PFTM - On the Road With A Famous Rock Star

February 10, 2004

Pages From The Muse

Articles Inspired by Blue Knight "Happenings"

This Month:
"On The Road With A Famous Rock Star"

By James Gilchrist

News York City, NY ----- What’s it like being a famous rock star? Well, since I’ve only been one once, I can only say that it is a bit like being at the airport, after you’ve passed through security but before you’ve boarded the plane. You sit down, you drop your bags and ask your partner to keep an eye on things while you get two Caramel Macchiatos from the nearest Starbucks, and while doing so, two women stop you and ask if they could please have your autograph. You smile and say, “No really, it’s not worth what you think it is…” but then, you don’t know what they think it’s worth so how can that be true?

Now most rock stars probably don’t wax philosophical (I’ll come back to that bit about wax) about the routine of being asked for autographs. But when you’ve only been one once (or twice), you are entitled to wonder at, well, the wonder of it. As an actor, I’ve been asked for my autograph by between 15 – 20 people in the course of a “career.” That hardly makes me a star. I’ve been told in elevators that I was “that guy from that movie,” or “somebody famous,” or just “someone” (to the last I always agree). I’ve also been mistaken for a wax-work figure while in the “Celebrity Party” room at Madame Tousseau's Wax Museum in New York City. I still don’t know who they thought I was but it was enormously satisfying to simply remove my right hand from my lapel and convince five people that they were seeing a statue come to life! With a quiet but polite, “If you’ll excuse me…?” I strode away from the table behind which I’d been waiting for my mother to finish her study of Paul Newman as gasps, startled laughter, and several whispered “Didn’t you think he was…” erupted behind me. Only rarely do people ask wax-works for their autographs, though.

A trip to see my grandmother in Detroit, MI last month marks the only time I’ve been asked for an autograph outside of, shall we say, my element. That is to say, outside of the lobby of a theatre I’ve just performed in, or outside of a bandstand or a store or a mall in which I’ve just performed my music (I’ll come back to that), or outside of say, any elevator in New York City. (Well, that’s not entirely true – I was once recognized by a college student who noticed me shopping in Macy's at the Town Square Mall in Rockaway, NJ. Considering that the last place she’d seen me was acting in a tour that included her school - Lehigh Valley College in PA - over 200 miles away from there, that was pretty special. But alas, she didn’t think I was a rock star.)

I was standing in line to get my boarding pass for Spirit Airlines Flight 1408 from Detroit’s Metro airport to NYC’s LaGuardia when I became a famous rock star. Isn’t that quaint? Not the rock star thing; the fact that Spirit Airlines still insists that everyone stand in line to get a boarding pass at the ticket counter even if you bought your ticket online – no E-Ticket machines, kiosks, or other customer service aids of any kind; even the departing and arriving flights aren’t on a television monitor, they are posted using those white plastic letters that always fall off the grooved boards that hang on the wall. Happily though, on this flight, upgrades were available so for an extra $40 I wasn't again going to have to sit inside Engine Number 2 (there’s a long story there involving inadequate soundproofing, ample legroom for Hobbits, and fake windows) all the way home.

In any event, imagine my surprise when from behind me in the “stand-and-wait-to-tell-us-you-already-bought-a-ticket-for-this-flight” line, a woman spoke up and said, “Excuse me…are you a famous rock star?” I’m not sure if she thought the back of my head looked like a famous musician’s, or if when I turned around she then thought the front of my head looked like it was supposed to, but she asked her question anyway. This past weekend, while I was talking with Kyle and Eric after a show we played at Esoterica, a New-Age Café/Bookstore/All-things-metaphysical-to-all-people kind of place in Leesburg, VA, a woman asked from behind me, “Excuse me…would you sign this CD?” Now the fact that the CD she wanted me to sign was a CD of ours I’d sold while performing at the store 6 months earlier, and that she had brought it with her to come see us perform the next time we came to her town, was pretty special. She didn’t ask me if I was a famous rock star, she was just operating under the mistaken impression that I was one and behaving accordingly. But again, I was in “my element” (you remember, the one about being in a store after having just done a show?) so not as big a surprise there.

What does one say when, while on the road, traveling for pleasure, someone stops you and asks, “Excuse me…are you a famous rock star?” Forgive me if I don’t think there is an inherently right or wrong answer to such an obviously philosophical question. Only having been one once myself, I can only tell you what I said.

I said, “YES."