I chose “only if the celeb is attractive.” I think it can be a nice ice breaker, say if you’re at a cocktail party or something where you don’t really know anyone but you’re going to have to be there for awhile so you might as well strike up a conversation with a stranger.
I get routinely stopped by strangers who tell me I look like Anne Hathaway. My best friend has gotten so used to it that he now immediately answers (for me), “This is Anne Hathaway.” I don’t take it as anything but a compliment, but I’ve heard it so often now that it gets kind of annoying when the person behind me in line at Taco Bell taps me on the shoulder to tell me.
I was recently waiting on a guy who looked a LOT like Cheech Marin. I asked him, “Are you who I think you are?” and he said no, but he’s done double work for Cheech. But I don’t usually mention it, unless I really think it’s the famous person.
Someone seriously said this to your face? Whoever it was, they should not be allowed to interact with humans.
I laughed and laughed imagining the look on the guy’s face when you compared him to Mr. Bean.
And, as George Costanza discovered, if you are Caucasian, never, ever tell an African American that they look just like [Famous African-American Celebrity]. Just. Don’t. Do. It.
I used to have a roommate who looked quite a bit like Tom Hanks at the time (they’ve both aged 15 years since then.)
He would get told this all the time, whenever we went out – and that’s just when he was with me. I can’t imagine how often he heard it when I wasn’t around.
Whenever someone would say “Hey… you know who you look like?” He would just nod and smile knowingly. He never seemed to mind, although I think sometimes it was a bit embarassing.
I voted for it being okay but as others have said, I guess it depends on who one is being compared to. Over the years I’ve been compared to Mary Tyler Moore (before she got all scary looking, poor thing), Pat Benetar and Sigourney Weaver, all no doubt due to my big, horsey smile. The only one that used to irritate me a little was when people said I looked just like Rosie Perez. Thing is, I totally do, but I absolutely loathe her so I didn’t appreciate the comparison. I had to remind myself that they were just talking about her looks, not her godawful voice and worse personality. Still, I’m flad she’s not on anyone’s radar anymore.
Wow. I recently saw possibly the same guy. We were flying home from vacation, and this guy was on the last leg of the flight, Charlotte to Pittsburgh. He caught me staring, smiled, and said, “Nope, we just look alike”.
I had to explain the situation to my gf. When we were waiting for our luggage, I did a GIS on my laptop and showed her a current Cheech Marin pic. She was shocked.
Here’s a new one for me, and it made my day: We have a freind staying with us for a few weeks. When I got home from work last night, I was wearing my vintage aviator-style sunglasses and a black sweater. As I walked in the door, she said “You look like Steve McQueen.”
My mom is white, but she looks exactly like the Florence (the maid) from The Jefferson’s. She is told this frequently. I have people tell me I look like a white Rosie Perez too.
I’ve never minded, but then again I’m an actor… at least in my head… so it’s theoretically helpful to know what “type” I am. Unfortunately, there seems to be little agreement on the matter.
In the past five years, several people told me I looked like a young (Bonnie & Clyde era) Warren Beatty – which is bizarre as I’m not at all that young, and on my best day, wearing a vest and a boater and toting a gun, I still don’t look like Warren Beatty.
I was once cast as Orson Welles in a recreated “War of the Worlds” broadcast because of a supposed resemblance.
I’ve also been told I look like Gilbert Godfried, which made a bit more sense to me
I used to get Tom Hanks a lot, but apparently we’ve aged differently because I haven’t heard that one in a long time.
From my experience, it is a very chancy thing telling a woman she looks like another woman, no matter how hot the other woman is. I know one woman who got ticked off because a guy told her she looked like Uma Thurman. OTOH, she didn’t seem to mind at all when I told her she had Botticelli eyes.
When I was younger, sometimes I’d hear I looked like some person or other (Tom Hanks? Steve Martin?). I always wondered why people think that’s an interesting thing to say. “Uh…thanks, I guess?”
I had a boss once who was told that he looked like Clint Eastwood, Johnny Carson, Tommy Lee Jones, James Garner, and Harrison Ford. The weird thing is he did- you could see every one of them.
