# minor anecdotes about famous people that creep you out. **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 31, 2007, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minor-anecdotes-about-famous-people-that-creep-you-out/417620 "2007-08-31T14:59:23Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 10
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2007, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minor-anecdotes-about-famous-people-that-creep-you-out/417620/181 "2007-09-04T18:04:29Z")
Did you know that Dick Cheney once shot an old man in the face and then made the victim apologize for getting his face in the way of Cheney’s birdshot? ---
**Author:** ![cbawlmer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/71e660/32.png) [@cbawlmer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cbawlmer)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2007, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minor-anecdotes-about-famous-people-that-creep-you-out/417620/182 "2007-09-04T18:21:15Z")
[QUOTE=OneCentStamp] This seems strange to me. Bruce died in 1973, and Seagal didn’t make his film debut until 1989. Hell, in 1973 he was only 21 or so. [/QUOTE] Seagal was a martial arts instructor for years before he became an “actor.” He moved to Japan in the early 1970s and married a woman whose family owned an aikido school so he could become an instructor there and avoid the draft here, since he was about 20 at the time. He easily could have been hanging around trying to get noticed at that time. He moved back to the US in the early Eighties, and broke Sean Connery’s wrist while working with him on martial arts stunts for _Never Say Never Again_ in 1982. ---
**Author:** ![Ranchoth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranchoth/32/1066_2.png) [@Ranchoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranchoth)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2007, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minor-anecdotes-about-famous-people-that-creep-you-out/417620/183 "2007-09-04T18:22:32Z")
Just for the record, do (dead) national rulers/leaders count as “famous people”? 'Cause I’ve got some pretty good dirt on Mao. For the moment, I’ll just say you probably wouldn’t mind Tiny Tim handy-wiping _him_ down… ::shudder:: ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2007, 6:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minor-anecdotes-about-famous-people-that-creep-you-out/417620/184 "2007-09-04T18:23:30Z")
[QUOTE=Diogenes the Cynic] Did you know that Dick Cheney once shot an old man in the face and then made the victim apologize for getting his face in the way of Cheney’s birdshot? [/QUOTE] Did you know that Karl Rove once shot a man in Reno just to watch him die? Scooter Libby paid everyone off so it stayed out of the news. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2007, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minor-anecdotes-about-famous-people-that-creep-you-out/417620/185 "2007-09-04T18:31:09Z")
[QUOTE=Priceguy] About James Doohan: He’s dead now, but I thought he never went to Star Trek conventions? [/QUOTE] I heard a radio interview with James Doohan a few years ago. You know, back when he was still alive. The radio guy asked him about William Shatner. “Well, my mother taught me that if you couldn’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all.” And then radio silence. Finally the interviewer said, “So, you’re not saying anything at all?” And Scotty replied, “I’m not saying anything at all”. And that was the end of his discussion of William Shatner. ---
**Author:** ![OneCentStamp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/13edae/32.png) [@OneCentStamp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OneCentStamp)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2007, 6:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minor-anecdotes-about-famous-people-that-creep-you-out/417620/186 "2007-09-04T18:33:44Z")
If you want minor anecdotes about famous people that will creep you out, go to [www.metal-sludge.com](http://www.metal-sludge.com) (NSFW) and find the Penis List. It’s a groupie-compiled database of penis sizes and sexual proclivities of over 100 rock musicians, and some of the proclivities are pretty ill. ---
**Author:** ![Judith\_Prietht](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/b19c9b/32.png) [@Judith\_Prietht](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Judith_Prietht)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2007, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minor-anecdotes-about-famous-people-that-creep-you-out/417620/187 "2007-09-04T18:39:10Z")
The circumstances surrounding Natalie Wood’s drowning have always kind of weirded me out, particularly in terms of how I view Christopher Walken (mostly in his creepier roles). The [wikipedia entry](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natalie_Wood) : > [@](#): > > On November 29, 1981, at the age of 43, Wood drowned while her and Wagner’s yacht The Splendor was anchored near Catalina Island. An investigation by Los Angeles County coroner Thomas Noguchi resulted in an official verdict of accidental drowning, although speculation about the circumstances continues. > > Wood was on board the yacht with Wagner and Christopher Walken. The couple had invited the character actor to join them during the Thanksgiving break from the filming of the science-fiction screenplay Brainstorm. Wood and Walken, who co-starred in the project, had shot love scenes several days earlier in North Carolina, which had recently become known to Hollywood executives as an excellent production site. Wood and her husband had stayed together in the Tar Heel State for weeks without causing any trouble or negative rumors in the vicinity of her filming location. (Wagner was on a break from filming his Aaron Spelling - produced hit TV series Hart to Hart.) > > Anchored in the Pacific Ocean on the Saturday night of the holiday weekend, Wagner and Walken reportedly had a loud argument about how Walken was behaving around Wood on the yacht and possibly in a Catalina Island restaurant where they all had partied earlier that day. Wood apparently tried either to leave the yacht or to secure a dinghy that was banging against the hull when she accidentally slipped and fell overboard. A woman on a nearby yacht said she heard cries for help from the water at around midnight, along with voices replying “Take it easy. We’ll be over to get you.” [4] The woman, a commodities broker who had never met Wood, Wagner or Walken, said this “call and response” continued for more than 15 minutes. She added that the woman who kept repeating “Help me” did it in a curiously flat, unemotional tone of voice. To quote the witness directly, “There just wasn’t much credibility in that droning repetition.” For that reason the commodities broker did nothing, and said that she felt “a lot of guilt” when she learned that Wood had drowned. [citation needed] > > Wagner has always refused to discuss the events of that night. Walken said in a New York Times interview in 1992 that there was no argument and that neither he nor Wagner witnessed Wood’s fall. He added that her small physical stature (five feet tall) was a major factor in the accident. [5] The skipper of the yacht, Dennis Davern, videotaped a rambling and confusing interview in 1992 for the TV documentary program “Now It Can Be Told” hosted by Geraldo Rivera. At one point during the interview, his girlfriend, who never met any of the yacht’s passengers, appears to goad him into making an accusation, and Davern hesitates. > > Of the three witnesses who have talked, only the commodities broker told her story to the media without being pressed and within a reasonable amount of time. (She gave reporters her whole story less than two days after Wood’s body was discovered; Walken and Davern both waited more than ten years to say anything.) > > Dr. Noguchi revealed that Wood was legally intoxicated when she died and that there were marks and bruises on her body, which could have been received as a result of her fall. In Noguchi’s memoir, Coroner, he stated that had Natalie not been intoxicated, she likely would have realized that her heavy down-filled coat and wool sweater were pulling her underwater, and would have removed them. Noguchi said he found Natalie’s fingernails still embedded in the rubber boat’s side. ---
**Author:** ![Push\_You\_Down](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/push_you_down/32/9095_2.png) [@Push\_You\_Down](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Push_You_Down)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2007, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minor-anecdotes-about-famous-people-that-creep-you-out/417620/188 "2007-09-04T19:04:04Z")
[QUOTE=Larry Borgia] I’m still wondering what the deal is with Zach Braff. [/QUOTE] He’s a notorious skirt chaser..and not just a skirt chaser but a dick also. From the bits and pieces that I’ve heard from people around town, he’s the kind of guy who assumes every woman wants to fuck him and when they shockingly DON’T, he flips our and has been known to scream “Bitch” and “Cunt” at them. It apparently wasn’t fame that did this to him-An acquaintance of mine went to college with him and he was a complete fucker then as well. ---
**Author:** ![Eleanor\_of\_Aquitaine](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a88e4f/32.png) [@Eleanor\_of\_Aquitaine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eleanor_of_Aquitaine)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2007, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minor-anecdotes-about-famous-people-that-creep-you-out/417620/189 "2007-09-04T19:04:05Z")
[QUOTE=Lemur866] I heard a radio interview with James Doohan a few years ago. You know, back when he was still alive. The radio guy asked him about William Shatner. “Well, my mother taught me that if you couldn’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all.” And then radio silence. Finally the interviewer said, “So, you’re not saying anything at all?” And Scotty replied, “I’m not saying anything at all”. And that was the end of his discussion of William Shatner. [/QUOTE] I saw him at a sci-fi convention in Columbus, GA many years ago, and he said rather a lot, although I recall bitterness rather than nastiness. He was asking fans to write to Paramount to complain about something to do with Shatner; I don’t remember the details, but I think it was the fact that the big three got paid significantly more for movies than the rest of the cast. When I met him briefly he was very nice. Called me “dear”. ---
**Author:** ![Trillionaire](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/aeb1de/32.png) [@Trillionaire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trillionaire)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2007, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minor-anecdotes-about-famous-people-that-creep-you-out/417620/190 "2007-09-04T19:12:00Z")
[QUOTE=Ranchoth] Just for the record, do (dead) national rulers/leaders count as “famous people”? 'Cause I’ve got some pretty good dirt on Mao. [/QUOTE] Yes. Mao counts as a famous person. ---
**Author:** ![rowrrbazzle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rowrrbazzle/32/414_2.png) [@rowrrbazzle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rowrrbazzle)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2007, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minor-anecdotes-about-famous-people-that-creep-you-out/417620/191 "2007-09-04T19:21:28Z")
> [@Priceguy](#): > > About James Doohan: He’s dead now, but I thought he never went to Star Trek conventions? He was at the one I attended in Chicago in the 70s. ---
**Author:** ![Abby\_Emma\_Sasha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e68b1a/32.png) [@Abby\_Emma\_Sasha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Abby_Emma_Sasha)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2007, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minor-anecdotes-about-famous-people-that-creep-you-out/417620/192 "2007-09-04T19:32:02Z")
[QUOTE=Diogenes the Cynic] I wonder if he meant Brandon Lee. I know Seagal went to that one. [/QUOTE] You’re right, it certainly had to be Brandon Lee. Bruce died too long ago for Seagal to be has-been. And I’m a she. ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2007, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minor-anecdotes-about-famous-people-that-creep-you-out/417620/193 "2007-09-04T19:34:09Z")
[QUOTE=Trillionaire] Yes. Mao counts as a famous person. [/QUOTE] An author _and_ fashion designer, sure he counts. ---
**Author:** ![cbawlmer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/71e660/32.png) [@cbawlmer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cbawlmer)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2007, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minor-anecdotes-about-famous-people-that-creep-you-out/417620/194 "2007-09-04T19:36:03Z")
I spoke with Harlan Ellison on the phone once when he called the comic shop I worked for to order some old books. He was a semi-regular phone customer (still is, as far as I know, but I don’t work there anymore). He was polite during the minute I talked to him, in an average, businesslike way. I don’t remember hearing any horror stories from the store’s owner about dealing with him, but I know he can be a real pill when he wants to be. I guess he figured we always had books he wanted, so he needed to keep being nice to us. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Swampwolf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8edcca/32.png) [@Swampwolf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Swampwolf)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2007, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minor-anecdotes-about-famous-people-that-creep-you-out/417620/195 "2007-09-04T19:38:16Z")
A buddy of mine who would drive bands’ tour busses was driving around a band whose name I won’t mention… The drummer, when Lee (not his real name) insisted that no, they couldn’t stop their tour schedule to get weed, they were running late and would barely make it in time to their next show as it was, threw an ashtray at him, hitting him in the face and (iirc) blacking his eye. Then, when they needed to get the bus back to the bus company, the drummer didn’t want to get dropped off at the airport, and decided he’d try charging Lee with kidnapping, b/c he was taking them where they needed to be instead of where he wanted to go. It gave me great satisfaction to see this unnamed drummer from this band whose name I won’t say get beaned in the nads in the beginning of the Simpsons Movie. ---
**Author:** ![AHoosierMama](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/258eb7/32.png) [@AHoosierMama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHoosierMama)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2007, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minor-anecdotes-about-famous-people-that-creep-you-out/417620/196 "2007-09-04T20:04:41Z")
[QUOTE=DMark] Barbra Streisand always has her dressing room decorated in white and takes pieces of art on tour to display in her room) [/QUOTE] Don’t know if it is true or not but I’d heard that Streisand insists that any hotel room she stays in has gardenias floating in the toilet when she arrives. Some hotel asked her to compromise and just have the gardenias in an arrangement in the bathroom, since flushing the flowers along with her shit messes up the plumbing. She won’t stay at that hotel now. I was never a fan, but now it is impossible for me to think of anything else when her name comes up. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2007, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minor-anecdotes-about-famous-people-that-creep-you-out/417620/197 "2007-09-04T20:20:34Z")
## Not a creepy anecdote (just kind of gay), but Ricky Martin sends an interior decorating squad ahead on his tour to redo his dressing room so it’s exactly like the one before (a sort of Tibetan minimalist scheme). I was disappointed when a friend who went to Troy State U. was George Carlin’s assigned escort and described him as an obnoxious primadonna who complained the car wasn’t fancy enough (admittedly it was a long drive from the airport in Mgy to the campus [about 40 miles]) and that he talked about hicks and rednecks the entire time. He was also furious at the hotel he was lodged in (Troy at the time didn’t have much by way of \*\*\*\* accomodations so it was Holiday Inn quality). Later he was booed for making so many southern jokes, which didn’t endear Alabama to him anymore. The biggest “total shite” celebrities I’ve met were a couple of soap actors whose names I don’t remember, Leslie Nielsen (whose girlfriend I remember thinking will be cute when she’s grown [which she should be by now as this was 20 years ago]), Edward Furlong (who was totally P-Whipped by his much older nasal-voice-from-hell girlfriend), Mary Steenburgen (who travelled in sunglasses and head scarf so as not to be recognized by fans- apparently she thinks she has some), Greg Allman, and above all- Gallagher, who was obnoxious as all hell and had a wife who reminded me of a buzz-cut Fran Drescher who was even worse than he was. ## Walter Matthau, Nell Carter, Roddy McDowell, and others who were bigger stars on the same picture as Furlong were all super nice, which was surprising. Sissy Spacek is a total soccer-mom in personality- shy, but very sweet- and Piper Laurie (who played her sister in the movie, as opposed to the holyroller mother) was sweet but in constant pain from a back problem. Jack Lemmon was okay but his wife was a total horror and his P-whipping made Furlong look like Sean Connery by comparison. (Her name was “Mrs. Jack Lemmon”- at least that’s how she introduced herself whenever she called the front desk.) Matthau actually expressed concern (to the hotel front desk staff of all people) about Furlong, saying something like “if his family wasn’t such druggy trash they’d run that bitch [his girlfriend] off”. Later he broke up with her and she sued him, but he seems to be doing better now with a new girlfriend/baby/etc… ## Whoopi Goldberg was very nice but usually stoned= the main memory we all loved of her was of her taking our snooty chef by the hand and forcibly teaching him to make potato pancakes- but her entourage (including a brother who lived in Montgomery at the time) were trashy. I’m surprised/glad they didn’t bankrupt her like MC Hammer. Her teenaged daughter was out-of-control the entire time she was here and actually got pregnant at some point during the shooting of the movie (she was about 15-16, which means Whoopi’s grandchild is almost grown). ---
**Author:** ![Beadalin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3be4f8/32.png) [@Beadalin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beadalin)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2007, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minor-anecdotes-about-famous-people-that-creep-you-out/417620/198 "2007-09-04T20:52:49Z")
A few years ago I read an interview with Snoop Dogg and came away from it thinking he’d held the point of view expressed below. In Googling it for this thread, I discovered that it was actually his friend, Bishop Don Magic Juan. Yet, whenever I see or hear Snoop Dogg, I think of the “she your rib” line. Ugh. > [@](#): > > The Bishop and I were bonding, having found more in common than either of us would have thought – until he tried to engage me in an uncomfortable debate about women. The Bishop, it turns out, takes a somewhat indelicate position on the subject of abuse, whereas I was raised in a strictly non-wife-beating household. ‘‘You’re going by the American way that men don’t hit women, and that’s not right,’’ the former pimp asserted. I told him an ex-girlfriend once hit me during an argument, and he was appalled. ‘‘She your rib, you ain’t her rib,’’ he said. We agreed to disagree. ([Link](http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,427488~7%7C%7C400257%7C0~0~slangemhigh,00.html)) ---
**Author:** ![Gala\_Matrix\_Fire](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/4da419/32.png) [@Gala\_Matrix\_Fire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gala_Matrix_Fire)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2007, 9:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minor-anecdotes-about-famous-people-that-creep-you-out/417620/199 "2007-09-04T21:34:33Z")
[QUOTE=Unintentionally Blank] I’ve said it before, but: The guys around the office think that says more about Elizabeth Hurley puttin’ out than Hugh Grant being faithful. Kind of a ‘no matter how good lookin’ they are, there’s some guy out there sick of her Sh\*t.’ [/QUOTE] Interesting. My view is that no matter how good lookin’ they are, there’s some guy out there who will still cheat on her. ---
**Author:** ![OneCentStamp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/13edae/32.png) [@OneCentStamp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OneCentStamp)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2007, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minor-anecdotes-about-famous-people-that-creep-you-out/417620/200 "2007-09-04T21:41:34Z")
[QUOTE=bluethree] Interesting. My view is that no matter how good lookin’ they are, there’s some guy out there who will still cheat on her. [/QUOTE] I don’t think you two are disagreeing. 😛 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minor-anecdotes-about-famous-people-that-creep-you-out/417620.md?page=9) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/minor-anecdotes-about-famous-people-that-creep-you-out/417620.md?page=11)