady]

In continuing with the thread in the Headset forum, I though we could have the same in the treatment forum.

This past week I was in France and spent Wednesday and Thursday morning in Paris before leaving Thursday afternoon.

Wednesday afternoon after walking along the Seine with my friend Michael we stopped at a cafe on the Rue Saint Germaine st. to have some coffee and take a break. I was describing to him how Wes Anderson was living in Paris for a few months working on his script and pre-production for the new film adaptation of The Fantastic Mr. Fox.

After we left the cafe and walked no less than a block continuing to discuss The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou and The Royal Tenenbaums we passed another cafe and there was Wes Anderson. I had to stop and went up and spoke to him. He was incredibly gracious and I even got my picture with him. I mentioned to him that I knew he was living in Paris as Noah Baumbach had mentioned it recently in a NY Times interview and working on the screenplay for The Fantastic Mr. Fox. He introduced me to the british woman he was with and then we left the both of them. That made the day for me being in Paris.

.....another story.

Last month Bret Easton Ellis was at Powell's books in Portland doing a reading from his newest novel Lunar Park. During the Q and A someone asked about the film version of The Rules of Attraction. Bret responded and then added that if anyone had any questions, the writer/director of the film Roger Avary was in the back of the room making everyone's heads turn a bit.

After the reading Roger then proceeded to talk with a bunch of people for close to an hour about films and books and whatnot before moving over to chat with Bret and a few people. Another great time and conversation, albiet much longer as Roger was very very friendly and was bouncing from talking about the upcoming Silent Hill adaptation he wrote for Christopher Gans to the lifetime rights of Bret Easton Ellis novel Glamorama he just purchased with the money he'd made off selling his script for Beowolf to Bob Zemmicks that he and Neil Gaimen had written.

It was a great time talking with Roger and then with Bret and Roger. Roger was arguing with Bret about how Roger likes to place resteraunt reservations as Britney Spears and Kevin Fedderline's(sp) reps to make sure they still have tables. Bret was then complaining and whining to Roger about how he always is doing this.
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[the mongoose]

a few years back a friend of mine invited me to a small coastal fishing town in FL because a film crew was going to blow up the house next door to his grandmother's house there for a film called "Coastlines".

Went to the set and got to meet and hang out with Timothy Olyphant!

and got to see a house blow up right in front of me!

[bklyndv]

Best celeb meeting I've had recently was Bill Murray. He and his son came in to the restaurant I was working at at the time and, in the middle of being crushed from the busy-ness of the night, I look over at my boss and he says "And no, we will not be doing anything special for Mr. Murray."

I look over at table 31, and there's Bill and one of his sons. I've waited on scores of celebs over the years, and I'm never nervous. But it's Bill Murray, probably one of my top 5 "Who would you like to dine with at your last meal?" types. I approached and gave them the schpiel, and he said "Why don't you just send us some food."

"How hungry are you?"

"On a scale of 1 to 10, I'd say about 7."

So I sent them some stuff and throughout the meal we chat and I generally do my best to get him laughing (and he returns the gesture.) At the end of the meal, I ask him what he liked best, saying "'cus clearly it wasn't the service." Overall he was very much the kind of person that reminds me of my family -- same dry sense of humor.

He ordered a few bottles of wine, one of which he insisted I have with him. I got a glass, poured about 2oz. He kept motioning "more, more." So, I'm about half-way up the glass (a big, 13oz glass) and he goes from gesturing "more" to abruptly cutting me off -- "Whoa pal. OK you overdid it there. I still want you to come back to work tomorrow."

I stood there drinking it on the floor which is flat out against service decorum but I was like "Fuck it. It's Bill mutherfuckin Murray!" My entire section of tables was sinking like a rock and I couldn't have been happier

At the end, he stood up and said "I'm Bill." We shook hands. He tipped HUGE, then went to the bar to finish his wine and really engaged all the other guests around. Hung out for about another hour just chatting and laughing with people.

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Same place, months ago. This woman and a group comes in and everyone I work with -- actors and dancers, mostly -- fall over themselves. "It's Ann Reinking!"

Me: "Who?"

As it turns out, she's probably most widely known for being "Grace" in the onscreen version of Annie. But her history as a dance choreographer is legendary. She's in Mad, Hot Ballroom apparently. I'm not kidding when I say I felt like she was waiting on me, she was so gracious. Just polite and bent over backwards to help me with my night.

About halfway through the meal, I keep looking at this guy to her left, and I think, "Man, that looks like an old Roy Scheider. Just like he looked in Jaws, but older."

Then it hits me -- Roy Scheider is older than he was in Jaws. It was Roy, and he couldn't have been a kinder, smarter kind of guy than I could expect.
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Same place. Joel Coen and Frances McDormand are regulars and cool, "average" people. Just come in, do their thing, are nice, etc.

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Taylor Hackford is an ass and as far as I'm concerned his movies make his name a self-fulfilling prophecy. Hack. I'm no longer at that job, so I feel I can spill the story without worry: this fat guy in a ski parka comes in with a young, evidently rich couple (they had the sort of tan, hair and teeth that says it all.)

He's talking so much that it's taking him 20-30 mins more than his companions to finish each course, which makes it tough to guage when to get the kitchen preparing the next courses. In the middle of their second course, a busser innocently offers to clear his plate (which he hasn't touched for 15-20 mins) and you would think Hackford had been spit onby his response, "You see THIS?! This is what I mean when I say in Europe service is SO MUCH BETTER than service in the states. NO, I'M NOT FINISHED. I'll TELL YOU when I'm done."

So I go over there and say "I'm sorry but it was just an offer -- if you're not finished, please take your time and enjoy your meal." I'm interrupted by his companions -- at the time I didn't know who he was -- "Taylor, relax -- they're just trying to be helpful." He proceeds to lecture them and anyone within earshot how "proper service" is supposed to be. I guess he thinks he's Orson Wells doing a commercial shoot -- "You get a jury show me where it says you should clear my plate and I'll go down on you..."

Anyway, at the end of the meal, I've been hearing him talk about Cannes quite a bit and I'm trying to do some minor damage control at this point. So I say "I heard you talking about movies earlier and I was wondering if you have advice on what's good?"

The lady across from him blurts out "Ray -- and he directed it!"

I really couldn't hold back my disinterest. After a second I managed to say "So, Jamie Foxx? He's talented."
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Kate Mulgrew came in with two blonde girls, they looked no older than 10. Kate Mulgrew is the kind of star you look at and it bugs the hell out of you because you know you've seen that face, but where...???

She's got a fantastic voice, and when I mentioned to a co-worker she sounded like Kathryn Hepburn, Mulgrew's identity clicked for him "She played Hepburn on stage! Oh, and she was on one of those sci-fi shows." Then it hit me -- of course, the female captain on Star Trek (not that I'm the type, just something I vaguely remember.)

Well, I'd cruise by her table throughout the meal and she was going to great lengths to tell what I assumed was a kid's story to these two girls -- taking on different voices for each character and going through some intense motions with her hands.

So, you could imagine my amusement when I heard "...and what could she do?! There was blood all over the place! Blood running down her dress and there was no taxi in SIGHT!"

WTF?

- jim

[GforGroove]

I met John Waters 2 weeks ago in NY
wasn't as kitsch as i would thought.. the man is a gentleman.

[Animal Boything]

One of my dad's best friends from high school is an animator... not somebody you've heard of, I'm sure, but well-respected within the industry. He does things like the Hershey's Kisses commercials, and he tends to hang out with interesting people.

I recently went to take a tour of his studio (Carl's Fine Films in San Francisco) and he started doing magic tricks for me and my brother... a hobby of his. A fellow came in to say he was ready for his meeting, and Carl goes "Hold on, I'm busy right now," and goes back to the magic tricks. Then a couple minutes later he's like "I'd better take this meeting. Oh, by the way, that's the guy who animated Gollum on Lord of the Rings." And we're all like holy shit, he kept THE GUY WHO ANIMATED GOLLUM waiting so he could finish his magic trick?

We got to talk to the dude briefly. I forget his name, but I did spot him on the RotK DVD a couple months later. He was very nice and told us we were gonna love King Kong and that it would make us cry.

Carl is also a good friend of David Fincher, so me and my brother have had a few opportunities to hear interesting second-hand things about him. For instance, the line "She should be shaved, sterilized, and destroyed" in 12 Monkeys was something Carl said (about whom, I forget) to Brad Pitt when Fincher introduced them, and I guess he liked it enough to use it as an ad-lib.

[b.miller]

...i just played poker with Gus from Red vs. Blue... does that count?

[grady]

Originally Posted by b.miller

...i just played poker with Gus from Red vs. Blue... does that count?

hehe...that is pretty damn cool.