Another Celebrity Sighting !

Two in one week!

I've seen many celebs at Nets games, particularly during the playoffs. But what officially constitutes a "Celebrity Sighting"? Certainly not if they simply introduce a celebrity from his seat and show his picture on the big TV screen (Last night: Bruce Willis, Penny Marshall, Steve Schirippa, and some rapper/hip-hopper I never heard of). Maybe, maybe not, if I see the celeb roaming the halls (Last year: NJ Governor McGreevy, Bill Murray, Julius Erving).

But last night was great. I'm going to my seat, and who do I see about to enter a luxury box? The great and incomparable Frank Vincent!

So I say to him "Excuse me, Frank Vincent, right?"
And I hold out my hand.
"Yeah" he says, and shakes it.
"I'm a great fan of yours" I say, and he thanks me as he starts to try to walk away. But I don't let it go at that.
"I gotta just tell you something else" I say, as I cut him off from the door he is trying to enter.
"Will this take long?" he asks, and I think I detect an eye roll on his part
"No" I say, and start trying to explain to him, and not very well, the Gangster BB.
He doesn't seem too interested, so I change the subject and tell him "You were the best in DO THE RIGHT THING" So he thanks me again and moves for the door.
I step aside, and close by telling him "I bet I'm the only one here tonight who recognizes you."
And he says "You're right. You must be Jewish"

WTF did he mean by that. Was it a compliment or an insult?

Kind of a wide-open insult. He could have meant anything. But maybe he is a member of the BB and recognized you from your picture. Did he ask you to get your shinebox? (that is the guy I'm thinking it is?)

That's him...

Billy "Batts" in GOODFELLAS
The guy with the Cadillac that gets sprayed from the fire hydrant in DO THE RIGHT THING
The girl's father in JUNGLE FEVER
The guy that turns on Joe Pesci in CASINO
The mob guy in RAGING BULL
Miscellaneous mob guy in WISE GUYS

I think he does a great job in most of his films.

He was great with Joe Pesci in Casino.

Must be he felt that you took to much of his time up and he wanted to move along. He may have taken that crack- "I bet I'm the only one here tonight who recognizes you." as an insult.

or again maybe he thinks you should get a job as an extra in a flim as a Jew mobster? What the hell send in your headshot and see what happens. You never know!

You should have told him, "I bet I'm the only one here tonight who remembers you playing drums behind Joe Pesci in The Aristocrats." Then he might have said, "You're right. You must be a member of AARP."

I never thought of that. You may very well be right.

I was trying to tell him what a great fan I was of his--he who is surely an actor without a great deal of recognition. I mean, how many people would even recognize his face, much less know his name?

But I guess I was really "tooting my own horn" for recognizing him, rather than paying him a compliment. I can see where he could have taken it as an insult. I'll have to look for him tomorrow night and try to apologize.

Oh sure, when I do this at the baseball stadiums, I'm deemed a stalker. Never got the eye roll though

Being at the game last night must've been great for you! Little did Frank know you sold your soul to the devil for that winning point!!

Yea, that's really going to go over well tomorrow, plaw! Now he'll really think you are a stalker (like Buffy over here!)

Sure, next thing you know someone is snapping a picture and one of two things happens>

1) there is a report in the star newspaper that I am out with a young blonde bombshell who isn't my wife or

2) some lady is sueing me for child surport or saying I hit her. OH WELL, the price for being famous!

Naw, I have never seen my face on the cover of a rag nor on the inside of a courtroom.

Hmmm, perhaps I should caption the photographs I DO have! haha - my cardinal rule...I NEVER kiss and tell.

I havea sighting of my own to share with you all, not sure if it accounts under "celebrity status" but does Big Foot count?

Man that is great, I would probably piss myself if a saw a celebrity in real life. Not too many stop by here in Iowa....

That's great, Plawrence! Mucho respect for going up to him; I know that with a star like him I wouldn't have the courage to even say hello! Well, maybe if it were Mister Hackman...

It is sad that he treat you like that. I have no idea as to what he meant with the Jewish remark. Is he (Vincent) Jewish?

Mick

Who told him that muthaf*ckin' bubbemeitzer?

Plaw, next time you rub elbows with Frank Vincent again try inviting him to a bar and tell him that "Drinks are on the House."

GoodFella

He must not have been aware that you "don't shine shoes no more!"

Mick

Well, I looked for him last night, but alas, he was no where to be found

Hey Plaw don't sweat it. When I was 11 or 12 I snuck under a wooden police barricade at Yankee Stadium when the game was over, just to get closer to Mickey Mantle as he headed for the parking lot. He had had a great game, so I ran up to him and stretched out my hand and said "hey Mickey gimme five!". Well he looked at me in the eyes, looked at my hand stretched out and sneered, rolled his eyes,shook his head and kept on walking, ignoring me. I felt kind of bad. SO I read some statistics, and realized that my friends were right...Willie Mays who'd often play stickball in the street with kids early in his career WAS better than The Mick.

right mick. Oooooppps, "watch the suit!"

GoodFella

Maybe The Mick was still nursing his hangover

I grew up right around the corner from Ebbets Field. I could hear the night game crowd noise from my bedroom window.

There was one of those old style places that we called a "candy store" (a counter with a soda fountain, a few tables, sold newspapers, cigarettes, candy...is that what they were called in the Bronx?) right across the street on Bedford Avenue. A couple of hours after a day game, Dodger players would show up for a bite to eat. This was 1955 or '56, of course, long before the days of food spreads in the clubhouse.

All the neighborhood kids would hang around outside waiting for the players, who were considered "regular people" back then, I guess, and they would obligingly sign autographs.

This was in the days when it was safe for a 6 or 7 year old to roam the streets with his friends unsupervised, and I had a whole collection of Dodger autographs. Don't know what happened to them though...

Nice to see you around here, BK.There hasn't been enough reminiscing by the oldsters lately.

I happen to come across this post while doing a search and thought that I would revive it. After this incident, we used to constantly joke with Plaw about his experience with Frank Vincent, and it always made him laugh.

As a matter of fact, when several of us met in Chicago in 2004, we were having dinner at Shula's Steakhouse and the waiter came over and presented a bottle of wine to the table and said "Compliments of Mr. Frank Vincent." We knew right away that the wine was from Paul.

So for those new memebers who may have heard us talk about the Frank Vincent story here on the boards, and for those of us who continually had a laugh with Plaw over the Frank Vincent story, here is the original post by Paul sharing his Frank Vincent story with the boards.

DC, Thanks for resurrecting this one!! I laughed my ass off the first time Plaw shared that story. Couldn't you just picture him, following Frank Vincent around, continuing to talk while Mr. Vincent was trying to get away from him??

Seeing his name in what I thought was a new thread freaked me out a little...

This is too funny.

So, Vincent is a bit of a dick... Who would've thought? You think he'd be a little nicer to his fans. I mean, he's a b-list celebrity, he's not exactly Gene Hackman.

Well, I don't know if it's really fair to call him a d**k. I mean, with all due respect, God rest his soul, Paul did say to him that he was probably the only one in the arena who recognized him.

How would you react to someone trying to tell you about an internet site and then saying something like that to you if you were a celebrity?

But that was our friend Paul!

I have to hand it to Plaw, I don't think I'd have the guts to make that remark, but I think he was justified in saying it. It seems like Vincent was being a bit of a dick before the statement was dropped. You know, rolling his eyes, not even pretending to be the least bit interested in what Plaw had to say... Oh well.

Either way, this story is good for a laugh.

I think I'd be reluctant to approach as well. I did it in Ocean City, NJ and met John Kruk and in Georgia 15 years ago this weekend with Tom Landry. Both guys were pleasant.

My brother-in-law has no hesitation. He approached the guy, who played George in Seinfeld at a Broadway play and the actor couldn't have been nicer. Similarly, he walked up and introduced himself to Pavarotti while the singer was having dinner, and Pavarotti actually invited his wife (my sister) and him to have dinner with his party.