Joe DiMaggio is a dunker?
June 11, 2010 5:46 AM   Subscribe

I may or may not have sat next to someone of considerable celebrity (an actor) on a transatlantic flight, while sitting in coach, a week and a half ago. How might I go about confirming one way or another, were I so inclined? That is, without encroaching upon this person's right to privacy?
posted by Busoni to Human Relations (21 answers total) 2 users marked this as a favorite
 
Check Oh No They Didn't for departure/arrival photos. Use the tags to navigate to the celebrity you think it might be.
posted by headspace at 5:47 AM on June 11, 2010


without encroaching upon this person's right to privacy
That rules out bribing someone at the airline to look up the passenger records. You could Google the person and scan magazine racks to see if there's any mention of his or her recent travels. Or you could call their agent and ask a straightforward question. Any attempt at a trick question (one that misrepresents who you are and/or assumes both of you know about the subject's trip) would violate privacy.
posted by beagle at 5:57 AM on June 11, 2010


Response by poster: Yeah, he's (am I giving too much away?) not on the list. I don't think he'd really be on the watchlist of tabloid websites like Superficial or TMZ.

I could email this person/this person's camp, if 1. I could address the issue tactfully and 2. I knew the email address.
posted by Busoni at 6:07 AM on June 11, 2010


Is there any reason you can't tell us who you think it might be? If the person is of "considerable celebrity" then surely it's not pushing the boundaries of privacy to speculate about when or where they have recently travelled.
posted by afx237vi at 6:11 AM on June 11, 2010 [1 favorite]


If this person has a twitter account, you could check their recent tweets to see if there was any mention of travel to the right place at the right time.
posted by somanyamys at 6:11 AM on June 11, 2010


WhoRepresents is the subscriber service of choice to identify an actor's publicity representative. (Their agent and/or manager will not take your call.)

I can also tell you that any Hollywood PR person who gets a call from a random citizen, asking to know if their client sat next to them on a plane, will be all "RED FLAG WARNING WARNING STALKER ALERT." That conversation will not go well for you.
posted by RJ Reynolds at 6:12 AM on June 11, 2010 [1 favorite]


Anecdotal of course - but I have a dear friend who is a musician in New Orleans and every Jazz Fest he has a gig somewhere. He also looks a lot like Elvis Costello. People are often convinced he is Elvis Costello. Once this couple was so insistant that my friend showed them his driver's license - they thought it was some sort of cover. They still thought he was Elvis Costello.

Not saying this happened to you, but it's possible. Of course you probably know this. Some regular folks really look a lot like famous people.
posted by dog food sugar at 6:18 AM on June 11, 2010


Just go ahead and believe it was that person. It probably was, and it's not like anyone will be able to call you out on it.

Almost every time I've had a brush with someone who I think might be a certain person, it has turned out to really be them, no matter how much doubt I'd had about it.
posted by hermitosis at 6:25 AM on June 11, 2010 [2 favorites]


In the future, "Excuse me, but are you {insert famous name here}" at the time of the meeting will probably be the best way to verify identity. Even confirming via Twitter that they were in the country at the same time as you really doesn't verify that you were on the same flight. It certainly makes it more likely than not, but it's still circumstantial evidence.
posted by COD at 6:42 AM on June 11, 2010


Well, I occasionally get people shyly telling me I look a lot like Eric Clapton (when I'm wearing my Kakadu 9H18), which seems to be a fairly polite way of letting The Real Eric Clapton answer shruggingly to the effect of "yeah, I'm always hearing that" if he wants to not be The Real Eric Clapton right then, but also to laugh and say, "well, I am Eric Clapton, so that's a good thing!" if he's feeling social.

Another way to do it which is much friendlier is to just say hello and introduce yourself. If you say, "Hi, I'm Sean" and they give the name you suspect them to have, then you can go from there. If someone you suspect is Eric Clapton says his name is Sam, then you can just let it go.

True thing is that most notables are just folks and unless they have an entourage of bodyguards and deflectors specifically to keep them segregated, are generally cool with being talked to as just folks. (Of course, floppy hats and big sunglasses and furtive glances pretty much mean: bugger off.)

Actually I think it's pretty nifty when someone I think is awesome goes up to someone they think is awesome and acts like a total doofus. Yeah, we're all just people, eh?
posted by seanmpuckett at 6:47 AM on June 11, 2010


How likely is it that this person of "considerable celebrity" would be flying coach?
posted by It's Never Lurgi at 7:01 AM on June 11, 2010 [5 favorites]


Do celebrities fly coach? Especially on a transatlantic flight?
posted by pecknpah at 7:15 AM on June 11, 2010 [1 favorite]


It's Never Lurgi, pecknpah: There was all the hoopla with Kevin Smith's recent problems on Southwest flying coach, so it probably happens a good amount. I'd consider Kevin Smith a decently famous enough celebrity, but others probably wouldn't.
posted by kpht at 7:20 AM on June 11, 2010


I was on a flight not too long ago with Ric Ocasek and Paulina Porizkova (they were in first, not coach). Only I couldn't quite place them -- well, him, it was Ocasek I sort-of recognized -- at the time... I was all, "jeez, who is that guy?? He's definitely a rock star. Is it a Ramone? Which Ramones are dead?" And it was driving me nuts.

When we landed, they went to the baggage carousel to get their luggage like everyone else. I positioned myself nearby. When they pulled off a suitcase, I bent to "tie my shoe" and read the luggage tag. Mystery solved!!!
posted by kestrel251 at 7:27 AM on June 11, 2010


I saw George Clinton in business class (coach with more leg room basically) so not all celebs fly first class.
posted by vespabelle at 7:45 AM on June 11, 2010


Busoni, it's worth pointing out that the power of the hive mind in instances like this is probably less "here are 42 ways you might try to find this out" and more "Oh, George Clooney? He was sitting at the table behind me at dinner on 01 June so I don't think he was sitting next to you on that flight."

So you might get a better answer if you just reveal who you suspect it was.
posted by DarlingBri at 7:57 AM on June 11, 2010 [1 favorite]


Just knowing if they were in town or not is not really a defining bit of data. I was dead sure I saw the Dalai Lama driving a white ford pickup a couple of weeks back, especially after I heard him (illegally!) talking on his cellphone in Tibetan. The fact that the Actual Dalai Lama had been at Radio City all day does not increase the chances that it was really him behind the wheel.

Also I don't think His Holiness is a Mets fan, as the driver's t-shirt would suggest.
posted by elizardbits at 8:07 AM on June 11, 2010 [1 favorite]


You can also try to guess why they were abroad. For example, if you flew from London, Britain's National Movie Awards were two weeks ago, so an actor may have attended that. Plug their name into Google News, maybe?

Last year I thought I saw Claire Danes on my flight from New York to LA. She did something strange at the gate too, like boarding last, I think. But I really only remember her face from her teenage years, and I couldn't be certain. You have my sympathy-- it's completely maddening!
posted by acidic at 8:38 AM on June 11, 2010


As others have said, not knowing who your celeb is makes it hard to be specific, but for some folks who are prominent enough for pictures of them to go on the wire, you can find out where they are or have been by the pictures in the searchable Getty Editorial site.
posted by aught at 8:56 AM on June 11, 2010


kpht - Oh, I know that not every celebrity flies first class or business class, but I did ask about this particular celebrity. You might have met Katee Sackhoff flying coach, but you probably didn't meet Leonardo DiCaprio.
posted by It's Never Lurgi at 9:02 AM on June 11, 2010


Why does it matter that you keep the identity a secret?
posted by From Bklyn at 9:27 AM on June 11, 2010


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