Putting Your Pants on One Leg at a Time - in which celebrities also have to find a bathroom

 I was once on an airplane trip that was notable for problems with the first class bathroom which was not working.  First class passengers were obliged to seek relief in other sections including an actor which I recognized [I think] going past.  I'm never quite sure if I've seen a celebrity.  It takes me a minute to go through the "He looks familiar, he looks like, no couldn't be, yes I'm pretty sure" stages.  By that time it's too late.  Not that I would have said anything anyway.  I can be a fan geek as much as the next person, but I'm rather shy meeting new people and my mouth sort of gets disconnected from my brain and I end up saying stupid shit.  And quite honestly, I don't think the celebrity needs yet another person telling him or her who they are.  They know.  They especially don't need to know this when they are trying to find a bathroom.  Have a heart, people.

Besides, actors, musicians and the many celebrity variations don't necessarily look like they do on screen.  They are on TV or on a movie screen working.  It's like seeing a picture of a moose.  The moose looks a lot different in person.  Who knew they were that big?  Some people, who are not well-know, wish they were.  But what they are defining as "well-know" is "rich, beautiful and well-loved".  Well, eventually, for some, that comes with doing their job.  I very much doubt that's the point.  They would have to have a burning desire to do what they love to keep going through the demands of their chosen profession.  Let's take actors and musicians.  What I've learned from watching interviews and behind the scenes.

Actors.  I started watching Supernatural [at season 10 because, remember, I'm usually late to the party on these things] and the accompanying behind the scenes, recordings of interviews and conventions and posts on the Internet.  So they wake up really early and go to work.  They are made up, dressed up and spend the day sitting and waiting for the crew to setup and re-setup between periods when they have to act convincingly like someone else while remembering scads of dialog, move and stand in the right places, put their emotions, or their characters emotions on display.  And they have to repeat this until the scene is right.  And they have long work days.  Really long.  So, they work 10-12 hours a day or more, days that have a lot of "hurry up and wait", have to memorize lots of words and act in scenes not only convincingly but with intensity and excellence.  Their profession also makes demands on their personal lives.  They can be away from family and friends for long periods.  They have to keep physically fit and watch what they eat.  If I have a bad day I can work at my computer under the radar and have a low-key day.  What can they say?  Oh, I'm feeling a little crappy today so I think I'll just do all my scenes sitting down in a bathrobe?  Would they choose this profession if they didn't feel compelled to do it?  If they are successful enough, they may be paid enough to be able to buy fun stuff.  Do they have time to enjoy it?  Hopefully sometimes, but if they don't really love what they do, it's just not worth it.  

Musicians.  Being a Seether fan, I have likewise followed the music and gone past into interviews and other recordings.   So, they are definitely doing what they love.  But, long hours in the studio recording.  On a tour bus away from family for 18 months to two years.  Playing for 90 minutes, getting back on the bus and traveling to the next city and doing it again.  And again.  And again.  There is an interview with Shaun Morgan from the band Seether in which he describes coming home after that and his family has, of course, established routines without him being there and  he says it's like being an outsider in your own family.  This sounds a hell of a lot like what people in the military say when they come home from deployment.  At least the band isn't being shot at.  Hopefully.  

O.K. I'm painting a rather grim picture of being an actor or musician.  I also see that they love what they do.  They enjoy sharing that love with other actors and musicians.  They have made lifetime friends.  Hopefully they enjoy meeting and talking to people about what they do, because that looks like it's part of the job expectation as well.  They can have life experiences that are unprecedented. They can meet celebrities and have a "fan geek" moment of their own.  Sometimes a mutual "fan geek moment".  

On the other hand, the intrusion into their personal lives from some fans and members of the press that forget celebrities are human beings can be phenomenal.  Interruptions to family outings, dinners, private meetings without any consideration.  Questions of a personal nature and questions that are just plain inappropriate.  Embarrasses the rest of us.  There is definitely another disadvantage of being a celebrity today than being one in the mid-twentieth century.  

Imagine you are Betty Davis.  There is a record of your work in film and some photographs and articles from magazines and newspapers.  A good percentage is controlled by the studio, by what she chooses to say with some hearsay thrown in which may or may not be accurate.  If you want to find these sources now, you will have to do some digging.

Imagine you are Brad Pitt.  There is a record of your work in film and numerous photographs and articles from news sources.  And almost every person can whip out a cell phone and take a picture or record what you are saying whether you want them to or not.  If you are dressed up and looking great. If you just got over the flu and you are going out to get Saltines and Sprite for your kids who now have the flu and you have been up with them all night.  O.K., if  you are Brad Pitt, it's likely you have employees that can go out for the Sprite because you are higher on the celebrity scale.  

The Celebrity Scale.  (according to me from what I see from the outside)

1. You are just starting out as a musician.  You are out of the garage but go from venue to venue playing to small crowds of dedicated fans.  Your fan base is small, but loyal.  You are happy to talk with them, with anyone from the media, to grow your career.  The percentage of people of that small fan base who will say something negative because it's genuinely their opinion, because they are jealous, or trying to get their own 15 minutes of fame on your back by saying anything whether it's true or not or is just mentally ill is a lot lower.
2. You are fairly or very well known.  You have a record label, staff support, someone booking your venues.  You have a nice tour bus with a bathroom, somewhere to sleep and someone to drive you while you sleep.  You have a larger fan base with a larger percentage of those who love you or love to hate you or just go to your concerts because you are the new thing and don't really care about the music and spend the time talking and taking selfies, taking up tickets for those of use who really love you.  All right, I'll stop.  Where was I?  Oh, larger fan base for good or ill.  There may be some stalking behavior from the press, who are trying to do their jobs, most with some finesse, others, not so much.  Even loyal fans can be intrusive.  They want to know how tall you are, who you are going with or married to, what you've had for breakfast.  This obsession to know everything is part of the fan package.  Most of us remember our manners and try to remember it's NOFB [Not Our Fucking Business].  Some of us propose marriage in front of your spouse and children because we, of course, are the only perfect person in the world for you that can make you happy.
3. Really famous.  Rolling Stones, David Bowie, Angelina Jolie famous.  Beatles famous.  You have to send someone out for the Sprite and Saltines because you don't have a choice.  You can't go out for a walk without being recognized.  The fan base is very big and somehow you have become less of a human being and more of an icon.  Even fans who really love you forget that you need to eat, get tired and grumpy and have to go to the bathroom.  You have parents, brothers and sisters, children.  You may, perhaps, have a distant cousin who will bad mouth you to get into the news.  You may have a significant other who is a real person with their own strengths, interests and job and not just an interchangeable appendage.  You may have children that you have to protect because the scary side of being famous is that some "fans" will try to get to you through them.  This is true for levels 1 and 2, but the percentages of these "fans" are lower.

Let's think about the phrase "fans who really love you" for a moment.  I am a fan.  I have access to all the You Tube recordings, posts, what have you from when you were 20 years old and just becoming know to now.  I can dip in at any point of your life.  I know what you look or looked like, sound like, move like.  I think I know you like a member of your own family.  I meet you and somehow you think I'm a stranger that you've never met. One of thousands.  What a surprise for both of us.

The really strange part is that the you singing at 24 and the you singing at 42 are both equally current to  me.  A You Tube space-time continuum that means you exist all places and all times at once.  So fans ask questions like, you cut your hair off, why did you do that?  You think, well, that was twenty years ago and I really don't remember.  And then they see you now and are surprised you aren't that 24 year old.  Where did the gray hairs come from.  Where indeed!   

It reminds me of questions at a Star Trek or Supernatural conventions.  "In episode 3, season 7 you said..." or "In the second season someone did something and it didn't match what they said in the first season."  You know when you learn a new job and your brain has to offload something cause you only have so much storage?  Television actors have to memorize a script a week and then a new one the next week.  And the actors don't write the scripts.  At least a songwriter has a long term investment in a song he or she plays thousands of times.  But if you can't remember what you had for dinner last week, the likelihood of them remembering what they did at a concert 10 years ago is very small.

So, my advice for fans, which I am going to do my best to follow: treat your celebrity [and their family] like human beings, ask before you interrupt private moments, or just wait for a better time, don't make shit up about them and if they have to go to the bathroom, leave them alone.  Unless they are out of toilet paper and then share!  [Don't ask them to autograph the toilet paper roll.  That's just tacky!]

EM