You’ve Been Fried!

My Father was a famous persona in the UK Drama/TV/Film industry in the 60′s / 70′s (a.k.a ‘Celeb’ as we call’em nowadays).

He was the son of a Steam Train driver and a House Maid (yes, I could hardly qualify as suitable “29th April 2011″ marriage material with that kind of working class blood pumping through my hyper veins!). He grew up in quite a shitty (to say the least) part of England but managed to get out of the Northern slums in the mid 20th Century and eventually end up in the Bohemian West End of the 60′s & 70′s where he worked from home as a Dramatist. 

My father wrote for stage, TV & screen – and was in fact one of the pioneers, alongside Harold Pinter, to make a breakthrough in the world of drama, bringing the working class to the front of the stage by establishing what would become known as The Kitchen Sink Drama (yes, no longer just aristocracy on stage, bite me Mr. Wilde!)

Unfortunately, my Father passed away when I was very young and I never really had the privilege to get to know him, not just as a father, but as a man who was well-known for his talent, who had a sharp, interesting & worldly mind, incredible wit and no drinking skills what so ever.  So I did the next best thing, I grew up with the idea of this incredible man  - a man who, although no longer with me, I still wanted to make proud.

As a result, I developed a passion and curiosity for his world; Arts, Theatre, world cinema, TV, music, philosophy, psychology, culture, people, design - always exploring and never resting, not for one second. With time it meant that my stimuli threshold became higher and higher and I became a person who got excited by the unusual, by the eclectic, and by the small (yet grand) curiosities and wonders of existentialism…

So where am I heading with this you ask?!

Well, a few days ago I had an experience that blew my mind away.

That kind of stuff doesn’t happen often, especially not in the world we live in today.

A world where the Justin Biebers are stars; where Brittany’s fame sky-rockets due to a temporarily insane act of head shaving. A world where the Kardashian Family’s “pearls of wisdom” are dignified by television and viewed by masses world-wide…. a world where the lowest common denominator that appeals to The Big Brother viewers – against all odds - manages to stoop lower and lower from one season to the next.

In a world of ‘here today gone tomorrow’ getting excited over cheap plastic talent seems to be the norm. A norm, which I personally am unable to relate to and quite frankly, think is really kind of sad as it has a huge knock-on effect on how we end up living our lives and the directions in which our society and social skills are heading… (more on that in posts to come).

When it comes to Fame, I have “properly” brushed against ‘Celebs’ 3 times in my life… only one of them truly knocked my socks off. This is my story – these are my claims to fame:

1. “The Nanny Diaries“ (London, Primrose Hill, Summer 2005)

On one of the rare occasions when the sun came out to play, I grabbed an iPod & towel and headed off to Primrose Hill in order to get rid of the pasty complexion that shamelessly took over my mortified body during the grey cold London winter months.

I was minding my own business when I somehow managed to get caught in a Frisby excitement between two very small and rather ugly dogs who were running around my legs disrupting my Sun Goddess quality time.

Him: (to the dogs) “Porgy, Bess… come here”

Me: (to self) “Porgy?!, Bess?! - OK someone’s been creative here, my attention is officially grabbed”

He approaches me slowly, I can see his silhouette only, the sun is strong and my Pradas are black and thick. As he gets closer…

Him: “Hey there, I am really sorry about this, are the dogs bugging you?!”

Me: (to self) “You are Jude Law!”

Me: (to Jude) “Nah, they are adorable (to self: “not!”), I love dogs, don’t mind them at all”

We exchange a few sentences and have a little laugh, he apologises again and walks off.

Me: (to self) “Midget Nanny Shagger”

Conclusion: Subject is talented, but the Bex is not impressed.

2. “Denzel Who?!” (Manhattan, Hotel Roof Top Bar, Summer 2009)

A hot summer night in Manhattan. An ex-colleague who was trying to get into my pants thought I would be really impressed if he took me to this VIP hotel roof top bar. It was so hot and humid that night that I immediately agreed to go as I knew it was the one place in Manhattan where I was likely to catch a bit of a breeze.

Despite the poor bloke’s serious attempts to make me fall at his feet, I was far from being tremendously impressed and at some point decided to go ‘powder my (very bored) nose’. When I came out of the rest room a guy who was sitting in a group with a few other men started talking to me. The minute he picked up on my English accent he told me he used to work in a recording studio in London back in the 80′s with the likes of Houdini, Sade and some other musicians and at some point through the conversation he said:

Him: “And I bet you don’t get to sit next to Denzel every day….”

Me: “Denzel who?!”

Him: “Denzel Washington!!!”

Me: (with the tone of an original American hoochie mama) “I don’t see no Denzel Washington here!”.

Him: “He’s sitting right next to you, yo!”.

Sure enough, the man himself was next to me, a large track-suit and baseball cap masking his appearance. I chatted to him, and although I think he is a very talented actor, his persona left something to be desired and his glory faded into the hot & humid Manhattan night air.

Conclusion: The Bex is, still, un-star-struck.

3. “You’ve Been Fried“ (Israel, Ben Gurion International Airport, Winter 2011)

Once again schlepping my huge bags around an airport terminal, I curse the day god made me the world’s worst jet-setter.

I cannot pack to save my life. The more I travel, the more packing-challenged I become… it takes longer, its less smarter, its heavier, its clumsier and certainly manages to kick some of the fun out of the whole travelling experience.

I am queueing at check-in and talking to a colleague who is travelling with me.

Him: “what the HELL do you have in that bag”

Me: (taking out a fil-o-fax, a brolly, a make up kit, a purse, another purse, a 6 pack of mints and then some and a copy of Stephen Fry’s “Making History”, which is quite a thick paperback) “This is what the ‘HELL’ I have in this bag, I carry everything, I am THE Human Turtle!”.

And then the miracle happens… Lo and behold – I see the man himself, Stephen Fry, ahead of me in the queue!

I am not a morning person, it’s 5am and I am thinking to myself that I must be seriously hallucinating… how is that possible?! I must be punked, or maybe Fr(y)ied…?! where are the candid cameras?! But its him, it truly is Stephen Fry, and I just feel I have walked into the best scene of my life’s movie to date.

Stephen Fry is my favourite author, he is sharp, he is witty, he is quite simply larger than life, and being the literature freak that I am, he is truly what I would regard as a world-class genius (or “celeb” to make it more relatable to some…).

I go to Mr. Fry and ask him to sign my copy of his book.

His Geniusness Fry:” Who should I write this out to?”

Me: “Bex XXXX”

His Royal Highness of wit: “Bex XXXX?!”

Me: “Yes… perhaps you’re familiar with my father XXXX XXXX?”

Sir Stephen Queen of Queens: “You are kidding me?! XXXX XXXX’s Daughter?! He is one of my favourite Dramatists (naming some of his work as he continues)”

We chat (too) briefly, he asks me if I am on his flight to London, unfortunately I am off to the little Maltese pebble… This is where we part ways. I am shaking with excitement, I can’t believe the Man I utterly admire just told me he liked my Father’s work! I kick myself for not being on the same flight as I feel like I have just missed out on one of the most amazing opportunities I will ever have in my life to talk for just a few minutes more to one of the few men who truly rock my world. And so I go to gate C1… frustrated, but kinda totally high on life.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I respect most forms of art & entertainment even if, truth be told, I might not relate or understand them all. I am open-minded to different genres and god knows have on occasion been guilty myself of taking a liking to plastic pop-cult.  However, I will not, for the life of me, ever be able to be in such awe of a 13-year-old whining Beiber with a nasty hair do, or of a bunch of American sisters who hardly share half a brain cell between them, or even of a ‘Denzel Who’ or a ‘Jude The Nanny Diaries Author’ as much as I am in awe of Stephen Fry and people of his calibre.

I never felt as honoured to be in the presence of a person as I was during those few moments at the airport. My Father, had he been alive today, would have been one of the people on this honour list, and its a shame that nowadays they dont make such great personas like they used to so much anymore.

So Dad, this one is for you – I wish I could have even just 1 short hour to talk to you as an adult, to be allowed inside that amazingly sharp and creative brain of yours. But for now… until the day we meet again over on the ‘happy side’, I will make do with my portion of utterly wonderful FRYs.