Betty on a Box

So I was thinking about all the famous people I’ve known. No, not like when I realised that my musician friend, Sugar, was actually well known in the Melbourne electronic underground. I mean really famous people.  But then I realised that the list would be pretty small so I’ve decided to include those I’ve known by 1-degree of separation. And then I thought that maybe I’d need a few rules that would define what I mean by “people I’ve known”.  Like, what was my proximity to them at the time of said knowing? And what activity were we engaged in?

Rules

1. If I’ve actually met them (names exchanged – mine, not theirs) – they’re in;

2. If I mixed up their Rubiks Cube, in; 

3. If we were eating at the same restaurant at the same time (but not necessarily together like the time John Singleton was with some broad at Yu-u) – not in;

4. If they were walking down a red carpet, not in.

So, here goes:

1. Noah Taylor – I used to work with his mother
2. Molly Ringwald – Oh, those 15 not-so-glorious minutes I spent “interviewing” her when she made the not-so-glorious poor excuse of a film Cut. The interview was, in fact, one of the worst experiences of my professional life. I still can’t talk about it.
3. Geoffrey Rush – Jazzy Jeff and I sat behind him and his family at the Melbourne premier of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone. I’m not sure if that counts but
4. Geoffrey Rush – Sat behind him at the Kino during a media preview screening of some film or other – I mean, there were only 10 of us in the cinema.
5. Adam Ant    
   
   God I used to think about him so much (“I wonder what he’s doing RIGHT NOW?”) (“RIGHT NOW?”) (“No, NOW?”) (“AND NOW?”) that it felt like I was with him EVERYWHERE.
6. Marcus Graham (remember E-Street’s Wheels and that bathtub scene?) – I was at the Malthouse cinema for the first night of Tartouffe and I was having a drink while waiting for Jazzy Jeff and I was sitting upstairs where perhaps I shouldn’t have been because then the cast and crew came out and started having dinner and there was Marcus, a few tables away. (I think I just broke rule number 2?)
7. Lawrence Leung – See rule 2 – At the RR OB 1 year ago.
8. Val Lehman aka Bea “Top Dog” Smith
   
   I met her on the weekend at Writers at the Convent! Introduced myself and got a photo. A photo! With BEA “TOP DOG” SMITH. My folks were RAPT!
9. Chopper Reed – It was when Jazzy Jeff and I had our graveyard show on RRR a few years back at the old studio in Fitzroy. It was around 1.30am. Chopper was coming out of the toilet. I was heading towards the ladies. He was zipping up his pants. It was my birthday. He said “g’day”. I said “hi” and kept moving.

I guess in all, I haven’t really known that many famous people. Jazzy Jeff has made a CD. I guess he’s famous.

So we walked in, Jazzy Jeff and I, to the humble Western Suburbs rents’ home to pick up the pooches. With the pooches scratching my unclad legs, I went straight for the pantry where mum keeps the bottomless jar of BBQ shapes – seriously, it’s always full, like a glass of cheap wine at a wedding. This is great as it makes me feel that I’ve never finished a packet, hence my youthful, dreamlike figure (dreamlike is true). So anyway, Jazzy Jeff’s busy drooling over mum’s stove checking out what we might be able to take with us for dinner. I turn around from the pantry and nearly choke on every one of those BBQ shapes I’ve shoved in my gob and the jar almost crashes to the floor cos there’s dad, all 70 years of him, wearing a baseball cap – BACK TO FRONT. This is a man who thinks that insomnia is best dealt with by drinking a cup of espresso, who falls from the ancient fig tree after breaking a branch with his hulking frame but decides to chop down the tree out of spite and who still thinks that all of the Hollywood actors of the 50s and 60s were Italian (the films were DUBBED, DAD!). So, given that the man doesn’t watch nearly enough commercial TV anymore thanks to 24-hours of RAI-International that beams in on the tele from the super-massive bird-shit-splattered satellite dish, where did the back to front baseball cap come from?Has Papà’s been sneaking into our place on the sly when he SAYS he’s mowing the lawn and in between snips he’s been watching MTV Cribs and he’s now down with the homies, yo?