Me and my mate saw Ross Kemp having a drink through the window of a hotel one night in Swindon. We tapped the glass and waved, fair play he came out and had a chat and a fag with us, before some pissed up local girls saw him and came over...bye then Ross!
Oh, I won a T-Shirt on Tiswas (my mum made a Worzel Gummidge puppet) and I won the compo haha! Sally James read my name out I remember.
Oi, Colin Baker was fantastic, he was my favourite Doctor until Matt Smith, and now I'm not sure - Baker's stories were mostly awful (no fault of his, of course), whereas some of Smith's are superb, so I can't easily compare the two Doctors to decide who is my definite favourite. My least favourite by far is Christopher Eccleston, and I'm not too sure about William Hartnell, and when I rewatched Paul McGann's film a while back I wasn't as keen on his portrayal as I'd remembered. He was better than Eccleston, though.
Clocked the blonde bloke out of Edge of Darkness (1985) version who visits Craven after he's been irradiated in the Blue Posts pub, London.
The Mrs and I heckled Bill Cash MP at a local meeting.
Cracked a joke to the Mrs about going up to Nick Hancock (in our local supermarket) and saying, "You look a lot thinner on the telly" only to find out that Hancock's Mrs was standing in front of me...she didn't look too pleased.
Met Bill Maynard when I was a kid.
Sat on Les Dawson's knee when I was a nipper cos he used to drink in a hotel that my mum and dad used to frequent near Blackpool.
"Psychic" Sally Morgan lives (or lived, maybe she's moved) not far from me, and stepped backwards into me in TK Max while holding an item of clothing up to look at it properly in the light. She literally didn't see me coming.
I've doubted her abilities ever since that moment.
Ones I can remember, all 100% genuine!
-I helped Christopher Ellison (Burnside from The Bill) fill out a lottery ticket when it launched back in '94
-I nearly ran Chris Eubank over when he was out jogging one morning
-I've shook hands with Pete Budd and Tommy Banner of The Wurzels
-been in a pub at the same time as Chris Tarrant and Brian Moore (England rugby)
-gave Tim Rodber (England rugby player early 90s) girlfriend a lift in my car
-Harry Enfield was on a table next to me and my wife in a restaurant
-sat on a plane with Lawrence Llewelyn-Bowen across the aisle from me
-got Maggie Philbin's autograph when she opened a shop at our local centre
-seen Justin Lee Collins many times around Bristol (my friends brother used to work in M&S with him before he was famous)
-Stephen Merchant was best man at my brothers wedding (they are friends from school days)
-last weekend at the Silicon Dreams event, had my photo taken with Martyn Ware and Glenn Gregory of Heaven 17 (csmith of WOS took the photo, Winston can vouch!)
and finally "celebs that have been passengers on trains I have driven"
-Jilly Cooper (author)
-Martin Bell (had his trademark white suit on)
-Frank Carson (R.I.P)
-The West Ham football team
-Barry Cryer
plus probably loads of others I just didn't notice! I've seen John Parrot and Ann Widdecombe at Bristol Temple Meads too.
On my first year on film school, I did a short film with John Ryes Davies, it was the last thing he did before he went to New Zelland to shoot Lord of The Rings!
I was 19 at the time, and he was a hell of a nice guy, very patient and learned allot from him.
Never had the chance to work with anyone that international or important again...
(although a friend of mine spent a day driving Bryan Ferry in Lisbon while we where working on a TV show... If I had a drivers license it could have been me...)
Oh, and I almost forgot, back when Jos? Mourinho was the Coach of Benfica (around 2000), I talked with him in at a night club. The team had just lose a match and he would be kicked out of the team not long after that... but he was cool and accepted to talk about football with a fan.
Oh, and I almost forgot, back when Jos? Mourinho was the Coach of Benfica (around 2000), I talked with him in at a night club. The team had just lose a match and he would be kicked out of the team not long after that... but he was cool and accepted to talk about football with a fan.
these belong in the 'big claims' department imo :)
Used to manage the building on Church street in Manchester (Pall Mall house which is now fancy apartments I believe) where Take that practiced their dancing just when they started getting famous.
Would have 100 young teen girls outside we had to keep out...even though they offered all kinds of things to get in.
When they wanted to go to the pub next door (the unicorn) we'd take them down to the boiler room which had an escape route which came out in the rear car lot and then they'd dive in the pub.
I think my mom has a photo of me and them sitting in the Unicorn holding our beers up to the camera.
Met quite a lot of famous people there though as the dance studios on the 4th floor were regularly used for practice by the local theaters etc.
Same building was later used in the movie 24hr party people..the scene where they are poisoning pigeons on the roof...used to sit up there and eat my sarnies on nice days.
Followed Lorraine "Luton Airport" Chase up the staircase inside the leaning tower of Pisa (behind a huge crowd of adolescent Italian boys - her skirt was indecently short!)
Saw Mick Hucknell in Boots in Esher
Saw Rick Parfitt from Status Quo in his car around Kingston
Sat next to Stuart Pearce (footballer!) in a pizza place in Newcastle
Was on a transit bus with Billy Connolly at Gatwick Airport
Met Colin Dexter and James May at book-signings
Errrrm...that's about it
My sister's mother-in-law is Richard and David Attenborough's sister though, so she hob-nobs with the stars all the time!
A few more:-
-Mark Regan (England rugby) went to my school and college when I was there
-Julie Burchill (columnist) went to my school before I was there
-Tony Benn was stood on the stage at my school when he famously lost his seat in the '83 General Election
-saw Elton John checking in at Heathrow in the 80s
-saw Tim Healy (Auf Wiedersien Pet) waiting for his luggage at Heathrow
-I was in the audience of "Deal or No Deal" when the jackpot of ?250k was won for the first time (studio is just down the road from me)
-my father-in-laws cousin is Andy Fairweather-Low (was in Amen Corner)
I was a few meters away from some of the actors from the first Transformers movie when they were filming one of the final action scenes on Broadway in Los Angeles.
I was a few meters away when Nicholas Cage was shooting a scene for a movie, also on Broadway in Los Angeles. Sometime between 2003 and 2006.
A very popular American football player used to be a regular at the Staples store where I work. Since I don't follow any sports, I have no clue who he was.
I was with my kids when they took pictures with some famous (unknown to me) Heavy Metal band members who went to Mitch Lucker's memorial concert in Pomona, California.
I once had a short conversation with an older Russian scientist who claimed he was part of the team that worked with Yuri Gagarin. This was a Space-related convention in Portugal sometime between 1990 and 1992.
Here are some lame claims that I can't prove because I ran out of money while investigating my family tree:
-My parents said our family descends from Charles I of Portugal (1863–1908 ), second to last King of Portugal. He was popular because of his paintings, drawings, appreciation of Oceanography, emerging technologies of the time, Science, etc.
-My parents said that the current Portuguese President is related to us, maybe a long distant cousin. Something I'm not very proud of so I rarely mention it or care about it.
-Both of the above claims were mentioned many times by my grandparents.
-I used to have a 30-minute TV show around 1 a.m. on Saturdays for an hispanic audience here in the U.S. It was about helping marriages. Long time ago, different life, different beliefs.
And a claim that is true but the family ran out of money while trying to do something useful with it:
-There is a town in the south of Portugal called "Palmela". Many years ago a large area near Palmela belonged to the family that had the same name as the place. Three (or maybe four, can't remember) one of my ancestors was at a bar, drunk, and sold all his land for a few coins. I don't know the details. All I know is that when I was growing up and we were going through some rural roads, my grandfather would say "this was all ours, but now it's too late. The land has changed hands and has been resold so many times that according to the lawyers it's too late to do something about it"
And the final claim:
-I grew up in the same city as the developer of EsxDOS. :)
I have seen Claire Short (Politician) at a platform in New St station in Birmingham,also in Brum at Dillions Book store (now Waterstones) i have seen 2 celebs. The first was in the early 2000`s when I went in looking for some books on ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics, on the top floor of the store by coincidence Bob Monkhouse was signing copies of his new autobiography,he was wearing that shiny pea green suit that you often see him wearing on tv but if I remember correctly he died some months later. ;(
The second was when i happened to be walking past the book store to see a small crowd of onlookers waiting for someone to emerge so I waited along with them and after a little while to my surprise Ulrika Jonsson appeared on the steps to small amounts of clapping and some boo`s from lads in England shirts (it was during the Sven affair nonsense),she waved but looked a little sheepish because of the booing,it turns out she had opened a children's book area in the store and that is the thanks she received outside, i have to admit i did feel sorry for her and she did appear quite pretty.
Finally for my last one I did meet and shake hands with Paul Usher (Barry Grant in Brookside),from 1997-99 I was a video games market trader in Wednesbury here in the West Midlands and as a promotion they hired him to visit the Wednesbury area and pose for photos with shop owners,market traders and generally meet people.
It was one of those surreal and bizarre moments i will never forget where I am standing at my stall in a nice looking but generally quite market when Paul enters followed by a trail of screaming women and girls,he does what he has to do like posing for pictures and chatting to us and then leaves followed by all the screaming women,the market returns to its dead quiet state with us stall holders just looking at each other...(cue crickets and tumble weed) ,but seriously he was a really nice guy and probably deserved his slick and suave reputation,the guy seemed to ooze an aura of confidence which he infected you with as he spoke and you could tell he did not look down or pre judge people,he picked up a rack full of Megadrive games off my counter and posed for a picture for the local free newspaper and has he left he told me his kids were always playing Diddy Kong racing on the N64 and I recall saying “yeah that is a good one” . I saw Paul on celebrity pointless last week and was surprised at how he had aged.
Other things I recall are that a school friends mom was in the same class at school as the boxer Barry Mcguigan,also a boss at my old job had a friend years ago who played keyboards for Paula Abdul and others,well this friend new the singer of the 80`s band Sigue Sigue Sputnik and so he took my boss to meet him,if I recall correctly the singer was at his nans when they met up with him and his was sitting knitting with her,which has to be a surreal image if ever there ever was one.
Finally Robert Plant was born in Dartmouth St West Bromwich and I currently live just a few streets away.
A grainy news paper cutting of me and Paul in 1998 and no I still don’t still have mullet hair and a tosh lol
-One of my fellow scouts claimed he was Glen Hoddle's nephew.
-My Mum went to school with one of the other two principle actors in Only When I Laugh.
-I once passed Bill Oddie in the Hunstanton Sea-Life aquarium; my brother pointed out he was there with family so we didn't say anything.
-I once played a round of Virtua Fighter against (M.C.) Hammer in the Trocadero in London; my attempts to find a pen to ask for his autograph caught the attention of a few others and as a crowd formed he ducked out. I don't think he was happy. He should be grateful I let him win.
-I passed one of the Hairy Bikers chatting to the guy who runs the bar at the place I stay at in Corfu. I didn't say anything as I didn't know which one it was other than 'the blonde beardy one' (it's either 'Si, Si' or 'Dave, Dave').
I once played a round of Virtua Fighter against (M.C.) Hammer in the Trocadero in London
I was thinking earlier "now who's going to be the most unlikely celebrity to pop up in this thread?", and the very first one I thought of was MC Hammer. Kudos!
Was he wearing his trademark "sh*t-catcher" trousers?
Comments
Oh, I won a T-Shirt on Tiswas (my mum made a Worzel Gummidge puppet) and I won the compo haha! Sally James read my name out I remember.
Now if the topic was idiotic bosses then I could make one of those long winded posts other users on this forum are so well known for ;)
Oi, Colin Baker was fantastic, he was my favourite Doctor until Matt Smith, and now I'm not sure - Baker's stories were mostly awful (no fault of his, of course), whereas some of Smith's are superb, so I can't easily compare the two Doctors to decide who is my definite favourite. My least favourite by far is Christopher Eccleston, and I'm not too sure about William Hartnell, and when I rewatched Paul McGann's film a while back I wasn't as keen on his portrayal as I'd remembered. He was better than Eccleston, though.
Clocked the blonde bloke out of Edge of Darkness (1985) version who visits Craven after he's been irradiated in the Blue Posts pub, London.
The Mrs and I heckled Bill Cash MP at a local meeting.
Cracked a joke to the Mrs about going up to Nick Hancock (in our local supermarket) and saying, "You look a lot thinner on the telly" only to find out that Hancock's Mrs was standing in front of me...she didn't look too pleased.
Met Bill Maynard when I was a kid.
Sat on Les Dawson's knee when I was a nipper cos he used to drink in a hotel that my mum and dad used to frequent near Blackpool.
Ian Kelsey coming out of our local church.
I've doubted her abilities ever since that moment.
-I helped Christopher Ellison (Burnside from The Bill) fill out a lottery ticket when it launched back in '94
-I nearly ran Chris Eubank over when he was out jogging one morning
-I've shook hands with Pete Budd and Tommy Banner of The Wurzels
-been in a pub at the same time as Chris Tarrant and Brian Moore (England rugby)
-gave Tim Rodber (England rugby player early 90s) girlfriend a lift in my car
-Harry Enfield was on a table next to me and my wife in a restaurant
-sat on a plane with Lawrence Llewelyn-Bowen across the aisle from me
-got Maggie Philbin's autograph when she opened a shop at our local centre
-seen Justin Lee Collins many times around Bristol (my friends brother used to work in M&S with him before he was famous)
-Stephen Merchant was best man at my brothers wedding (they are friends from school days)
-last weekend at the Silicon Dreams event, had my photo taken with Martyn Ware and Glenn Gregory of Heaven 17 (csmith of WOS took the photo, Winston can vouch!)
and finally "celebs that have been passengers on trains I have driven"
-Jilly Cooper (author)
-Martin Bell (had his trademark white suit on)
-Frank Carson (R.I.P)
-The West Ham football team
-Barry Cryer
plus probably loads of others I just didn't notice! I've seen John Parrot and Ann Widdecombe at Bristol Temple Meads too.
I was 19 at the time, and he was a hell of a nice guy, very patient and learned allot from him.
Never had the chance to work with anyone that international or important again...
(although a friend of mine spent a day driving Bryan Ferry in Lisbon while we where working on a TV show... If I had a drivers license it could have been me...)
Oh, and I almost forgot, back when Jos? Mourinho was the Coach of Benfica (around 2000), I talked with him in at a night club. The team had just lose a match and he would be kicked out of the team not long after that... but he was cool and accepted to talk about football with a fan.
these belong in the 'big claims' department imo :)
Would have 100 young teen girls outside we had to keep out...even though they offered all kinds of things to get in.
When they wanted to go to the pub next door (the unicorn) we'd take them down to the boiler room which had an escape route which came out in the rear car lot and then they'd dive in the pub.
I think my mom has a photo of me and them sitting in the Unicorn holding our beers up to the camera.
Met quite a lot of famous people there though as the dance studios on the 4th floor were regularly used for practice by the local theaters etc.
Same building was later used in the movie 24hr party people..the scene where they are poisoning pigeons on the roof...used to sit up there and eat my sarnies on nice days.
Edit: this scene
And I can still sleep with both eyes closed. There! That's my lame fame claim!
Followed Lorraine "Luton Airport" Chase up the staircase inside the leaning tower of Pisa (behind a huge crowd of adolescent Italian boys - her skirt was indecently short!)
Saw Mick Hucknell in Boots in Esher
Saw Rick Parfitt from Status Quo in his car around Kingston
Sat next to Stuart Pearce (footballer!) in a pizza place in Newcastle
Was on a transit bus with Billy Connolly at Gatwick Airport
Met Colin Dexter and James May at book-signings
Errrrm...that's about it
My sister's mother-in-law is Richard and David Attenborough's sister though, so she hob-nobs with the stars all the time!
What colour is it? Is it a whiter shad(Stop that RIGHT NOW! - Ed.)
Worked with another bloke whose wife once dated director Richard Stanley.
I've stood behind some A-listers in airport queues: Lisa Rilley, newsreader Michael Buerk and Dennis off Auf Wiedersehen Pet.
Also: drank beers with Big Boy Barry off Games World about 10 years ago. He told rapid fire jokes none-stop.
-Mark Regan (England rugby) went to my school and college when I was there
-Julie Burchill (columnist) went to my school before I was there
-Tony Benn was stood on the stage at my school when he famously lost his seat in the '83 General Election
-saw Elton John checking in at Heathrow in the 80s
-saw Tim Healy (Auf Wiedersien Pet) waiting for his luggage at Heathrow
-I was in the audience of "Deal or No Deal" when the jackpot of ?250k was won for the first time (studio is just down the road from me)
-my father-in-laws cousin is Andy Fairweather-Low (was in Amen Corner)
I was a few meters away when Nicholas Cage was shooting a scene for a movie, also on Broadway in Los Angeles. Sometime between 2003 and 2006.
A very popular American football player used to be a regular at the Staples store where I work. Since I don't follow any sports, I have no clue who he was.
I was with my kids when they took pictures with some famous (unknown to me) Heavy Metal band members who went to Mitch Lucker's memorial concert in Pomona, California.
I once had a short conversation with an older Russian scientist who claimed he was part of the team that worked with Yuri Gagarin. This was a Space-related convention in Portugal sometime between 1990 and 1992.
Here are some lame claims that I can't prove because I ran out of money while investigating my family tree:
-My parents said our family descends from Charles I of Portugal (1863–1908 ), second to last King of Portugal. He was popular because of his paintings, drawings, appreciation of Oceanography, emerging technologies of the time, Science, etc.
-My parents said that the current Portuguese President is related to us, maybe a long distant cousin. Something I'm not very proud of so I rarely mention it or care about it.
-Both of the above claims were mentioned many times by my grandparents.
-I used to have a 30-minute TV show around 1 a.m. on Saturdays for an hispanic audience here in the U.S. It was about helping marriages. Long time ago, different life, different beliefs.
And a claim that is true but the family ran out of money while trying to do something useful with it:
-There is a town in the south of Portugal called "Palmela". Many years ago a large area near Palmela belonged to the family that had the same name as the place. Three (or maybe four, can't remember) one of my ancestors was at a bar, drunk, and sold all his land for a few coins. I don't know the details. All I know is that when I was growing up and we were going through some rural roads, my grandfather would say "this was all ours, but now it's too late. The land has changed hands and has been resold so many times that according to the lawyers it's too late to do something about it"
And the final claim:
-I grew up in the same city as the developer of EsxDOS. :)
The second was when i happened to be walking past the book store to see a small crowd of onlookers waiting for someone to emerge so I waited along with them and after a little while to my surprise Ulrika Jonsson appeared on the steps to small amounts of clapping and some boo`s from lads in England shirts (it was during the Sven affair nonsense),she waved but looked a little sheepish because of the booing,it turns out she had opened a children's book area in the store and that is the thanks she received outside, i have to admit i did feel sorry for her and she did appear quite pretty.
Finally for my last one I did meet and shake hands with Paul Usher (Barry Grant in Brookside),from 1997-99 I was a video games market trader in Wednesbury here in the West Midlands and as a promotion they hired him to visit the Wednesbury area and pose for photos with shop owners,market traders and generally meet people.
It was one of those surreal and bizarre moments i will never forget where I am standing at my stall in a nice looking but generally quite market when Paul enters followed by a trail of screaming women and girls,he does what he has to do like posing for pictures and chatting to us and then leaves followed by all the screaming women,the market returns to its dead quiet state with us stall holders just looking at each other...(cue crickets and tumble weed) ,but seriously he was a really nice guy and probably deserved his slick and suave reputation,the guy seemed to ooze an aura of confidence which he infected you with as he spoke and you could tell he did not look down or pre judge people,he picked up a rack full of Megadrive games off my counter and posed for a picture for the local free newspaper and has he left he told me his kids were always playing Diddy Kong racing on the N64 and I recall saying “yeah that is a good one” . I saw Paul on celebrity pointless last week and was surprised at how he had aged.
Other things I recall are that a school friends mom was in the same class at school as the boxer Barry Mcguigan,also a boss at my old job had a friend years ago who played keyboards for Paula Abdul and others,well this friend new the singer of the 80`s band Sigue Sigue Sputnik and so he took my boss to meet him,if I recall correctly the singer was at his nans when they met up with him and his was sitting knitting with her,which has to be a surreal image if ever there ever was one.
Finally Robert Plant was born in Dartmouth St West Bromwich and I currently live just a few streets away.
A grainy news paper cutting of me and Paul in 1998 and no I still don’t still have mullet hair and a tosh lol
A Stourbridge local then? ;-)
You'll guess in about two seconds flat where I grew up from my first "claim":
Went to school with loads of Lenny Henry's cousins.
Met Jasper Carrott in the toilets at Birmingham Hippodrome when the school took us to see a pantomime.
Used to meet Rat (guitarist from Ned's Atomic Dustbin) for a few drinks in Wolves.
Met the Dodgy band members when they were supporting a mates band (before they got famous, and they were so far up their own arses...)
Took the piss out of Roy Keane at Alton Towers because he was too chicken to go on the Corkscrew.
Spoke to Stan Collymore at a nightclub in Wolves where he was paraletic.
-My Mum went to school with one of the other two principle actors in Only When I Laugh.
-I once passed Bill Oddie in the Hunstanton Sea-Life aquarium; my brother pointed out he was there with family so we didn't say anything.
-I once played a round of Virtua Fighter against (M.C.) Hammer in the Trocadero in London; my attempts to find a pen to ask for his autograph caught the attention of a few others and as a crowd formed he ducked out. I don't think he was happy. He should be grateful I let him win.
-I passed one of the Hairy Bikers chatting to the guy who runs the bar at the place I stay at in Corfu. I didn't say anything as I didn't know which one it was other than 'the blonde beardy one' (it's either 'Si, Si' or 'Dave, Dave').
- IONIAN-GAMES.com -
I was thinking earlier "now who's going to be the most unlikely celebrity to pop up in this thread?", and the very first one I thought of was MC Hammer. Kudos!
Was he wearing his trademark "sh*t-catcher" trousers?
I was a lighting tech for the Rhythm Masters one time, that was an odd experience, but they were pretty cool fellas.
Brookside only had 2 characters. Sinbad and the lesbian kiss girl. That was probably some random nutter tbh :)