DATELINE:
By CAJeannieFan57/Donna
What a lovely way to spend my birthday, hob-nobbing with two of my favorite celebrities, and a host of many others!
My friend Sally (a serious autograph collector) picked me up in the early part of the morning and we made our way up to the Burbank Marriott where the show is held. It’s a good 2-1/4+ hours drive for us, but we usually chat. My voice was supposed to be on serious vocal rest, so I was saving it to talk to celebrities (especially Barbara and Bill). The show wasn’t quite open yet even for early birds, when we arrived, but you always talk to people in line when you’re waiting – after all, everyone there is either a film, TV show, or music fan and you instantly have something in common: “who are you here to see today?”
Once in, we immediately headed for Barbara’s line. She
wasn’t there yet, but her line was already forming, so we got in it. They were
just inside the main room by a door, so the line went around the door, into the
hallway and waaaaaaaay back!!!! When we got in the
line, though, we were just outside the door in the hallway. I did peek into the room and saw that Mario
the bottle guy was immediately inside the door, with Bill on his left, and then
a tall table and stool for Barbara.
There were people in line that wanted to meet only Bill because of TBNS,
so the line moved a little and finally I was close to the door. I peeked in and called out Bill’s name. He
turned around and when he saw me, he smiled and said, “Hi, Donna!” About 5
minutes later, he did a stretch break and came into the doorway – I got a big
hug and a kiss on the cheek. (Others around me were going, “whoa!”) He asked about my husband, so I
responded. (We had stopped in
At 10:00 (regular show opening time), the owners of the show staged a real “Barbara’s arrived” red carpet treatment (without the red carpet). They brought her in front of a backdrop for a photo shoot in the hallway by her line. One man saved Sally’s and my place in line so that we could get photos. Then it was back in line.
Mario, the bottle guy, had been playing “name that episode” with some 8”x10” screen captures and the people in line. Most couldn’t name the episode - - I could, though. He stopped playing after I named about 4 in a row - - wasn’t sure if he just had to stop because of the crowds or why. He was selling his bottles for $99 to $499…and evidently sold a few here and there.
The line finally began to move because Barbara took her place. When I got up to Bill, I presented him with 3 things. One was a card, another was a packet of photos, and the third was a tin of homemade brownies and a giant Hershey bar. (The man is a severe choco-holic and I figured he now trusts me enough to go for home baked brownies!) His helper was a woman from a local radio station in LA where he’s done a couple of radio shows over the years, and she laughed and made a comment about “hope they’re not loaded with pot.” I giggled and said, “I know that story too! Nope, no pot in OUR house!” Bill signed a photo for me, and then my friend Sally got him to sign a photo she’d started back in February with Larry Hagman.
Finally I got up to Barbara – to get both my bottle *and* my
picture signed (the one started last July with Bill at
Our next stop was at the Mod Squad area – Peggy Lipton and Michael Cole – for Sally. Sally and I share photography duties when one gets the autograph (and sometimes has to pay for the photo too). Peggy was a sweetie, and Michael was gem!
Prices have gone UP in the past year, and we can no longer
get by with $100 budget. It used to be, the photo and
autograph would cost $15-20 and a photo with the celebrity would be thrown in
free. Nowadays, though, the autographs
are $25-30 and the photo with the celebrity, on your own camera, is $15. Professional photos will set you back a
Our next stop was at the Monkees’
table. Micky Dolenz and
Peter Tork were both there. Micky
has done the
We wandered about and met a few others for Sally, including Kathy Garver of Family Affair. I’d met Johnny Whitaker from that show a couple of years back, but the photo I got was from “The Littlest Angel”. Kathy is selling a Family Affair Cookbook, so I told her of the cookbook we had on our I Dream of Jeannie website - - hers is about the same idea - - and she gave me a couple of good ideas for ours, on the spot.
Harry Anderson was on my list (as I mentioned above), because my husband and I have always enjoyed Night Court. Harry’s a nice guy, funny, and reasonable. As he stood next to me for a photo, I asked him, “How tall ARE you!” He answered, putting his hand on top of his hat, “This tall.” After I stopped giggling, he said, he’s 6’4”.
While Sally brought some of her collected autographed photos to an authenticator, my eye caught a man with a Jeannie bottle that did NOT look like one of Mario’s bottles. But moreover, his bottle had a CASE!!! So I wandered over and enquired. It turns out that his name is John, and he worked on the 1985 reunion movie. This was the actual special effects bottle used in that movie, and the specially made case for it. OH, COOL, I thought. Then he showed me his photo album, full of photos from the set. It included photos of Barbara and Hayden Rorke, too.
Lunch was at the Daily Grill. Sally treated me to lunch since it was my birthday. The Grill does a good Cobb salad, so that’s what I had. It was pretty good.
My phone kept ringing all morning. Evidently my daughter called when I was in line to see Barbara - - too bad I didn’t have it out, as her ringtone is the Jeannie song! Barbara and Bill would have cracked up, as would everybody in line. My dad called when we were just getting out of lunch – all because of my birthday.
In the afternoon, we still had to wait for Sally’s autographs to be authenticated. These were things she’d collected by mail. When she finally got to pick them up, more than half of them were real and she received Certificate of Authenticities for them. Among her “not authentic” autographs were John Travolta’s and Robin Williams’, to name two.
The show has begun a raffle ticket drawing bit. They did one bit at 2:00 pm, and one at 4:00. We stayed for the 2:00 drawing but didn’t win anything, but didn’t want to stay longer than 2:15. Before we left, I swung by the IDOJ corner, and lo and behold, Bill was out and about. I caught him, gave him another hug, and went on my way.
It took us almost 3 hours to get back - - bad traffic in Commerce and then in the Santa Fe Springs area on I-5. It always bottles up in those places, but on Saturday it seems to be worse than on Sunday!
My husband loved his Harry