Julia Stiles
3
She has relatives who live in my area of NJ, and she supposedly drops in on occasion (my married friend, old enough to be her father, has a huge, creepy crush on her). I walked past her once in the local shopping center and I guess my eyes widened involuntarily when I saw her. Seeming exasperated, she rolled her eyes and continued on, which pissed me off for several reasons-- (1) I don't find her all that great looking (2) I'm not a fan; I've never seen any of her films (3) Even if I were a fan, I'm respectful; there's nothing of the stalker in me and I'm not lucky enough to be making money as a paparazzi (4) I, too, am old enough to be her father and, unlike my friend, my "crushes" (is that even a word a middle-aged guy uses?) tend to be uncreepy ones directed towards women closer to my own age range.
I got over my pique quickly enough when I realized--- (1) She probably didn't find me all that great looking either (2) I may not be a fan, but guys like Mark David Chapman and Robert Bardo aren't, unfortunately, figments of the imagination, and she doesn't have an internal radar that helps her separate non-fans from psychotic ones (3) I may be respectful, but I have to assume a lot of people she encounters aren't (4) I may not have a camera in my hand (or hidden in my shopping bag), but how does she know that the chubby guy with the bad dandruff over in the deli department doesn't have one, or that guy pushing a broom over in produce, or the housewife with 2 kids and 20 bags in her cart, or...?
I've heard she's talented, and actually very nice personally, but to be honest, I really am not all that interested in finding out for myself whether that's true or not. With Hollywood being what it's now become...namely, a multi-billion (or is that trillion?) dollar industry that almost uniformly churns out junk...there are a ton of big-budget stinkers out there starring people of talent (and no-talents as well) that I'll never have any inclination to see. Truth is, I very seldom go to the movies anymore; I end up buying or renting old classics, or foreign films, or low-budget curiosities from the past, on DVD. Believe me, Ms. Stiles, I really was in that aisle only for the rice cakes and the split pea soup...