Ilan Mitchell-Smith’s presence at the Chiller Theatre show in Parsippany, New Jersey on April 27, 2013, was enough of a clincher for me to actually purchase my plane ticket to attend it. Sure, there were others, but it would have just been too incredibly painful to miss knowing that he would finally be making an appearance. Actually, this was his second autograph show; I had read recently of a Weird Science reunion at the Blood at the Beach event in Virginia Beach – but only after it occurred – at which he showed up for the first time.
Not necessarily reclusive, but long retired from the show business world, Ilan currently works as an assistant professor in the English department at California State University in Long Beach. I had seriously considered stalking him there during one of my visits to Jimmy in order to add his signature to the Weird Science photos seen below.
I have a…shall we say…special relationship with that movie. It’s one of the most oft-quoted films in my life – particularly between my friend Eric Hubble and me. So far I had managed to rack up encounters with stars of the film Anthony Michael Hall, Kelly LeBrock, Robert Rusler, Judie Aronson, Suzanne Snyder, Michael Berryman, and Vernon Wells. There are others to be sure, but meeting Ilan-Mitchell Smith, who played the lead role of Wyatt Donnelly, was certainly the highest on my list (and also the most realistic).
I kicked off our meeting by telling him how long I had wanted to meet him and nearly making the fatal mistake of telling him that I considered the ‘stalk’ option. He took it in stride once he determined that this was the only weird thing about me. We chatted about his appearance at Blood at the Beach, his current career teaching early English literature, and the possibility of doing a Hollywood Show (I’m not sure why I ever bother to pitch this, as there is no need to ‘meet’ him again).
Overall, it was an extremely pleasant encounter, and he was nice enough to pose for a free photo or two. In between the pics, he sneezed on his hand – so that is why his hand is in an odd position in the photo below. But then again I expected there to be something ‘weird’ about our encounter. I was kind of counting on him to be human about this.
Celebrity encounters from the Spring 2013 Chiller Theatre will continue…
YES! good work, my friend!
Only Bill Paxton remains, yes?
Eric Hubble
August 1st, 2013