Thursday, May 07, 2015
Blind Item #3- Kindness
At a film festival this past weekend, this B list mostly movie actor from some of the biggest box office movies of all-time who took a turn on a pretty decent cable show was the perfect example of how you want an actor to be when you invite them to an event. Throughout the entire weekend, no matter what he was doing or who he was with the actor would step away from his conversation or meal and smile and take a photo with the fan. No matter how many times this went on all weekend, the actor repeated the process tons of times and always smiled and always took a minute for each fan.
Billy Zane?
ReplyDeleteSteve Buschemi
ReplyDeleteor Bill Macy
ReplyDeleteNow that's how a grateful celebrity should act.
ReplyDeleteI know I'm being a bitch, but isn't that why they were invited to an "event" that included *fans*? For real...isn't that the entire purpose of their attendance? I'm obviously missing some important thing that everyone else seems to understand because I feel like me showing up, sitting at my desk, attending meetings and generally doing my job should be considered a *kindness*.
ReplyDeleteNo fans = no career.
I'll try to shut up the rest of the day - this crap just really bugs me.
Woody Harrelson
ReplyDeleteExcept During a meal,it is totally normal that the actor is gracious with the fans when he is invited( so paid) to a festival
ReplyDeleteWhy not a blind about how Walhberg,Bale or some rappers were gracious with the fans last weekend when they were at MGM for the fight?
I agree that this is how a celebrity should act but if these blinds prove anything it's that some celebs consider themselves above this behavior once they get an ounce of fame. It's refreshing to hear that some stars still understand their job description. kudos to whomever this celeb is. :-)
ReplyDeletegood guess
ReplyDeleteIt was a film festival. He wasn't brought to go eat dinner and then shake hands and take pics with people that come up to him when he's eating. Depending on the film festival you're usually going to some small theater and doing a Q&A, usually with a person on stage and sometimes with questions from the audience. Then you show up to a movie and if you can go over to the fans waiting and sign autographs and take a picture or 2.
ReplyDeleteThis isn't like a charity event where you show up, walk the red carpet, and then walk around the party talking to people and trying to get them to donate money to the cause. For cancer related charities they usually will have several people that are battling the illness, or are survivors and you meet with them and take pics. Most of the time film festivals are held over the course of several days or weeks. You're not there for a full 3 days or week 2 walk all around town signing autographs and taking pictures.
Just some thoughts from someone that's been through it. I don't know if this really qualifies as a kindness, but, and you can call me ungrateful, but people coming up to you in a restaurant when you're eating or talking with someone is pretty rude. Ok, it's not rude when the fan is really polite, but a lot of the fans are super rude and demanding. But thinking that someone is "always on the clock" is fucking ridiculous. When you clock out from work do you go home and have your boss call you asking to do things off the clock? Yeah, I know we're public figures and all that, it's BS. Our jobs are go to a set, act, do photoshoots for that movie, do interviews for that movie, go to premiers and pose for photos and do more interviews, then go to meet and greets with fans and taking pics with them, then you go to special screenings where you do a Q&A with fans. That's the job.
I don't think anyone in the acting world really believes doing all the things other than acting aren't part of the job. But we're not always on. "No fans = no career," doesn't mean we don't get off time. Times when we're not working on a movie or doing press for a movie, and out with our families or whatever. We are not your property. Yes, people are fans of the actor or director, but ultimately we want them to be a fan of the characters we play. If they think the person behind the character is an asshole? Well I'm at the point where I think, "You're loss. I might have been a dick to you, but I still act to the best of my abilities and you will be missing out on an awesome movie." Plenty of people in Hollywood have no fans, yet they have a career. The reality is most acting roles in a movie are not expected to bring in any fans. The star of the movie is expected to, or if it's something like Batman then the character is expected to bring people in. The director, or sometimes a producer can also bring people in. But the person that's 3rd lead? They're not really expected to bring anyone in. It would be nice if they did, but they're not expected to.
I'll put it this way, based on friends I have at Warner Brothers, no one is expecting Margot Robbie to be the one bringing in fans, or any of the other guys on that cast not named Will Smith or Jared Leto. They're expecting Joker to bring people in, not Jai Courtney.
*sorry for the length. have downtime & nothing to do at the moment.*
JayJay your comment makes me think of that quote from Clueless. "What's a Monet? From far away it's OK, but up close its a big old mess."
ReplyDeleteI'm a mess? I know it sounded like I was saying that I have no problem being rude to a fan that's interrupted dinner, but I'm actually not like that. The "you're lose" was more about things I've said in an interview that some people wouldn't like. Like making a joke and some tiny portion of people getting upset about it and saying they won't go see me in a movie.
ReplyDeleteElijah Wood? Idk.
ReplyDeleteReally?? A kindness blind for acting like a decent person. I guess the bar is pretty low for celebs.
ReplyDeletethis is Elijah Wood and he has a reputation for being down to earth and nice to everyone this isn't a surprise but it's nice to hear he is a normal person.I looked up what film festivals were recent and then his Twitter and it looks like he was at one .
ReplyDeleteNot a mess, just a normal human. poor choice of quote. Honestly I'm still just bitter over that one time I met Anne Rice and she was a complete bitch to me! LOL
ReplyDeleteBut I also met the guy who played Krixus in Spartacus and he made my knees watery. So on balance, I guess it's a coin toss.
Manu Bennett! He's fantastic! Glad to hear he's good to fans.
ReplyDeleteI want it to be Woody H but can't find pics of him at press events or festivals recently. I like the Elijah Wood guess
ReplyDeletelook at a tumblr called eternallyelijah.tumblr .com I'm convinced
ReplyDeleteI think I finally solved a blind XD is this what it feels like being a detective?? lol
ReplyDeleteI agree with the Elijah Wood guess
ReplyDeleteIs that you Jimmy "JJ" Walker?
ReplyDeleteA Woman’s Work, Belfast Film Festival: this week’s new film events Saturday 11 April 2015 04.00 EDT
ReplyDeleteA Woman’s Work | Belfast Film Festival | Alchemy Film Festival | London Independent Film Festival
http://www.theguardian.com/film/2015/apr/11/this-weeks-new-film-events
I met James Gandolfini at a casino in Indiana of all places and the guy was so charming and kind. We had a drink and talked for about an hour. Sweetest guy ever and I actually cried when he died like I lost a friend.
ReplyDeleteThat works!
ReplyDeleteLee Pace? Hobbit, GoftG and Halt and Catch Fire on a&e(?) i think
ReplyDelete"*sorry for the length. have downtime & nothing to do at the moment.*"
ReplyDeleteCan I have your autograph then?
Hey Mom, You got it!!! how appropriate with Mother's Day coming Up and All !!!
ReplyDeleteI think @JayJay makes some valid points in his post. Actors are humans. Despite their fame and celebrity they still have to do everyday mundane human things (unless they pay someone to do those things for them) i.e. go grocery shopping, pay bills, shuttle the kids to and from school and/or activities, get a haircut, go to the doctor, etc.
ReplyDeleteI'm no celebrity, but I know there are times when I'm "on" and times when I'm "off". I try to be cordial and genuine in public, but sometimes you just want to do what you have to do without too much interference from the outside world. Maybe you don't feel well or didn't spend an iota of time getting ready just to run a quick errand.
Anyway, I can see the need for some quality downtime and un-interrupted time with friends, colleagues, or family where intrusion by even the best-meaning fan is seen as a put-off.
I've met celebrities that I admired for their work that were absolute asshats in person and others that I hadn't paid much attention to that were pretty cool (and vice-versa). The celebs I do come into contact with I tend to treat as I would any normal person in a public setting and I certainly wouldn't walk up to Joe Blow during his dinner at a restaurant and expect him to be accommodating and cordial if we didn't already know one another.
GET AWAY FROM ME!!!!!! SECURITY!!!!! :p
ReplyDeleteThe thing I try to do when working with people who are being awful human beings is to remember that I don't know what's happening in that person's personal life. I met a fan and talked to them for a little bit. They thanked me for not being an asshole (Although talking about this kind of makes me an asshole, doesn't it?) the fan talked about meeting an actress. She had just rounded a corner and he approached to try and get a picture. She was rude and stormed off. I told him, "For all you know she might have just got off the phone with her mother who told her that her dad's cancer is back."
ReplyDeleteI don't know if that's what the issue was. She could just be a rude person that is always that way, but you never know what a person is going through. People can have bad days, bad weeks, bad months, or even bad years. One other story to tell is about a friend of mine that was out to dinner with his wife at the time. Their relationship wasn't going great and he knew it, but he loved her and in something that might shock CDAN readers, he never cheated on her. I don't think she cheated on him either. They grew apart and she began to be very cold towards him. They had been in an argument in the car ride to the resturaunt. He sits down and tries to apologize, say he was wrong, basically trying to salvage the evening. After a little time she finally says, "I can't do this anymore." then talked about how she would always love him... Seconds after she told him this, seconds after learning that his marriage was over a fan approached. This particular fan wasn't very polite. He signs an autograph, then they ask for a picture, so he takes a quick one, then the fan wants to have a conversations with him and he tries to tell her that he's very sorry but he's on a date with his wife. The fan blows up at him. The fan yells a bunch of stuff that others on this site have said in the comments of stories about a celeb being bad to a fan.
The next day blinds start appearing that are clearly about him. Over the next couple days the story pops up all over the place. So now a lot of fans think he's a jerk who thinks he's better than others. It's not remotely true, he's always been good to fans, but that one incident led to him being labeled an asshole. Point to these long winded stories is that you have no idea what someone, celebrity or otherwise, is going through. A guy could approach an actress on the street and come away thinking she's "a bitch" because she gave him a look that he thought was a "fuck you," or that she was saying, "you're scum!" But the reality is, the guy approached with that wide eyed look and huge grin that a lot of people have when they approach a celebrity. To tell you the truth, that look is terrifying. It's a look I would expect to see on a serial killer's face right before they murder me. To a woman I'd imagine it's even scarier. You could probably go online and find some guy talking about how he hates her, or how she's a bitch because she rushed off when he wanted to ask for an autograph, or take a picture. That fan doesn't see that she wasn't rude, she wasn't a bitch, she was an actress that didn't know if the guy was a fan or a stalker. She didn't know if this guy wanted to hurt her or not. Should she stick around to find out?
I'm rambling again. That's what happens when I wake up too early in the morning. To the CDAN users/fans that see this, try to remember that you really have no idea what's happening in a person's life. They might be genuinely rude, or they might be someone going through a really tough time. And a quick thanks to Eddy for his comment on my earlier comment!