being in LA I have met a lot of celebs. Also I did a short stint at Creative Artists Agency where I saw bunch more.
probably the most interesting story though is one of my first celeb encounters back when I was pretty NAIVE.
It was back in 1989 when I flew out to LA for summer orientation for USC. I had taken a red eye that hopped from El Paso to Reno and then from Reno to LA. On the Reno leg as I boarded the plane I saw Comedian/Actor Louie Anderson (and his assistants) seated up front on the aisle. (I think I initially thought he was John Candy.) As I passed him, I nodded and said "I like your work." And he gave me a nod and said "thank you."
After we landed, I was hanging around the baggage claim trying to figure out what I should do. It was 2 am and check in at campus wasn't until 8 am. So I was just standing there and Louie walked up to me and started chatting me up, asking who I was and what I was doing etc. So we talked for like 10 minutes before his guys got his baggage. At the end of the conversation, I thought I should use the opportunity to "witness" to him, so I pulled out the newly released orange God's Word or Man's and handed it to him. Before, I could get out an explanation of what it was, Louie autographed it AND wrote his telephone number and said that I should "call him sometime and maybe we could hang out."
(I thought to myself that the poor guy was happy to have someone treat him like a normal person and not fawn all over him just because he was a celebrity.)
After school started about a month and half later, after prompting from my roommate, I decided to call up Louie and see what he was doing. We chatted for a while about this and that, school, his current projects and so forth. Then after awhile the conversation took a strange turn. Louie suggested that we could get together at his house sometime, have pizza and whatever. I think I asked something about what he meant by the "whatever" part and he said that there were some things that it was not wise for him to mention over the phone.
The light on my footpath was beginning to brighten, and it began to dawn on me that this guy might be in to me in more than a friendly way. (Of course, it wouldn't be until many years later that he would openly come out as being gay - unless maybe it was one of those Hollywood things where the insiders know the deal and it is just the general public that don't.)
Anyway, I think we had another conversation after that and by then the signals were pretty clear and I had gotten the picture by then of what Louie had in mind for this freshman just off the plane from New Mexico. I don't mean to say anything bad about him. He is a very sweet and kind guy who had an alchoholic father and a hard upbringing.
I never called him after that for a long time. Years later when he started hosting Family Feud, I tried the number just to see if it was still his but it was dc'd. I still had the God's Word of Man's pub with his signature and old phone number for a long time and i might have it around or boxed somewhere.
Anyway, that was an interesting celebrity encounter that has amused my family for quite some time. For me the funniest thing about the whole thing was when he autographed the publication when I was trying to place it with him.
-Eduardo
PS: I have pics of Leonard Nimoy (but I didn't get in them), got autographs from Elton John (for an ex girlfriend who was big on him), got an autographed Martian Chronicles from Ray Bradbury, chatted up Neve Campbell one time at a party, took a coke away from Christina Applegate of Married with Children Fame, saw Morgan Freeman not too long ago just a few feet away from me, and so forth. In LA it is easy to have such encounters but since I don't pay much attention to celebs I hardly ever see anyone unless someone points them out to me. A lot of my friends are in the industry. My friend Andy for example does the casting for CSI. A wedding I am going to tonight on the marina is of two friends who met on the set of 24 (he is a boom operator and she is an actress)...and so forth.
