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From Rick Mercer to James Cameron, East Coast residents have had some encounters with famous people ranging from cool to embarrassing
Matthew Lohnes from Dartmouth, NS, has had many memorable run-ins with movie stars while working as an ROV (Remotely Operated Vehicle) superintendent. Photo by File Photo /Contributed
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Jessie Legge of Flat Bay, NL, will never forget her most memorable celebrity encounter.
Legge, who works as a coach bus driver for Parsons Transportation each summer, runs into famous people quite frequently, but due to her shyness, she seldom talks to or even engages with them.
During the summer of 2022, Legge was travelling to Woody Point.
“It was very busy, and two of our buses were booked into a local restaurant for lunch, so us drivers waited until the last minute to go into there to eat after everyone else was seated,” Legge says.
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Once inside, she walked upstairs, and on that day she noticed it was unusually crowded. Someone motioned her over from a nearby table, which she approached. As a bus driver, Legge is often referred to when travellers have a question regarding the area.
“I love it when tourists ask me about something they wish to know. It’s one of my favourite aspects of being a driver,” she added.
As Legge approached the people at the table to answer their questions, they proceeded to ask where they might find the best homemade food heading towards Port aux Basques. She told them that The Hungry Bear has great food, and she just happened to be heading there.
The diners at the table seemed pleased that Legge could answer their question. She continued to chat with them about the weather, not having a clue who she was talking to: well-known Newfoundland comedian and author Rick Mercer.
Legge was interrupted by her tour guide who let her know that her meal was coming, and she graciously excused herself from the group.
“I said ‘Well, I must go before I starve to death.’ They laughed, and I shook the male’s hand and said, ‘Please enjoy your trip here,’ and I asked him his name, and he said Rick,” she recalls.
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“I replied, ‘Rick who?’ With a slightly crooked face, he said, ‘I’m Rick Mercer.’ I said ‘No, you’re not, you’re too short!’”
Jessie Legge of Flat Bay says her most famous encounter was fellow Newfoundlander and television icon Rick Mercer, pictured here in a ceremony to celebrate his Canada’s Walk of Fame achievement. Photo by Joseph Gibbons /joe gibbons
When Mercer successfully convinced Legge it was indeed him, she turned to look at his male companion, who was laughing quite hard at the exchange he’d just witnessed.
And did she stop there?
“Nope! I said to Rick he looked taller on TV and as I was seated behind him I said, ‘Look, I tower over you!’ He nearly choked! I went red in the face, turned around, put my head down, and thought I just made a jerk of myself in front of Canada’s funny man.”
After Legge got over the initial embarrassment, she asked Mercer if she could have a photo taken of them together, which he happily agreed to.
“But our faces were red. We only stopped laughing long enough to take a snap, and I then disappeared.”
Hollywood comes to Nova Scotia
Matthew Lohnes from Dartmouth, NS, has had many memorable run-ins with movie stars while working as an ROV (Remotely Operated Vehicle) superintendent.
Lohnes says running several successful businesses has opened many doors to meet great movie stars, mainly during a stint working on the blockbuster Titanic, which was filmed in the late 1990s.
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“My company developed the moon effect in that movie,” explains Lohnes. “We were moving around the barge that had this massive crane on it that held a huge light to create the moon effect for any scenes with the White Russian vessel in it.”
But perhaps his most memorable work was helping light the famous moment when the character Rose throws the necklace, The Heart of the Ocean, back over the side in a scene that was filmed off McNabs Island.
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Celebrities dropping by Gander
Lohnes figured once the film wrapped he’d never encounter director James Cameron again, but much later, when Cameron was filming a follow-up documentary, he was once more up on the White Russian vessel chatting to the crew of the blockbuster movie.
Not one to find himself star-struck, Lohnes says he finds most celebrities he encountered to be “very cool” with one exception: “Jason Statham was a jerk to all around him,” he said.
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Statham aside, the bulk of famous personalities Lohnes has crossed paths with or worked with have all been pleasant.
“The best one I met was actress Heather Locklear, who was super nice. She hugged me a few times in between shooting days of the 2004 NBC series LAX. Pamela Anderson was totally not what I expected; she was in Halifax for the Juno Awards.”
He adds that he found Anderson to be a “really cool, smart woman.”
Pamela Anderson, who was in Halifax for the Juno Awards, is a “really cool, smart woman,” said Dartmouth resident Matthew Lohnes. Photo by Peter Parsons /PETER PARSONS / Staff
‘Really cool’
Some other famous encounters that Lohnes remembers fondly is when the late actor James Gandolfini (of The Sopranos fame) bumped into him at L.A.’s famed Mann’s Chinese Theatre for the premiere of the 2004 comedy Surviving Christmas, singer Macy Gray in 2005, and Britney Spears at London’s Heathrow Airport (his mother chuckled at the large size of the pop singer’s hat box).
“I think it’s really cool the big names are here, but Disney and many others have been here for a very long time,” adds Lohnes, who points out that in 1994, during the filming of the thriller Dolores Claiborne, the production members all stayed at a motel owned by his father in Lunenburg.
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“Disney used to rent the place all the time,” he added.
As for those on Lohnes’s list of celebrities who he hasn’t encountered yet but would like to, he names Sylvester Stallone, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and Denzel Washington.
Another of his wishes is that studios would gravitate to more practical means of film-making.
“I’ll add I wish big brands in film would stop going so heavy on CGI, use real people and make-up artists rather than just use CGI to fill in the cracks,” he says.
He uses the Will Smith apocalyptic drama I Am Legend as a great example of the creatures resembling “cheesy cartoons.”
“If they had used real people, the film would have been so much better, they did great with the overgrown city streets though,” he added.
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‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.saltwire.com ’
