Let me start out by saying that it was a big deal for me to meet Andrew McCarthy at the Chiller Theatre Show on October 12, 2012. It is true that it was one of many great celebrity encounters, but in retrospect this was quite a biggie. For a child of the 80’s such as me, meeting a member of the Brat Pack is beyond cool (this is my second meeting with a member of the exclusive group following Anthony Michael Hall).
Although his star power was consigned mostly to the 1980’s, he starred in several memorable films of that era – all of which cull many great memories: Pretty in Pink, St. Elmo’s Fire, Less Than Zero, Mannequin, and one of my favorite comedies ever, Weekend at Bernie’s.
Of all of these, it was the latter film that interested me most, particularly since I had recently gotten a photo from it signed by co-star Catherine Mary Stewart – and the photo featured Andrew McCarthy as well. The charge for the autograph was $30, but there was no question that I was going to make the purchase, but the deal was sweetened all the more because he offered a free photo with the autograph. I personally thought this was quite generous and with such an icon of the 1980’s, pretty unheard of.
The two anecdotes that come with the meeting sound a bit negative, but I only mention them because they happened…and I always tell it like it is. The first little tidbit was that he didn’t know how to spell the word “flagellate.” I’m not sure I would either if I had been put on the spot. The reason I know this is because I asked him to write a quote from Weekend at Bernie’s, which he was kind enough to attempt. If I were him, I wouldn’t be flagellating myself of the error. Lord know everyone reading this could find some of mine in less than zero seconds.
The second thing was that when I went to pose for the second ‘back-up’ photo, I said “can we get one holding the photo as well?” – which means that I’m going to hold the photo up. He agreed, but mentioned that he wasn’t going to hold the photo. I didn’t want him to anyway, but I thought that was a little unusual that he thought I was imposing…and really how much imposition would it have been if I had wanted him to hold it. Perhpas he was still running through his internal dictionary trying to come up with the correct spelling of “flagellate.”
In any case, there’s no way that I could stay angry at “Larry Wilson” himself – he was just so lovably conniving in Weekend at Bernie’s. And it was a pleasure and an honor to meet the fine actor who played him.
Celebrities of the Fall 2012 Chiller Theatre show will continue…
I took the photos and I agree — it was weird.
I don’t know that he felt that it was an imposition. He may have, but the way I interpreted it, he just didn’t want the photo to be taken with him holding the autographed one. He had no problem standing up and putting his arm around you and was even generally rather friendly. As I recall, when you asked about taking the second photo, he looked to you and said, “well, you’re going to have to hold it” or something like that — and he wasn’t angry or serious, he was still smiling, but he did tell you that very deliberately. It was just weird.
Peter
March 4th, 2014