Neal Adams is not exactly a celebrity, but is well-known and admired by comic book fans for his artwork in Marvel and DC comics in the 60’s and 70’s. I met him at HeroesCon in Charlotte, NC last month and found him to be very unpleasant.
Jim Steranko, whose fame dates from the same period of comics history, was also at this con and he was quit pleasant and chatty.
a good friend tells the story of taking a flight to or from Pittsburgh, PA, finding himself sitting next to Mr. Fred Rogers. He wanted to say something nice to him about how much his daughter enjoyed the show, but wound up blurting, “So, Mr. Rogers, how are things today in your neighborhood?”. My friend says that Rogers stared at him for moment, then turned away to look out the window. Mr friend says, “I felt bad. I wanted to apologize, but I didn’t know how.”
Andre the Giant and I and 50 other people were waiting for a plane to be called – might have been Newark, could have been Hartford…He had a small carryon and big scowl. but a few people tried to get him to respond to them, and he just ignored them. We made eye contact and i did a little thing where you act like you are drinking a little cup of water. He didn’t do anything at first but kept looking at me, so I repeated the gesture, nodding at him as I did so. He made one quick nod, so I went to the concession and brought back a bottle of water for him. Everyone looked at me, then him, then me, then two kids ran out and came back with their own bottle of water to give to him. He didn’t actually smile, but he did mutter ‘thanks’, and then our plane was called. he was in first cabin, so I didn’t see him again.
I think it was Raleigh where I saw Bill Russell and some other guy sitting on a comfortable bench right in the middle of an area where terminals intersected. They were talking quietly. I first saw him as a member of the US basketball team in what, 1958? with KC Clarke? Anyway, this was in the 1990’s. I wanted to tell him how much I had enjoyed his career, he was a pioneer and a masterful player, maybe the best at his position of all time.
but, I was really unwilling to interrupt him. I wish, somehow, I had just sauntered over and said ‘thank you for it all’ and walked away.
How about stories from users here who have been mistaken for celebs? Someone with very bad vision, apparently, mistook me for Glen Campbell once. Wanted me to sing so he could be sure…that was a deal breaker.
In his defense, from what I’ve read he was in nearly constant pain during his final years.
I think I’ve mentioned on here that I worked at a hotel where Whoopi Goldberg stayed while shooting a movie in the late '80s and I don’t think I ever saw her when she wasn’t stoned. Sometimes she was super nice, other times very “nobody talk to me”, though she did make everybody’s day when she went into the kitchen and taught the obnoxious chef how to make potato pancakes to her liking.
I never met him personally but I heard several bad encounter stories about Andy Griffith from people I know and trust who worked with him in Charlotte on Matlock. He always seemed moreosely serious when he wasn’t playing a folksy good humored character, so I don’t find it hard to believe he was rude and off-putting in person. Don Knotts had the opposite reputation: always chipper and approachable.
The only rude celebrity I have encountered in my travels was in Westwood. I can’t remember his name; that’s how irrelevant he is now. He had some random show with a woman named Sarah (IIRC). I asked him, “aren’t you…?” He said, “Yes, I am, and walked away”. A-hole. He only got the job because his mom worked for the studio/network.
A small list of celebs I have met that have been courteous / friendly:
Don Sutton
Bert Blyleven
Steve Yeager
Dave Winfield
Bob Griese
Lynne Swann
Magic Johnson
Randy Jackson (Michael’s brother)
Tito Jackson
Jermaine Jackson
Wynton Marsalis
Pat Boone
Glenn Campbell
Stevie Wonder
Chris Isaak
Cicely Tyson
Tyrese
**Senator **Obama
Former President Clinton
The a-hole’s name: Byron Allen
See? Always a performer. 
They are both keenly aware that they are in the position they are in because of their fans. They take that seriously and show their gratitude after every show. After listening to Penn very often I can see how he would be very demanding. When talking about their act he says it would be very easy for them to rest on their laurels and just perform the same act for years. But they don’t. They are constantly working on the act and changing it with new tricks. They both put in 10-12 hours of work a day. He laughed at the contestants complaining about the long work days on celebrity apprentice. Penn in particular is a very driven person. I can definitely see him demanding the same from those around him.
And Andre was usually drunk too.
The movie I.Q. was being filmed around Princeton in about 93. Princeton is not a very big town. It was big news. Meg Ryan made a very bad reputation for her self. Surrounded by bodyguards. No one should dare approach her. IIRC Tim Robbins was just seen as being quiet and keeping to himself but not rude. Walter Matthau could be found in one of the local bars every night mingling with the locals.
Yeah, my friend had to drive him back to his hotel and said Art just berated his manager the entire drive right in front of my friend. He said Garfunkel was one of the nastiest people he ever worked with. The nicest was John Prine.
I’ve done some work for Tyler Perry and Vince Vaughn (at different times). They were both as gracious and kind as they could be. The unpleasant: for such a big guy, Vince Vaughn has really soft, girly hands so his handshake was a little creepy. Sorry. That’s the worst I’ve got.
Walter Matthau was super friendly when he stayed in Montgomery making a movie- couldn’t have been more approachable if he’d been a retired salesman. So was Jack Lemmon, but Frau Lemmon was a horror.
I remember reading a Madonna interview once that given time and ambition I could look for, but instead I’ll just paraphrase. She was asked about charges that she berated her dancers and musicians and crew, and stated that she was definitely tough on them, but mainly during rehearsal. Her reason was that- paraphrase- “if somebody pays what is probably to them a LOT of money to see my show then they want to see a great show, and if the musicians hit a bad note or a dancer is out of sync or the sound is off in any way it registers, and ultimately they don’t go away thinking ‘it was good except that one guy and those two notes and the sound’, they go away thinking 'Madonna gave a so-so show.”
I don’t have any problem believing Madonna can be obnoxious even under the best of circumstances, but with her and Penn & Teller and other celebrities who are not only making a lot of money but having to justify ticket costs and employ a lot of people, I can understand how brand protection could probably make you a bastard/bitch (bitchard?) even if that’s not your usual personality.
I worked at a 7-11 store in Lawrenceville, NJ, while that was being filmed. It was a 20-25 minute drive away from Princeton U, but literally down the street, on the same small state route. My coworker waited on Meg Ryan, and said that she was just a normal person, and nobody bugged her. I had a few encounters with known people, but no bad ones.
If they told you they worked with him on Matlock in Charlotte, they were likely fibbing. Matlock was taped in Wilmington, which is about 5 hours east.
My family is from there and can confrm every bad thing you ever heard about him. I’ve never met anyone from Wilmington who had a single nice thing to say about Andy Griffith.
He’s a long time Seattle resident and I’ve seen him out and about in the area many times over the years. He’s always seemed gracious and given smiles and waves to folks that recognize him.
Only celebrities I’ve ever met were Ray Lewis and Larry Czonka.
Ray is from my hometown and I ran into him in my gym once. I told him that I’d been a fan of his since his days at UM and it was nice to meet him and he was very polite and friendly.
Czonka I ran into while he was filming his outdoor show at Katmai National Park while I was there to photograph the Alaskan Coastal Brown bears at Brooke’s Falls.
I mentioned to him that I’d been a huge Dolphins fan since I was in elementary school and had watched him during the Undefeated Season as a young child and that he was one of my favorite players ever. He took a photo with me and talked to me for quite a while there about football and Alaska and different locations where he’d filmed. He was a bit…bluff, maybe is the word, like someone who has a great deal of self-confidence and a high opinion of themselves, but he wasn’t mean or unpleasant. He was very cordial and pleasant to me. Great experience.
Oh, I just remembered, I also ran into Forrest Sawyer, former ABC news personality once at a gun show in Tampa. Talked to him briefly and asked him if he was working on a story, but he said no, he was there because he’s a big knife collector and there were quite a few knife tables there.
National radio host Mike Gallagher.
I briefly knew Mike in the early 1980s. Cutting to the chase… Mike asked if he could use my library card to check out a book at the local library. I said, “Sure.” He never returned the book, and the library started sending me overdue notices. :mad: I told the library what happened, and they eventually stopped hounding me about it.
My wife was not at all a wrestling fan, but had absolutely nothing positive to say about Andre the Giant of Bobo Brazil when she encountered them while working an event in the early 80s. Rude, stupid, smelly, add any number of unpleasant descriptors.
Yes, Wilmington. Senior moment, sorry.
My cousin’s cousins are contractors in Florida and don’t much care for Burt Reynolds. He was nice enough, but they agreed to do a job for him involving fencing and gates for about $40,000 - price agreed to in advance- and got only about half that when he filed for bankruptcy protection. They lost money on the deal and turned down other jobs while they were doing it.
I understand not wanting to rehash the details, but could you pretty please link to where you’ve discussed this? I really hate Gallagher and I would love to read about him being an asshole.
That’s a very generous explanation, but no. The people who work on those shows have worked with a lot of people who have performance contracts and they’re used to perfectionists. They’re also union folks who are paid quite well for overtime so long hours of hard work are not the problem. Abusive and bullying behavior from an overly aggressive, rude, and arrogant jerkhole was the issue.