Conventional Wisdom: Not Your Trained Monkey
Posted By Kathleen David on May 29, 2014
This is not to most people in fandom. This is to that small minority that can’t seem to get a grip on boundaries. But this behavior bothers the ever loving out of me and all I see is, in the land of right now, it getting worse.
I read yesterday a bunch of people taking James MacAvoy to task for swearing at some teenagers. How rude said some. What a dìçk said others. And here I thought he was such a nice guy said some more. So I did some digging around and found closer to the whole story. Mr. MacAvoy was with a bunch of his mates in a pub celebrating a friend’s birthday. These teens asked for pictures and autographs and Mr. MacAvoy informed them that he was there to spend sometime with his friends and could they just leave him alone. Now the teens were not the first ones to approach him and ask this of him. This had been going on all evening. But apparently these teens wouldn’t take no for an answer and he blew up at them with language that was pretty harsh. So now he is the bad guy in the piece.
Well may be he shouldn’t have been out in public said some. There is a price for fame said others. He shouldn’t have to hide because he’s an actor and a popular one in some circles. He wanted to go where his friends wanted to go which was this pub. He shouldn’t have to hide.
Recently there have been a spate of pictures from Glasgow of Robert Carlyle. He is filming a film there and spending time with his family. He has been very polite and gracious to people and taken a lot of selfies. But I can see the strained polite smile on his face. I have seen it before on friends who have to deal with the same thing. I had more respect for the fan who just posted that she had her hands full and Robert Carlyle opened the door for her at a grocery store. No picture just her moment with the actor out on twitter.
I remember years ago I was working at the Emory University library and I had gone to another library to pick up the books that belonged in our collection while returning books that belonged in theirs. I had to do that about once every two days. Well that day had been around finals so there were more books than usual and I was juggling the stack trying to figure out how to get the door to open when I heard a familiar southern voice say, “Here, let me get that for you.” The door opened and I turn to thank the person who did me a kind deed. I was a bit startled so I did stammer but I managed to thank President Carter for opening a door for me. No selflies or the like back then in the mid 80s just someone being very polite and honestly I wouldn’t have asked anyway.
I have had meals with people who tend to get the general population to do a double take when they realize who is sitting at the table. I had a lot of fun watching people walk by Peter’s at the rehab hospital when Stephen King and I were just sitting there talking waiting for Peter to finish up his physical therapy session. There were two looks that were prominent. One was those that were trying to figure out where they had seen Stephen before because he looked familiar and the other were people who had been informed that he was in the building and were coming by for a glance. Now props to everyone there, no one asked for an autograph or a selfie. They were professional about it.
Misha Collins got some serious flack for saying the actors aren’t your trained monkeys after being asked to say this or do that. But they aren’t.
Actors are people to. They have to deal with cat boxes and walking their dogs. With laundry and dishes. With all the issues of living and they should be able to go places un-harassed and do what they need to do. They should be able to go out with friends to places and have a drink or a restaurant and have a meal without it being interrupted 20 times by fans. This holds true for everyone really.
I remember when I worked at Del Rey, I was out to lunch with a good friend. We were over towards on 8th avenue having walking from Time Square. Walking towards us was David Bowie and Iman they were hand in hand just enjoying the day. There was what we call the New York nod acknowledging that their greatness had been recognized. They smiled and nodded back and we went our way and they went theirs. That is the way it should be.
There is a time and place for everything but I really wish people would realize when it is neither.
I am grateful for those who recognize boundries.
Well said. I doubt I’ve had as many encounters as you have given your location and your general travels, but I taught at a private school in LA for 9 years, and there were certainly some “boldface names” we saw in the parent body or at admissions open houses. I always tried very, very hard to say nothing more than a quick acknowledgement that I’d enjoyed their work (assuming I had) and leave it there.
(By the same token, though, there were clearly some of those parents who walked around the place as if they expected an entourage following them everywhere. Those were the parents you knew might wind up presenting a problem down the line.)
Yes, the more things change, the more they stay the same….
I live near Palm Springs now, and lived here thirty years ago as well. Back then, it was not surprising for my brother to get off work some night, be walking down Palm Canyon, and smile and say hi to a guy walking the other way swinging a golf club, Bob Hope. They and others were just residents. Then, as now, there were places that the famous went to be seen and noticed, and other places where they just went to relax, but the locals pretty much new what the difference was. Of course, tourists have always been a problem!
In this new age of selfies and photobombing, though, the limits have been blurred. People ‘expect’ to interact with their heroes in the rich and famous, and tend to forget that they are people too. The trained monkey comment is pretty close to the mark, that is how they are looked on by many of the general public…
On a tangential note, when I was at ConnectiCon last year, I was at the top of a balcony and saw a familiar-but-not-notably-famous face (among the sea of famous, con-famous, decorated, familiar, and otherwise generally friendly faces) heading down the escalator. The person was close enough for me to call out and wave to a friend, but not to converse. After a couple of minutes during which the non-incident passed and my brain percolated, it occurred to me that the person was (I thought) you. So if you were at CC last summer, the bearded guy squinting slightly and staring at you from above didn’t intend to be rude but was just trying to identify you. If you weren’t there, then I owe that apology to someone who looks a bit like you.