Who Makes You Speechless?

Sometimes, when people who don't know me very well find out that I've made a couple of films, they  ask, "So, you must have met some famous people then?"

Like Robert DeNiro? Or one of those kids from Twilight? Sorry, no. But if I'm in a particularly goofy mood, I'll tell them about meeting John MacKay.

Who?

 

He is sometimes credited as  John A. MacKay.

No?

 

I was at the Woodstock Film Festival in 1999, screening 8 1/2 x 11. After the screening a woman came up to me and introduced herself as a casting director. She was very sweet and complimented the film and told me she knew Ellen Pompeo, one of the stars of my film. (I knew Ellen before she was famous, doesn't count.)  She then said she was just checking out the festival with her friend, John. She pointed to a handsome man in his late 50s standing near a car, his foot on the bumper, his elbow on his knee, his chin on his knuckles. I recognized him immediately as an actor in one of those films that was important in my life, Simple Men.

"Oh my god," I said, "he was the father in Simple Men!"

"That's right. Do you want to meet him?"

"Yeah, I'd love to!"

Here's an unofficial trailer for Simple Men. MacKay can be spotted very briefly, he's the white haired guy around 1:37 in.

She introduced me. We shook hands and he complimented me on my film. Then I said something like this:

 

"This is ... I'm ... wow .... you were ... Simple Men is like .... I mean.... I'm just .... phhfffffllllhhhh..."

 

He nodded and said, "Thank you."

John MacKay isn't terribly famous, even by character actor standards. I'm sure you've seen him in episodes of Law & Order and its spawn and in commercials (he did a pretty funny cell phone commercial a few years ago where he played "THE Man"). But what made my jaw drop is knowing that he participated in a film that means the world to me. I think I would have said pretty much the same thing had I been introduced to Robert DeNiro (replace Simple Men with Raging Bull and Taxi Driver).

And what if I was introduced to those Twilight punks? I think I'd probably give them a head nod and say "How's it going?"

Have you met someone that made you lose the power of speech?  Is there someone out there you imagine would have that effect on you?