Chiller recently moved back to the Hilton Parsippany in Parsippany, New Jersey, where it had taken place the very first time I attended. And the setup was rather similar to Monster Mania, which is certainly preferable to the crush experienced during Chiller at the Sheraton. I'd never been particularly bothered by the throngs packing the hallways and rooms, but I did fear for the celebrities in those circumstances. It just never felt safe. With wide-open spaces and more clearly defined waiting lines, the situation felt better at the Hilton.The first celeb I ran across was almost at the front door. Max Gail proved very engaging. He's familiar to the world -- and me -- as Wojo, Detective Stan Wojciehowicz, on Barney Miller. But he's got a special place in my heart as Harold in one of my guilty pleasure movies -- D.C. Cab. So we got talking about the 1983 film that starred a veritable array of comedians -- Bill Maher, Marsha Warfield, Paul Rodriguez ... Gary Busey (hee hee) -- alongside Adam Baldwin and Mr. T.
Max told me his wife had been pregnant and about to pop with his first child, India, when the filming was winding down. He was good friends with Busey before they made the film, but got tight with Maher and "T" during the making of the movie. Most of the people who come up to him at events like this either reference Barney Miller or D.C. Cab. (Nothing about his one episode appearance on Damian Lewis' show Life?) "The ones like you who like D.C. Cab realllly like it," Gail added.
We had a nice moment when taking our picture together. Max said, "You're a good hugger." And I replied, "I was just about to tell you the same."
The funny thing about these events is that what happens in the couple minutes you get with a celeb can and will often be impacted by the person who they met before you. And ahead of me on the Olga Korbut line was someone who might be politely described as possibly too happy to see her. Let's just say it was in a way that made the four-time Olympic gold medalist uncomfortable.So both she (and her handlers -- because they don't have quite the poker faces as the former Russian gymnast) seemed relieved when that person departed and I stepped up. For the probably dozenth time that day, Olga heard someone was deeply inspired by her performance at the XX Olympiad in Munich. She changed gymnastics forever and literally flipped it into the spotlight. It became must-see TV.
I tried to meter my enthusiasm on this front, and she really was delightful to meet. We talked about how her world totally changed after she redefined the sport, particularly on beam, floor exercise and uneven bars. "I couldn't go anywhere myself," Korbut said. "I was always mobbed and people kept giving me things. We agreed that wasn't so bad."
Xander Berkeley has been in some little show called The Walking Dead. As I've never seen that, my interest in meeting him wasn't for that. He's easily recognizable to me for blink-and-you-miss-'em appearances on the last season of M*A*S*H and the best season of Moonlighting. He was Henry Hurt in Apollo 13 and Buzz Aldrin in the TV movie Apollo 11. But he was also in the first truly great episode of The X-Files, "Ice."
So we got to talking about that instead of zombies. Xander hung out with David Duchovny and Felicity Huffman that week off the set. And he rued not seeing Felicity for a while, but said he's still friends with David. And, in fact, he did three episodes of Duchovny's underrated Aquarius.But the thing that really blew me away was when Berkeley asked me "Are you a writer?" I'm sure he enjoyed the amazement that crossed my face in the split-second before I answered. He just knew that was the case, adding as an artist he has a proclivity for studying faces. And that's what mine told him.
After taking the best selfie I've ever had (and a rare celebrity picture in which I actually look relaxed) -- there's that artistic ability again -- he signed the ongoing project known as my X-Files yearbook, told me to enjoy my collection, winked at me and got back to the waiting zombie-loving throng.
Speaking of Walking Dead alum, I also wanted to meet Kirk Acevedo, because he played Staff Sgt. Joe Toye in my favorite mini-series, Band of Brothers. I had no idea I'd get to hear a story about the real man from their unfathomably treacherous winter in Bastogne during World War II that rivaled the amazing tales depicted over 10 episodes.I'll let Kirk do it: "Joe Toye disappears and he comes back a day later with a live German prisoner. And that's why they won that battle, but they couldn't use that because they would have had to go a different way with the story."
Even the Bastogne set in Band of Brothers proved to be an amazing spectacle as they converted an airplane hangar into the forest. "They built trees into like a huge planter the size of a football field."
I was astonished when Barbara Hershey was added to the Chiller lineup. I know she starred in The Entity and the Insidious films, and most recently has been featured in Once Upon a Time and Damien, but my strongest impressions of her have been in Hannah and Her Sisters, The Right Stuff and Portrait of a Lady.I asked whether she had any stories from the latter. She was nominated for an Academy Award as best actress in a supporting role for the Jane Campion film starring Nicole Kidman and John Malkovich. She said she definitely did but was hesitant to go into details about them. She did say it was amazing being in Italy to make the film.
I was downright gushing when I got to Peter Riegert, an actor who truly makes every single project he is in all the better for his presence, be it Animal House or The Mask or even Oscar. I focused on Crossing Delancey, telling him that it's one of the rare movies that both my mother and I love. He put his hand over his heart, saying "You make me feel very good."The movie, which starred Amy Irving, was filmed in downtown New York near where Riegert worked before he was able to make a living acting full time. That served to make the whole process more comfortable for him.
Little did I know he had joined the cast for the third season of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, or I would have loaded him down with more questions about being in that series, and specifically serving as the love interest for the indomitable Carol Kane.
It was also amazing to meet Samantha Mathis, and I regaled her with tales of how my mom loved her in The American President while my sister and I are particularly huge fans of her in The Thing Called Love. She asked me my last name and I told her and she said "So I have much Schector family love." Indeed she does. I'm always happy to see her listed on the cast of something I'm watching, most notably -- so far -- X-Files producer Chris Carter's short-lived Harsh Realm or Little Women or Jack and Sarah.In The Thing Called Love, she starred alongside the late River Phoenix, Sandra Bullock and Dermot Mulroney, playing a woman with dreams of success as country music writer/singer. She demurred at praise for her performances, saying she had lots of assistance in making it palatable, but I consider it an underrated gem.
My longest wait of the day was for Tom Berenger, and truth be told, I had been on the fence about whether I'd try to meet him or not. I'm glad I did, he was very attentive and gracious -- like pretty much everyone all day. There was a lot to choose from in his filmography to converse with him about. And in fact, Tom himself agreed he'd been blessed with so many great movies.
I mentioned The Big Chill because I had just seen it recently and it was on my mind. Berenger said it was a perfect shoot, nothing went wrong with a cast and crew of heavyweights -- the Lawrence Kasdan film starred Glenn Close, Kevin Kline, William Hurt, Jeff Goldblum, JoBeth Williams, Mary Kay Place and Meg Tilly -- and they had just one hour of overtime for the whole thing.Then I brought up one I thought he might not talk about as much over the weekend at a sci-fi/horror-focused convention, Betrayed. In that movie, he played a racist Midwest farmer. "(Co-star) Debra Winger said it was my best part, and I said you're just saying that. Then I watched it three times and thought maybe she's right. ... She's the smartest person I've ever worked with."
I've been going to these cons and having a great time talking about favorite projects for about eight years. At one of the earliest ones, I met Bronson Pinchot. And at this Chiller, I viewed Pinchot hanging out with his Perfect Strangers co-star Mark-Linn Baker, mostly from my spot on the Berenger line. It was adorable to see they're still friends in real life.
When I met Baker, and even though I watched that sitcom and really loved My Favorite Year with Peter O'Toole, I spent my time talking with him about a couple guest roles that have stuck in my mind over the years. First, Moonlighting, in which he played hapless Phil West in the episode "Atlas Belched," and I recommended he check out blooper reels to see his old buddy Bruce Willis struggling during a scene with him in that show. Then I mentioned Ally McBeal, he guest starred in a Christmas episode called "Making Spirits Bright."Mark mentioned he was friends with Bruce when he was just an unknown bartender in New York and that he also knew most of the actors from Ally -- many theater veterans as well. He sure knows how to use his time at the convention wisely, adding he had done a couple episodes of Blue Bloods with Tom Selleck and also an episode of Christine Baranski's show The Good Fight -- the latter of which he deemed was "chock full of the best actors."
So another fun full day with memories stacked in my head like Record Store Day exclusives on my album shelves.
