Associations
On Sunday, I went to hear William Unwin, tenor, sing (along with the entire Monteverdi Choir) at Lincoln Center. They offered up a solid rendition of Mozart's C-minor mass and a perfectly splendid version of the Requiem. By way of associating myself with greatness, I'd like to point out that just hours before the concert, I'd been hanging out with Will on the 102nd floor of the Empire State Building. It's a small and awesome world.
posted by Skay @ 3:54 AM
2 Comments:
My Accidental Brush With Greatness story:
Four years ago, I was unexpectedly upgraded to first class on a flight from Boston to Philadelphia. The man sitting next to me looked familiar, and after discreetly scrutinizing him, I realized that it was none other than Bob Cousy.
I had no idea how to approach talking to him, since I didn't want to seem like some star-struck basketball fan (which I was). Then I remembered that he had a role in the film Blue Chips as a college athletic director, and shares a scene with Nick Nolte (who plays the college's basketball coach). In the scene, he makes something like 20 free throws in a row in one uninterrupted take.
So I opened the conversation with, "excuse me, Mr. Cousy, that scene in Blue Chips, the one with you shooting the free throws, did you only need one take to get that right?"
He laughed, and responded that no, the second take was the one that ended up on the screen. We talked about Bill Russell, Cousy's years in the Celtics organization, and the current state of basketball for a couple of hours. It was pretty great.
That's awesome, Donovan. Well done on the opening question, too.
I suspect it must be lonely to be a well-known figure. You want to make friends and talk to people as your equals, but it's got to be difficult to find people who will consider YOU an equal. I bet you get wary very quickly indeed.
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