Recently I was part of the audience for the Australian premiere of the new Sandra Bullock movie “The Heat“. I am not a huge fan of comedies but, as my daughter had won tickets to the premiere, we went along to the red carpet event.

Not being people who enjoy the spotlight, we declined the opportunity to walk the carpet and headed straight for the cinema.  There we were able to watch on the big screen all the fun as the celebrities arrived and miss all the crush and confusion of the actual red carpet event.

While we watched we realised how narrow our knowledge of Australian celebrities really is.  We watched as person after person walked the carpet, posed for photos and then chatted to the entertainment journalists from many media outlets.  Who were all these people? They  were possibly household names in some areas of the country and possibly excelled in their fields of entertainment or sport but to us they were just nameless faces.

Of course, when Sandra Bullock arrived we recognised her.  Our impression was that she seemed a very nice person who had lots of times for her fans as she stopped to sign autographs and have her photo taken by smartphone wielding fans whose goal was to get a selfie with the a star. She did this with apparent grace and poise, endearing her to even more fans and creating an impression for us of a celebrity who is down-to-earth and caring. The joy on the faces of fans she spoke to was evident.

The endless stream of nameless celebrities continued and then finally another face we recognised. Readers of my blog might recall that earlier this year my daughter and I went to see the Alan Bennett play “The History Boys” at the Opera House.  So blown away was I by the quality of the performance that I blogged about it.  Then we went to see it again and I blogged again.  One of the stars of that performance was Lindsay Farris and it was he who we identified on the red carpet. Finally  an Australian celebrity we recognised and for whose talent as an actor we felt awe. We resolved, if possible to see if we could speak to him after the movie, so my daughter could get a photo with him.

When the lights went down in the cinema, entertainment reporter Angela Bishop introduced Sandra Bullock, who made a short speech and then the movie began. We found it very entertaining.  The plot held together well and there were a lot of funny laugh-out-loud moments.  The timing of the two lead actresses, Sandra Bullock and Melissa McCarthy, was good and the direction was solid and strong.  I was surprised that I found it entertaining as I am not a fan of comedy and prefer my cop movies with more drama and less laughs but it was a good movie, possibly made even better by the fact that it cost us nothing to be there.

Once the credits started to roll we prepared to exit the cinema so that we could find Lindsay Farris.  No, we were not stalking him, as we knew there was one entrance so, if we waited, my daughter might get her photo opportunity and this came to pass.

What a delightful young man he is! He was gracious and charming and made polite conversation with us. We took a photo and then, when his friend pointed out that there was a lot of blue glare, we took a couple more until there was a reasonable one for my daughter to remember the event by. We had the opportunity to tell him how much we enjoyed his performance as Dakin in ‘The History Boys’ and then left him to enjoy the rest of his evening with his friends.

All in all I was left with favourable impressions of both Sandra Bullock and Lindsay Farris in their treatment of fans.  From the lofty heights of the Hollywood star to the less deified atmosphere of Australian theatre these two thespians demonstrated that it is possible to make the fans happy through simple gestures of goodwill.

All in all it was a rewarding evening, if only for the excitement that Lindsay gave my daughter by taking time to speak to her.  Her joy was one of the pleasures I was glad to be able to share with her and I am thankful to Lindsay for giving her this delight.

It was a good night at the cinema.  So glad I went.