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My Brush with Greatness
I've lived in Orange
County, CA, just a short drive from LA since 1962.
Here are some of my "run-ins".
Saw Lucille Ball in the mid 60s at Disneyland. She had boarded the
train (Disneyland Express?)
that goes around the perimiter of the park. She waved and blew kisses
to the now large crowd at
the Main Street Station as she pulled away.
Met a pre-Rockford Files James Garner at Disneyland in the late 1960s.
He was very nice and polite
and spoke to my family for several minutes. Surprisingly few people
recognized him. Turns out he was
waiting for his wife/girlfriend to come back from the restroom.
At Disneyland again, I was standing in line for the submarine ride
right behind Phil Collins in the early 1980s.
I said "Hi Phil" and he motioned with his hand as if to say "Shhh,
don't say my name or draw attention to me".
A couple of teenage girls who were across from us in the wraparound
portion of the line must have heard that
because they then screamed "HI PHIL COLLINS". He then just kind of
buried his face in his hands.
At Tower Records on the Sunset Strip in the late 1970s I saw Charles
Nelson Reilly. I lingered in his
general area for a time just to see what he'd buy. What did he select?
Barry Manilow's Greatest Hits.
Across from Tower Records on Sunset Blvd in the early 1970s was another
record store called "Licorice Pizza".
Saw actress Valerie Perrine there one afternoon. At that point in time
she was a stunner and me being about
16 at the time, I was a starer. Got an eyeful.
I've run into baseball great Rod Carew at some local stores in the
Anaheim Hills, CA area.
Not a very friendly guy.
In the early 1960s when I was 7 years old, I saw Vincent Price at our
local Sears store. He was there to
promote something and was doing a pre-promotion walk through of
some sort. I loved horror movies
even as a young kid so I walked up to him and asked for an autograph.
There was no one else around
him but me and his response to me was a gruff "Oh, please!" as he kept
right on walking.
I detested him from that point on.
When I was a baby in the mid 1950s my family was on a plane that also
had Peter Graves as a passenger.
According to my mother, he asked to hold me, patted me on the head and
said what a nice baby I was.
Anybody remember the 70s funk band The Brothers Johnson? I got a chance
to talk to George Johnson,
the guitar playing Brother, at length one day in the late 1980s. He was
at a record store grand opening in
Orange County, CA and a friend of mine knew the owner so we got in the
store before the actual opening.
He had met everybody! He talked about Donna Summer, Quincy Jones and
Michael Jackson and the
whole Jackson family among others. No real dirt, just some nice tidbits.
I met a Miss Universe at a theater in LA. My wife and I were there
watching a Panamanian folk dancing show.
When we were leaving, she was walking toward us in an exit corridor.
This Miss Universe (Justine Pasek 2002)
was from Panama as is my wife who recognized her immediately. She
stopped and talked to us (mostly in Spanish
to my wife) and I realized that in the presence of advanced hotness,
I'm still a starer.
There's more, but I've gone on long enough.
F N