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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Have you met a celebrity villain?

865 replies

pawsies · 13/03/2021 13:29

Someone that is controversial in the media or comes across unpleasant on TV or whatever?

What were they like in real life?

AIBU to think there might be some surprises and some of them will be a persona on TV or whatever?

OP posts:
Justjackie · 16/03/2021 04:03

Roxanne Pallett in real life is exactly as she came across in Celebrity Big Brother..... This is who she is! Sad

PuppyMonkeyBaby · 16/03/2021 05:07

Geoff Capes the wrestler. Miserable git. I’m showing my age!

Pogostickhellride · 16/03/2021 07:06

I met David Bellamy when I was very little. I was a big fan at thr time. He was lovely.

SchadenfreudePersonified · 16/03/2021 07:29

I met David Bellamy, too (40-odd years ago). Both he and his wife were lovely, They had a LOT of children - about seven, I think, most adopted from different ethnic backgrounds.

It seemed a big and very happy family.

SchadenfreudePersonified · 16/03/2021 07:30

Just checked him on wiki - five children.

PopsicleHustler · 16/03/2021 07:32

Very interesting thread.

Its turned into :

  • celebs we thought were nice, are horrible
  • celebs we thought were awful, are nice or not what we expected
-meeting both famous and infamous people, what we have encountered and what we have observed.

I've never really met famous people, only seen Liam Gallagher crossing the road in london and looked like a total scruff bag. Met someone from hollyoaks at a family event in a park in Hampshire, absolutely loved himself and full of himself. And met Linford Christie at a school sporting event and he was very nice and down to earth. Unreal to think that was over 20 years ago!

PolloDePrimavera · 16/03/2021 07:41

Popsicle I saw Linford Christie at an athletics event when I was about 11, went up to him, asked him for an autograph and called him Mr Christie (Blush)... He said, "not now love, I'm training." He wasn't. And Kris Akabusi laughed!
I saw Trudie Styler at a Madonna concert, she was walking across the main crowd at Wembley, to get to this platform in the middle. For reasons best known to myself, I prodded her on the shoulder! Why?!?!?! She smiled at me. Sorry Trudie, I was a dick.
Disclaimer: not saying any of the above are villains, although my grandma was furious with Linford after that.

PolloDePrimavera · 16/03/2021 07:42

I live very near Ian Brown and my dog escaped into his garden. He was very nice about it. Not a villain unless we are talking about anti maskers.

AndNoneForGretchenWieners · 16/03/2021 08:01

@PuppyMonkeyBaby interesting about Geoff Capes. I met him through work (he was patron of a charity I worked for) and was organising an event for him to speak at, and he was fine with me. Really engaging and polite. I think I still have his phone number in my contacts list (have no reason to phone it though). Maybe in professional mode he is different to personal?

honeylulu · 16/03/2021 08:30

I'm cheered by the more positive experiences of David Bellamy. Perhaps he was just having on off day. To be fair, I did have two lots of dealings with him (I was working for an ecological publisher and he was giving us his time for free to support awareness of the world's coral reefs being eroded). First time I dealt with him on the phone and he was perfectly nice. Second time was in person at a trade event (when he was grumpy) and he was dressed up in a coral polyp costume - it did look rather hot and uncomfortable to be fair.

I also once met Melinda Messenger at my local station. I saw this lady who looked so glamorous, despite being in a tracksuit and knew I knew her. Could not place her, thought she must be one of the school mums. As I passed I said a cheerful "hello" and she replied "hello" with a lovely beaming smile. After she'd gone I realised who she was and that I didn't know her at all.

n00bie · 16/03/2021 08:43

To add another post, a close relative works in the technical side of entertainment and has met a few people who are the opposite of what you’d think. Jimmy Carr was very nice and polite, and spoke to the crew about what he wanted from them and asked their names and thanked them after the show. Dawn French had no interest in the little people, and was very standoffish, leaving her huge entourage to speak for her.

Neap · 16/03/2021 08:59

To be honest, these threads always depress me slightly. I think it’s a combination of how much people seem to cherish these encounters for years as a brush with ‘greatness’/villainy/fame etc, and how much they seem to expect a specific standard of behaviour from ‘celebrities’.

Obviously behaving rudely to waiters etc is never ok, but I’m frequently preoccupied and probably not smiley or friendly to passing strangers, depending on what’s going on in my life — I think it’s pretty unrealistic to expect anyone to be always ‘on’. I mean, Ian McKellen once stole my taxi on Oxford Street, but I don’t shake my fist at the tv shouting ‘Fuck you Gandalf!’ when he’s on Graham Norton’s sofa being all twinkly.

GoryGilmore · 16/03/2021 09:07

I mean, Ian McKellen once stole my taxi on Oxford Street, but I don’t shake my fist at the tv shouting ‘Fuck you Gandalf!’ when he’s on Graham Norton’s sofa being all twinkly

😂😂😂

Ihopeyourcakeisshit · 16/03/2021 09:16

I once ran over Kenneth Cranham's foot with a pram in Mark's and Spencer's, he was very forgiving.

GuyFawkesDay · 16/03/2021 09:32

@honeylulu DB was a family friend via TV work and he was a really lovely man.

I remember watching Happy Valley years back and thinking James Norton was v scary (Tbh his character was terrifying) but he is reputed to be a very nice guy.

ancientgran · 16/03/2021 09:33

@n00bie

To add another post, a close relative works in the technical side of entertainment and has met a few people who are the opposite of what you’d think. Jimmy Carr was very nice and polite, and spoke to the crew about what he wanted from them and asked their names and thanked them after the show. Dawn French had no interest in the little people, and was very standoffish, leaving her huge entourage to speak for her.
You can tell from my name I'm old so this is a bit out of date. My DH knew a tech guy at a big theatre. He told funny stories about stars of the day but the one he rated was Marlene Dietrich, said she always arrived with presents for backstage people. He reckoned she was a wise woman as she always got the best sound/lighting etc.

Not sure if it makes her, and maybe Jimmy Carr, nice, shrewd or calculating. Certainly made her popular backstage.

Iamthewombat · 16/03/2021 09:50

To be honest, these threads always depress me slightly. I think it’s a combination of how much people seem to cherish these encounters for years as a brush with ‘greatness’/villainy/fame etc, and how much they seem to expect a specific standard of behaviour from ‘celebrities’.

This.

What’s bizarre is that some people ignore the thread title, don’t appear to read the thread and plunge straight in, gagging to relate the tale of how they once saw Joanna Lumley in a hotel reception and she seemed charming etc etc.

Despite the thread being about ‘encounters with celebrity arsed’ or ‘have you met a celebrity villain’.

Is it that exciting that you have to seize every opportunity to tell strangers about it, even if it is irrelevant to the thread?

Re celebrities being a bit grumpy when off duty and someone approaches them: they can’t be ‘on’ all the time, can they? They are still human.

(I am laughing at ‘fuck you Gandalf’!)

Orchidflower1 · 16/03/2021 10:08

@Iamthewombat the thing is though some threads evolve like a conversation. This is an example of such.

Iamthewombat · 16/03/2021 10:15

How is leaping in with an irrelevant story an example of a conversation ‘evolving’? Particularly when the people doing so clearly have not read the thread?

COPPER3 · 16/03/2021 10:19

Paul O'Grady...yeah i know!? I was told by a friend he was really rude and unpleasant to all the staff whilst filming him. He is super to dogs though..

Ihopeyourcakeisshit · 16/03/2021 10:26

@COPPER3

Paul O'Grady...yeah i know!? I was told by a friend he was really rude and unpleasant to all the staff whilst filming him. He is super to dogs though..
Doesn't surprise me, wasn't he best friends with Cilla?
ChazsBrilliantAttitude · 16/03/2021 10:40

A dishonourable mention goes to Phil Collins. I used to do some autograph hunting when I was younger. He was on a chat show and all the other guests came out and signed autographs for the dozen or so people waiting. (Including a hilarious Rik Mayall RIP). There was one keen Phil Collins fan there and not only did he ignore us all he actively turned away so she couldn’t even get a photograph. It was so obviously a deliberate snub that she burst into tears.

Neap · 16/03/2021 10:42

Re celebrities being a bit grumpy when off duty and someone approaches them: they can’t be ‘on’ all the time, can they? They are still human.

(I am laughing at ‘fuck you Gandalf’!)

Whoops, I may have inadvertently repositioned Ian McKellen as a taxi-stealing celebrity villain. Grin

It's actually people's behaviour around famous people that interests me. I was once in some glossy Knightsbridge hotel lobby waiting for a friend and Robert de Niro and Al Pacino walked in, and I didn't clock them for a bit they were just two important-looking, well-groomed middle-aged men in suits and the place was full of similar, and I was tired, late for something and annoyed with friend but I swear, there was a change in the air, as other people responded to Bigtime Fame entering the building, even staff trained to deal with the famous with discretion, and insanely wealthy and powerful fellow-guests.

What struck me too is that as well as having a couple of giant security guards, neither of them ever looked around them, which you'd probably train yourself not to do if everywhere you ever went you were the person everyone was looking at. I think that that was why I first noticed them -- everyone else was looking at them, or pretending not to, and they weren't looking anywhere but at one another or the floor.

I assume they were promoting a film, but the only thing I remember about when it was that I'd just come from the Hyde Park Last Night of the Proms prom where Sue Perkins conducted something after she won Maestro.

And, not unrelatedly, the friend I was waiting for worked for a classical music agent, and was upstairs dropping off dry cleaning or something for an opera singer who was in town for the Last Night. At around 11 o'clock at night.

Ihopeyourcakeisshit · 16/03/2021 10:47

I will confess I would likely lose control of all my faculties if I was somewhere and Al Pacino and Robert Dr Niro walked in together.

WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll · 16/03/2021 10:49

Doesn't surprise me, wasn't he best friends with Cilla?

One thing I never quite got was that Cilla, Paul and Dale Winton were all really close pals - I think she often spent Christmas with them after Bobby had died; yet I've only ever heard reports of Dale being genuinely lovely.