My friend Freddie (@freddieoconnell) tweets:
“Watching @robilyaimy tweet with @MillaJovovich is surreal. Only one has stayed in my guest room … and ridden in @dhlovelife’s [Daryl Hannah’s] car.”
It’s surreal to actually be replied to by someone who you’re usually used to seeing at about 20’ tall, well-lit, poreless and perfect. Twitter is developing into an interesting, somewhat humanizing media.
Of course, It CAN be boring as Hell. I must admit, most of the “celebrity” twitters that I follow are uninteresting to say the least, probably posted by an assistant of some kind, designed to market and advertise rather than truly connect and communicate.
As far as I can tell, Milla actually sends her 140 character updates herself and the constant little notes about her day shine light on the remarkably unremarkable Life of a hardworking young mother who just happens to do all her own stunts.
The celebrities that we all admire, that we look up to – these are people that we wish we could be – it’s so often that they are brought down to earth by scandal or stupidity (I write this as we’re slowly watching Tiger Woods’ reputation unravel). It’s so refreshing to have a pedestal deconstructed by the simple humanity of someone. My own “celebrity”, small by comparison though it may be, is constantly challenged by brushes with indignity, threats of insult, image consulting – who do I want to be to people who don’t me? It’s frustrating enough figuring out who I am to the people who DO know me, much less to those I don’t know at all or, most frightening of all, the people on that strange edge of friend and fan. On one end we insult people by being unfamiliar, and on the other end, with the slightest acknowledgement, we invite obsession and stalking.
I first encountered Milla Jovovich through her album “Divine Comedy” on a recommendation from a friend in college. We’d gone to see the Cranes somewhere in Baltimore and there was one of those “if you like THEM you’re REALLY like…” type conversations. The friend was right. Fifth Element came out a year or so later and it took quite a while for me to connect the two. I stumbled across Milla Jovovich’s twitter through a science fiction site and it’s just cool to listen to someone complaining about having to hang from x height for y hours and how many Advils she plans to take because of the strain. It’s not a problem I generally have. I worry about my finger tips, string cuts and strain from moving our gear. I have a bad day when a finger pick rips inward and gets lodged under a fingernail, or when the venue doesn’t want to pay us, or when a talent buyer just isn’t interested. How much electrical tape will I use to patch my finger up? How many GOOD gigs do I need to patch up my ego after a bad one? There are people who care about that, believe it or not. Fine with me – I think I’ve got a pretty cool job too.
Meg Bowen at the Senator… Meg Bowen… GoatFish Dylan Lee Brady Petal Blight
But here is the slayer of zombies, aliens – a beautiful woman with a gorgeous voice- a heroine – and my friend Athena, of the band Playground Etiquette, on a whim and out on a limb, tweets her about a new song. A positive (and public) response meant the world to her. To have the world wide web support of a woman she idolizes like that is a warm envelopment – and Athena swelled on stage to tell the tale. Also on a whim I wanted to let Milla know what that meant….
Going to Glastonbury, CT for a family visit!! Youngling Kristen Jones… Flour catastrophe!!! Luigi the crooked cat. New niece Kate. Other Rob. Kristen’s sister Gwen. On the way back from Thanksgiving in Connecticut, we stopped for gas and ran across this sign. I think it’s the first time I’ve ever seen anything quite this fierce mounted outside a building…. and definitely not sure what to think of it. Immigration is something that I’ve got a lot of mixed feelings about – the offers of kindness, the American dream – they run smack into the practicalities of money, taxation and space. The unfairness of how we get away with treating our undocumented workers runs into the reality of the financial collapse we’d face if we didn’t have a lower class of below-minimum-wage labour…
When we are in a position of being admired I’m amazed by how little we have to do to make someone else glow. Of course, the relationship isn’t equal. It leaves the fan wanting more but we’re in show business, and it’s our job to get out while the getting’s good. We’ve GOT to leave them wanting. Complete satisfaction is perhaps something we only give to our sexual partners!
The phrase “oh, could you just say something, it would mean SO much coming from YOU” wasn’t something that I ever thought would be spoken to me. And beyond that, it’s not something I ever thought I’d understand – but here I am getting that warm and fuzzy feeling of knowing that a myth exists and that she’s bruised and tired and amazed at her child’s antics. And that, in my opinion, she spells “owie” incorrectly, and she bothered with a 140 character response to little old me.
And I swell to tell the tale.
