Celebrities that surprise you by being nice people

In My Humble Opinion
21

I’ve met quite a few celebrites, and with a few exceptions, most were very nice, and even humble. Basic, ordinary people actually. So ordinary, that it was surprising. The ones that I expected would seem larger than life and have attitudes to match, yet were the exact opposite were:
Clint Eastwood.
Danny Glover.
Michael Richards.
Jeff Daniels.
Richard Crenna.
Willem Dafoe.
Brian Dennehy.

Within 10 minutes of meeting those folks, I had forgotton “who they were” as they were so grounded and well spoken. They were all funny as hell and intelligent to the point of being scary, especially Clint.

Have met a lot of sports celebrities, and they have all been just overgrown kids. Very fun and personable. I enjoyed Silky’s post about Sir Charles, as we live near a lot of Rams players, and Kurt Warner recently started grocery shopping at the store where my wife works. It’s the only store in St. Louis where he doesn’t get mobbed by fans. He said it’s nice to go shopping and talk to people as a person instead of being attacked. He thought it would be the opposite since he’s local so he always went far out of his way to shop but since he and some of the others are part of the community here, everyone understands that the man is just a man and not a deity. (It’s still a trip to be picking out pork chops with him though, talking about the weather each week). Someone once asked why he was there and he had the same basic answer. “People don’t understand that my family does actually need food, and sometimes the grill is burning and I might be in a hurry… you know, like they are”. It’s such a low profile event at this store though, that my wife, who works there and watches football, has never noticed him in there.

On a side note, the biggest capital P Prick I’ve ever had the displeasure of meeting was Stallone. He was the opposite… someone I thought would be a decent guy but turned out to be much bigger than his jockstrap.

22

I’m not sure if this counts…

The cutest girl in 7th grade was named Stasi (short for Anastasia). Everyone, I mean everyone, knew who she was. I had a mighty big crush on her for 5 years. In the 12th grade, she asked me to go to the prom with her. Wow! What a woman.

23

I missed the bashing thread. Well this isn’t really a bash so I’ll go ahead and post.

I was down at panama city beach florida a couple years ago for spring break and they had the WWF in town so those guys were running around all week. I not a fan or anything so it wasn’t really a big deal. I know who a couple of the guys are, but I’m not going to press for autographs or anything. So I’m there trying to pick out a pair of sunglasses at Crazy Pete’s $10 Sunglass Hut when a couple of the wrestlers pull up. The one dude waited n the car and the other one (I just checked the website and his name is Raven), hopped out and started trying on sunglasses. Anyway he’s standing there next to me and mutters in my general direction “where’s the mirror.” I had the handheld mirror in my and I was pretty much done with it so I hand it over to him. He snatches out of my hand, no thank you, no nothing. He just sort of grunted. I don’t know if he was ‘in character’ or what. Anyway I was sort of amused by that, but I didn’t say anything.

So Raven finally settles on a pair of glasses, and here’s the kicker, he get the goofiest round, colored, Lennon-style shades you’ve ever seen. The sort of thing that you would expect little hippie chicks to wear, but this guys 6’6" probably pushing 300 lbs and he looked like an absolute tool. (No offense to Lennon-style shades wearers.) So we saw him later on the MTV event thing, and he had a different pair of shades on. I can only imagine some MTV guy pulled him aside and told him he looked like a dork and made him change sunglasses.

24

I didn’t mean to dis Lennon shades in that last post, just that they didn’t look so hot on Raven.

I also met Lexi Lawless, sp?, (US soccer palyer with the crazy red hair). I was hanging out in a bar in Hoboken NJ and he walk past. I said “Hey Lex how’s it going buddy?” and he replied “Hey hey whats up.” Pretty random stuff. Anyway Lexi seemed like a nice guy.

25

Maybe Stallone was caught on a bad day. A friend of mine had dinner with him (the connection was that he was in a band with a Stallone cousin, nobody you’d know unless you’re into folk music in the DC area), and found him pleasant company.

Of course, he was allowed at that time to be himself, and maybe not worry about having to be Rocky.

It was a lesson to me about what fame really is about when Mel Gibson came to SC to film “The Patriot.” I’d admit that I’m out of the loop regarding popular culture. I liked Gibson’s movies, but to me, he’s just another actor.

Just the announcement that he was coming made it sound like a visit from the Pope. It was easily the biggest news in decades. Gibson sightings were highly prized news. People who I thought were level-headed turned absolutely ga-ga over it.

And Gibson was professional about his obligations to the locals as well. He showed up for lunch unexpectedly in York (pop. 6,000), and you could tell he did it not because he needed to eat, but because that was part of the job. (The story was duly reported in the media, of course). He also made a sizeable donation to a local charity, and attended a press conference with the other stars.

And that was it. He met us outsiders halfway and returned to his work. The filming were on secluded sites, and he rented a house in a secluded neighborhood, and he was nevermore to be seen. This is not to criticize him, BTW. It must be hell to be expected to constantly, constantly, constantly live up to other people’s expectations, not to mention take their s*** if they don’t like you.

Gibson was professional during filming as well, and the atmosphere on the set allowed some of the extras to see him on a regular basis. One of them was trapped in a tent with him during a rainstorm, and while waiting for it to blow over and filming to resume, talked for a long time about, of all things, raising cattle.

26

I met Benny, Phoebe’s limo driver from All My Children at a bar in New York a year ago. No one remembered him (his stint on that soap was quite a few years ago) from the soap opera, but they did remember him from a recent T.V. commercial.

Boy, did we have fun. Although I’m always a lot of fun at bars.

I used to work in the same building were 60 Minutes is filmed. Ed Bradley is a loud-mouthed braggert, Andy Rooney is not a curmudgeon --he is pure evil. But Diane Sawyer was alway polite and gracious and ten times more prettier in real life-- and that’s saying a lot.

Oh, and that guy who won the first year on MTV’s Say What? Karaoke is the coolest guy! [sub]Hi MannyL[/sub]

27

Oh, yeah, Alexi Lalas. I thought you meant Lucy Lawless for a bit (until the soccer part).

When I was in Ireland some years ago I met John Langstaff, who was really cool. Other than that I seem to miss all the celebrities.

28

pesch writes:

> Maybe Stallone was caught on a bad day. A friend of mine
> had dinner with him (the connection was that he was in a
> band with a Stallone cousin, nobody you’d know unless
> you’re into folk music in the DC area), and found him
> pleasant company.

I presume that this Stallone cousin was Don Stallone, who was in the group Clam Chowder, right? So is this friend of yours one of the other Clam Chowder members? Which one - Kathy, John, Sam, or Bob? (Oh, well, you said “he,” so it can’t be Kathy.) I’ve seen the group perform many times. I know each of them a little bit.

29

<blusing> Thanks Biggirl but I came in second not first

30

You saw Prince on TV and you think that wasn’t a total performance for the camera? Of COURSE he seems like a nice guy when the cameras are running.
I used to work at a place known as “The Computer Store to the Stars” right in Studio City, and I met and knew thousands of celebrities. They were pretty much all nice people. But wait til they get to WORK.
I remember one morning I was trying to sleep in late in my artist’s loft in downtown LA while there was a film shoot setting up outside. Suddenly I was awakened by a huge banging on my second story wall. I went to look out the window and Tony Danza was throwing a basketball at my window. I told him to please stop it because I was trying to sleep. He started cursing me out, questioning why I was trying to sleep during the day, and what the hell did I have any business living in THIS neighborhood while HE was working on a film shoot. I told him I LIVE here and he DOESN’T, and if he didn’t stop banging his basketball on MY wall, I’d throw a bucket of water on him. He went away, still cursing at me.

31

Dizzy Gillespie - A friend of mine noticed him on the streets of D.C. a while back, looking in a store window. Since my friend had only a side view of Dizzy, he wasn’t positive it was him. My friend walked up and said, “excuse me, but aren’t …” Dizzy spun around, looked my friend in the eye, put his finger to his lips, and blew his cheeks out. Not sure if that qualifies as “nice”, but it does qualify as funny.

Ben Stiller - I ran into him at a bar in NYC. I went over to him and told him that I thought the “Oliver Stone Land” sketch on the “Ben Stiller Show” was one of the funniest bits of TV I’d ever seen. He was flabbergasted that anyone even remember the skit, much less the show, and was very funny and gracious.

Sua

32

I’ve had quite a few celebrety expierences since I moved to NYC. When I first moved here I was a manager in a couple of the bigger movie theatres here so I did see some at premiers but sometimes they just walked in off the street.

One of the best was Robert Duvall. I was at the 84th ST theatre and at that theatre there was this nice old lady who tore tickets. She had been tearing tickest there since before I was born. Well one afternoon I am selling tickets and Robert Duvall cames up and buys a ticket. I wait a minute and I start to poke my head out the box office to say to Mrs. Black ‘Hey that was Robert Duvall’ but he is standing there talking to her. After he leaves I ask her about it and she explained that ‘Bobby’ used to live in the neighborhood and came in all the time but since he moved (to N. Carolina I think) he hadn’t been around much and they had some catching up to do.

33

George Carlin was, without a doubt, one of the coolest guys I’ve ever met. Given his stage persona, I kind of expected him to be a prick, but he was very gracious and down-to-earth. He was already one of my idols, but this made me like him even more.

Weird Al Yankovic was the same way.

Donnie Osmond was a prick.

Jack Blades from Night Ranger and Damn Yankees was very cool, too.

I met Michael Damien (gasp and swoon!) several years ago. He was doing a Meet-and-Greet, and my then-girlfriend was vacationing in Florida, and couldn’t attend. Out of the goodness of my heart, I went to this Meet-and-Greet for her, and got pix and his autograph and stuff for her. He was very gracious and understanding.

Lita Ford and Nikki Sixx were both a trip.

David Faustino (Bud Bundy) was extremely cool, too.

The guys from Ratt were pretty down-to-earth, too.

34

I met one mr. Todd Bridges and talked to him for about an hour. He’s very smart, very funny, polite, friendly, and smiley! I had a great time with him.

Also Gary Sinise was great, looked me right in the eye, asked my name, gave me some advice that I asked him for…he was really nice. I felt so stupid. I was blushing and my heart was pounding…MY GOD I LOVE HIM SO MUCH.

Also, and face it, you knew this was coming…Rammstein are all VERY nice, VERY polite, funny, English speaking, and a party with them is always a great time.

Faith No More, on the other hand…WERE TOTAL PRICKS.

jarbaby

35

Given his status he could have been very difficult, but he was actually very cordial - I’m referring to Jerry Garcia. You know the guy has had every possible scam, line, comment, and load of bull shit presented to him, but when I met him I suppose he sensed that I wasn’t about any of that so it went easy.

The JGB played at the Richmond Coliseum in 1993 and I, being a City employee with a connection in the City Manger’s Office, managed to be backstage at the venue when he arrived. A few of us had worked on arrangements for the show and his publicist arranged for a quick introduction. I told him how much I enjoyed his work and the positive effect it had on me. He was genuinely pleased and appreciative. I did manage one moment of weirdness, which he also appreciated - I had him stand against a wall while I did a headstand and I had it photographed. There’s him (completely straightfaced even though he thought it was a very far out idea)and me beside me standing on my head. After that he shook my hand, still chuckling to himself, and left.

36

Clint Eastwood
Nice, down-to-earth, rather soft-spoken, but he drives just like he was in a movie: Fast and scary.

William Shatner
Funny, up-beat and self-depreciating. He kept making jokes about being a bad auther and a worse singer.

Sean Connery
Very quiet, wry. Almost exactly like his stage personna.

Buck Darma
I didn’t even realize who I was speaking to, until he said ‘this is my set’, and went up on stage. We’d just spent the last 40 minutes yakking about fishing off the California coast. Worse, I’m a huge BOC fan. Pretty cool.

37

My mother-in-law grew up in Southern California in the 1940’s. She fondly recalls a kind couple who were also regulars at the club her parents belonged to. Of the two, she was particularly fond of the gentleman since he always had a pocketful of candy to share with children. The couple? Lauren Bacall and Humphrey Bogart.

Art Neville comes to our church on occasion. He’s private, but soft-spoken and rather mellow. His granddaughter (daughter, by some accounts) will be in pre-kindergarten with our older son next year, so I might get to know him a little better.

38

Um,Chas,I was saying,IMHO,that I had thought that Prince was a space cadet and was surprised to see that,IMHO he wasn’t.
Thanks for sharing your opinion on that, though. And your anecdote, even though it’s the opposite of what the thread title asks for.
Why didn’t you run downstairs and give Tony Danza “a hard punch in his solar plexus”?

39

James Hetfield and Jason Newsted (sp?, it’s been a while) from Metallica were both really nice guys, so was Van Halen.

40

Met a bunch; a few of my faves:

Les Paul. The first time I went to New York city, I found out about a little bar he plays at occasionally. He happened to be playing so I went. What a nice guy. I talked to him at the bar for a half hour or so. He jammed better than I can ever hope to. Also, met Harry Shearer who was in the audience, another nice guy.

Raul Julia. The best word I can think of to describe him was “dignity.” He was very gracious and kind.

Nick Nolte. Met him during a test run of Barbra Streisand’s movie, The Prince of Tides. He was warm and friendly. Barbra was a bitch, treated the people who worked at the theatre like dogs, but we’re here to talk about positive things…