Just bought my ticket to see Jared Diamond of “Guns, Germs and Steel” fame at the LBJ Auditorium (KLRU Distinguished Speakers Series) next month and it got me thinking.
Some other famous/ semi-famous speakers I’ve seen:
Douglas Adams speaking about computers and the internet (probably the most interesting and engaging person I’ve ever listened to).
Barbara Jordan speaking about Black/Jewish relationships since the 60’s.
Oliver Stone speaking about film in general but mostly about “Natural Born Killers” (it had just come out).
Quentin Tarantino. The Austin premiere of “Pulp Fiction” with an open forum at the end (one of the funnest nights of my life).
I’ve seen Bruce Campbell too. He was at the Alamo Draft House here in Austin last year to pitch “If Chins Could Kill” along with a screening of “Evil Dead”. I guess I wasn’t expecting anyone to know who he is. A class act all the way, baby.
I saw Jerry Brown when he was running for president. (I think on the Notre Dame campus.) It was a really big deal to me at the time (first election I was old enough to vote for) but now that he’s mayor of the next town over it seems sorta boring, haha.
I saw Gerald Ford when he was doing a speaking tour in the late 1980s (not sure if this was affiliated with a book or anything.) It was a big deal and cost a lot to see him, but because it was held at one of the theaters in the chain I worked for, I got to work the concession stand then sneak into an empty seat shortly after the introductions. If memory serves he came across as sort of a space case. Someone asked him a question about the minimum wage and he replied “oh yes, what is it now – like seven dollars? It should be much more than that.” (I think around that time minimum wage was $3.85.) He didn’t fall down though, haha.
I went to the first Mystery Science Theatre Conventionfestorama and got to see a panel discussion/q&a by several of the stars of that. I remember someone asked them the difference between an “area” and a “region.”
I didn’t ever hear Douglas Adams speak but I did meet him briefly at a book signing.
I probably have a couple more but I’m drawing a blank. Do stand-up comics count? I’ve seen like a hundred probably.
Rigoberta Menchu, speaking on the plight of indigenous peoples in Guatemala
Al Gore, during the last Presidential campaign (he spoke in downtown Chicago in front of City Hall, so it wasn’t much of a challenge)
Madeleine Albright, while she was Secretary of State
Henry Kissinger (although the lecture was sold out and we had to eavesdrop from the hallway, which was just as well because I wasn’t keen on giving him my money)
Galina Starovoitova, Yeltsin’s advisor for interethnic affairs
Geraldine Ferraro, as VP candidate (which was really cool! We got press passes, from my HS paper, and got there early enough to be in front of all the print & network guys in the press section. You snooze, you lose!)
…and many others who are probably too obscure for normal people to know who they are, but who are well-known in their fields
Non-political: Kurt Vonnegut (who was exactly like you probably imagine him, i.e. very crusty!)
I’m sure there have been more, but these are just off the top of my head.
Oh! I just remembered. Russ Meyer came to speak and answer questions at my theater in conjunction with the 25th anniversary of the release of Faster, Pussycat – Kill! Kill! He autographed my poster. I think I annoyed him by constantly asking him for Roger Ebert stories.
I saw Kevin Smith speak at the University of Kentucky last year, and he’s just great. The man talked for 5 hours or so, even though he was only paid for two. Then he took anyone who showed up to a movie the next day.
How could I forget Justice Harry Blackmun at my commmencement? And JFK Jr. must have been there, too, since he graduated the same year I did (not that he spoke at commencement, and I didn’t see him, but hey, he coulda been there.)
Wow … Eva … that’s so cool. I’d love to see those people (except Kissinger, of course).
What do you consider ‘famous’? I pretty much see only political people too, no one that really makes my knees buckle with excitement.
Last night I saw Stephen Lewis, Special Envoy to the UN for HIV/AIDS in Africa. [political/emotional hijack]There’s lots of shit going on down there. The famine combined with HIV/AIDS is causing maybe the largest-scale human tragedy there’s been in centuries. His report is coming out soon. How come no one is really paying attention? I guess people don’t want to talk about it because it’s too sad/awful/depressing. Apparently it would take only $27 billion USD to solve the AIDS crisis.[/political/emotional hijack]
Also Linda McQuaig, Ralph Nader, John Ralston Saul, Saskia Sassen, David Suzuki, Vandana Shiva, and Deborah Harry (who I was disappointed to find out was not the one from Blondie but an aboriginal activist … she was good anyway) …
Plus Margaret Atwood spoke at my frosh week but that didn’t really count because she didn’t say much.
Jack Layton, new leader of Canada’s NDP party (the lefty one), back when he was a city councillor, I saw him all the time.
Sue Johannsen (as in Sex with Sue) spoke at our high school once.
At Mrs. Bernse’s grad at the University of Calgary about 4-5 years ago, the guy who invented Java was given an honorary degree and gave a speech. He looked kind of like a real life version of the comic-book store guy on the Simpsons.
There was a collective <gasp> from many in the crowd when he said something along the lines of:
“Don’t fucking listen to people that say you can’t do this or that… they’re full of shit”
or something like that. Kind of funny. I didn’t expect to hear him say that.
i went to a conference last year at the natural history museum in manhattan for high school students about leadership
…mayor bloomburg came, about 45 minutes late, and i’m not exactly a fan…
russell simmons, who runs a clothing line
wyclef jean, who was amazing…he was on right before the mayor, who was very late so they just kept telling him to stretch and say more things. he held an impromptu concert for us in this auditorium and was improving lines to old songs of his in all these languages and it was just awesome.
I saw Noam Chomsky speak here at my University. And it was helluva boring. Now I don’t always agree with Mr Chomsky but I at least was expecting some fire in his speech. But he just stood at the lectern and read off his speech in a monotone voice. He probably brought up some good points but his delivery was so bad none of them stuck. Maybe it was just an off day for him…
Let’s see…
I was present at the third Bush/Gore presidential debate, which took place at my university. I really wish I hadn’t been. Boring, boring debate.
Before that debate, I was at the protest and sat with my friends at the sound board while Ralph Nader spoke. Good guy, but silly ideas. Not my political leaning at all.
also-
Henry Rollins- funny, funny man.
Harold Ramis- funnier man
Stephen R Covey, the author of Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, the book MBAs everywhere love. Boring speaker, though.
Stephen Chu, 1997 Physics Nobel Prize winner. Fascinating speech.
Greg Lougainis, the former olympic diver and current activist- Very interesting speech.
Dr Ruth Westheimer- yeah, the Dr Ruth. Great speaker.
Al Franken- another funny man.
Off the top of my head, that’s about it. I’m sure there are more, but I’m stopping now.
Me too, at Penn State. I stood about twenty feet from the podium. Funny story–four years later I was on campus again to go to the library. George Bush the Elder was speaking there, I had forgotten about it (else I wouldn’t have gone that day, place was incredibly crowded). Joe Paterno came out to introduce him…the cheers were louder for JoePa than for the sitting President of the United States!
Hmmm, who else? P. J. O’Rourke. (Nice guy, real short.) Lord Jenkins (Late British pol, former chancellor of Oxford U.) James Ellroy. (Talked to him later, one of the highlights of my time here on Earth.) A bunch of English-Reformation historians who will not be known to many people outside British academe. (Other than, probably, David Starkey.)
Charles and Lynda Robb (on separate occasions – I also got to meet Lady Bird Johnson, which was pretty exciting)
Bill Clinton, I guess, if inauguration speeches count
That’s about it; we didn’t have anybody particularly famous for my graduation, but since the last two famous graduation speakers at my university were Margaret Thatcher and Antonin Scalia, I wasn’t about to complain.
