For the sake of acknowledging reality, it should be noted that people lie on the Internet. But this roundup of Reddit stories regarding regular folks meeting celebrities are still the most convincingly real accounts we’ve come across. Although this is a collection of some of the worst or strangest cases, it became evident in our digging that most people, in fact, have pleasant encounters with famous people (notably John Mayer and Bill Hader). But still, a few suggest otherwise.
Tommy Lee Jones
I used to work at Starbucks in San Antonio and Tommy Lee Jones has a home there. He strolled into my store one day. He was a dick. He argued with us about a syrup charge and then complained about his drink. We offered to remake it, but he left grumbling and being an overall dick. I know he has that reputation, but I honestly didn’t really believe it until I interacted with him. One of the customers asked for his autograph and he told her to fuck herself.
Gave the guy prompt, courteous service, never got intrusive, treated him as a regular person, checked on him once to make sure everything was cool, pretty much everything you need to do to make sure the customer has a nice dining experience while barely being there yourself. Gave stiff, one-word dullard responses the entire time and then left me about 5% tip as his thanks. Fuck you, Strahan.
Ice-T
So it wasn’t exactly the worst for me, but the situation wasn’t good. I saw Ice-T at a McDonald’s in LAX airport. They fucked up his order and he was complaining to them. When they got it right, he came over to the condiments stand, where I was, looked over and said, “Fuckin’ McDonald’s man.” I sort of laughed and agreed. It was the greatest moment of my life, but definitely the worst for those employees who got yelled at by Ice-T.
Joe Montana
I used to run a candy store and Joe Montana lived in town. He came in one day with his wife in the early afternoon. A construction worker from across the street walked across and came in. He walked up to Joe and said, “My family had a lot of issues while I was growing up, but I wanted to tell you that we always sat down on Sunday and watched you play for the Niners. I just wanted to thank you for those memories.” Montana turns to him and says, “Sorry buddy, you’ve got the wrong guy.” He apologizes, looks confused and leaves. I knew it was him just from recognition and his build/height, but said nothing figuring maybe he was just very similar looking.
His wife uses her credit card to pay for the trip, and I check her ID. Sure as shit, Jennifer Montana.
Rihanna
I met Rhianna while I was stationed in Japan on the US George Washington (aircraft carrier). I was actually assigned to follow her group around, take pictures and provide assistance for anything. She wasn’t miserable really, just sort of disinterested and snobby the whole time and blatantly ignored the poor officer who was trying to lead her tour and give her the info on the ship. She didn’t even perform for us, so I have no idea why she was there. She signed autographs lazily on the mess decks for about 30 minutes and then left. Later she tweeted about how dirty our ship was.
Harvey Keitel
Bartending at a posh hotel in Palm Springs, he walks up to the bar. I greet him and ask how I can help him. He tells me, “get out of my eyeline,” which apparently means don’t make eye contact with me. What an anus-apple.
Christian Slater
Met Christian Slater at a bar once and he was trashed. I looked at him and kind of turned my head and said, “Aren’t you…” Before I could finish he goes, “GHRYEah it’s fuckin’ me, what’s it to you? Ya wrap your car around a tree and now I’m the asshole?” I had no idea what he was talking about and just sat there dumbfounded. Before I could say anything else he flicked a (unlit) cigarette in my general direction and stumbled off. Not sure I could classify this as the “worst experience” because it’s hilarious and a weird story.
Wesley Snipes
I used to wait tables at Planet Hollywood in Orlando. One day Wesley Snipes and his family came in. The manager told me and another waiter to serve just him and his family, no other customers. There was like 10 of them including kids, grandma, etc. Anyway, we served them for about 2 hours, they got their meal fully comped so they didn’t pay anything for the food, and left me and the other waiter a massive tip. Guess how much… ZERO. Nothing. Not one dollar, and they got well over $200 of free food.
George Lopez
When I was 15, I met George Lopez after the filming of one of his “George Lopez” show episodes. During the show, he drank a lot and got pretty shitfaced and afterwards when I asked him for some life advice he replied, “Drugs. If you’re not doing it, you’re overdoing it kid.” He also gave my friend’s dad (who worked on the show) about an ounce of incredibly powerful weed for my friends and I a couple of weeks later.
tl;dr George Lopez gives kids drugs.
Michael Jordan
I was at a nice restaurant in L.A. and we had just been seated. Started glancing over the menu and a waiter taps me on the shoulder and says, “I’m so sorry sir, we are at max capacity and this table was reserved.” I felt so awkward, it was probably 20 minutes in; we had gotten our drinks and then he came up to me. I was a bit of a dick since I just got off the plane and was starving. I said to him, “Unless it’s Kobe Bryant or George Bush, they can wait 20 minutes.” I hear a laugh and who should be there but Michael Jordan. He says ,”I’m not Kobe but I’m pretty close.”
I told everyone to get up and leave. They all started laughing. MJ said he was sorry, but he was flying out in 2 hours and wanted to get a steak beforehand. Another table finished up, so we waited the 10 minutes it took for them to clean it and we were seated again. I was a bit irritated, but our bill was paid for in full along with a card and a phone number. We called it the next day and told her what happened and she said, “Oh Mr. Jordan felt horrible and has gotten six tickets to tonight’s Lakers game to make up for last night.” Ended up being one of the best trips ever.
Ron Jeremy
My roommate (Tiffany) and I went to Vegas for the Nightclub & Bar Convention. They booked Ron Jeremy, and Tiff was a huge fan, so she got him to sign her butt/hip. He fancied her, so he got her digits and we were supposed to meet up with him at some club later. Table, bottles, whatever. The convention had booked a BOB show so we stopped by there first (it was a free show/free drinks kinda thing). BOB took a liking to us, so we ended up blowing Ron off to kick it in the studio with BOB. Ron Jeremy starts blowing her phone the fuck up at the same time BOB is calling mine.
She woke up to crap tons of missed calls, texts and voicmails. She feels bad, and we meet up with him that next day. He’s still in the same clothes he wore the first day we met him, he still smells the same (awful), and he brought a porn friend of his (some guy) with him.
Besides the fact the RJ asks to sign my boob, he keeps grabbing us, all while he’s pedantically spouting his views on politics. He then grabs Tiff while his friend distracts me and tries to get her alone so they can have random sex in some hallway. No thank you. We both try to get the fuck outta there ASAP, and he IS NOT taking “no” for an answer. We start lying about needing to get back to our hotel to get to the airport. He insists on driving (some creepy old beat-up truck). We FINALLY get to our hotel and he refuses to let us go. He even wanted to go with us to the airport! Then he tries following us into the hotel still going on about how we should spend more time with him. I really thought we were gonna have to Chandler-Yemen this guy. We eventually told hotel security not to let him in. Not that they listened.
It was unreal.
Shia LaBeouf
No joke, Shia LeBeouf tried to eat me.
I served Emma Bunton, a.k.a. Baby Spice, in a coffee shop I worked in. She asked for a Belgian bun (like a sweet bun with white icing and a cherry on top). She said something along the lines of, “There’s not enough icing,” and points to the another available bun and says. “I want that one.” All the while not looking me in the eye and being generally miserable. I was so excited to see/meet her and all she wanted was extra icing. There was no please or thank you, she just grabbed the plate (with new bun) off me and slunk over to the till with her nose in the air.
Bob Saget
Bob Saget cussed me out live on stage in front of 1000 people.
I used to run a specific piece of technology for live events and I got hired by a charity that Saget does a lot of work with.
Before the show, I brought him over to the tech table at the back of the house, showed him how everything worked, and he went to the stage to start the show. Almost immediately, he starts explaining how this tech works to the audience (because they were going to use it). BUT, he explains it completely wrong. He then asks me to put something up on the screen that was completely impossible. I’m not on headset for this show, so all I can do is tell a runner who runs off to find the producer. In the meantime, he’s accusing me of not paying attention and starts cussing me out. Eventually he moves on.
At the first break, he storms back to my table and asks me “what the hell is going on?” I politely explain that he was mistaken and that I wasn’t capable of doing what he asked me to do, and I go through my instructions again. To his credit, not only did he apologize to me right there, but when he took the mic again, he apologized in front of the whole audience. It was pretty neat.
