12. Robert Shapiro

30 01 2010

November 16, 2000

Robert Shapiro was the next celebrity en route to the stage. I felt very comfortable walking up to him and starting a conversation because six years earlier he was practically my roommate—except he only lived in my TV. He was probably your TV roommate back in the day as well, along with Marcia Clark and Judge Ito. (How great would it be to have a roommate who only lived in the TV? I knew a girl in college who had a roommate that only lived in her closet. And only on the weekends. Really.)

Anyway. Robert was talking to some people and when they walked away, I approached him. He turned to me and puffed up a bit as he looked me up and down. I said “Hi. This is kinda weird but I have a celebrity photo album—it’s just a bunch of pictures of me taken by celebrities. Would you take my picture?”

He said, “You want me to take one of you?” I said, “Yah.” He paused and seemed to consider the idea from all angles. Where is she going with this? What is this crazy girl up to? Does she have people living in her closet? Does she have a permit for that? The questions were endless, but the one he landed on was, “How are you going to know I took it?”

Easy enough. Well, maybe for people who think quickly on their feet. Turns out I don’t.

I said, “You could stick your finger in front of the lens when you take the picture. Give me a thumbs up!” I don’t know how that makes any sense since nobody knows what Robert Shapiro’s thumb looks like, but it was the first thing I could think of and again, apparently I’m not so good at the impromptu answers. (See Bruce Willis and the El Niño exchange.)

Fortunately, I was talking to a lawyer. In his legalesque, beyond-a-shadow-of-a-doubt kind of way, Robert turned the camera around to take a picture of us together. At least that’s what he tried to do. Unfortunately, he wasn’t so lucky with his aim that day and took a picture of my left ear and the party behind us. It was obviously wrong so he tried again.

A fellow partier walking by saw our predicament and graciously said, “Oh here, I can take that” and reached for the camera. Robert quickly said, “No. I have to take it.” The guy looked perplexed, wrinkled his brow and slowly walked away scratching his head. (Not really with the scratching part. That’s metaphorical. But the rest is true.)

So Robert concentrated a bit more on framing the shot and we posed for another. Success! He said, “That will be a good one.” I said, “Yah, it will. Hey, I’ll send you a copy!” Now, if he was still living in my television I would already know his address but life goes on, so I asked for his business card. He said, “Great. Yah, I want to see that,” and reached into his wallet. I took the card, thanked him and moved back into the mix and back on the prowl. No further questions.