[Sussex] Mingling with the Rich and Famous

[PILTDOWN MAN]

Here I go:

Richard Branson used to come in my office when I worked at Gatwick and we serviced his aircraft when he first started his airline, the bloke is a tit.
Peter Allis often came in my pub
Paul McCartney in my pub a few times now this guy is a huge tit, but I'm friend with Heather Mill's brother so biased

Cricket
People I got to know reasonably well and some I consider/d friends, David Shepard, Bickie Bird, Roy Parmer, Graham Roope, Chris Adams, Tony Piggott, Adrian Jones, Will Beer, Trout, Duchess of Norfolk

Football
Gary Nelson, Alan Curbishley ex-wife used to babysit for them.

Other people that have come into my pubs

Chris Ellison (Burnside), Bono, Status Quo, Mike Smith and Sarah Greene, Danny Cullip, Charlie Oatway, Lord Snowden, Maurice Saatchi, N Soames, Russel Slade and some more I can't remember


Edit. Met Big Dunc as I was staying in the same hotel as Everton in Cardiff a few year ago, he bought me a drink and the following morning, day of the match, came and had breakfast with me brought over all the backroom staff as well.

 

[SeagullDubai]

I bought Noel Edmunds a gin and tonic 42 years ago.


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[Raleigh Chopper]

I was at Heathrow when Mike Tyson came out through arrivals for the Bruno fight, total mayhem ensued with press and public and he was rushed by a huge security team through the terminal.
Unfortunately for Mike, in the melee he was shoved into me so I chinned him and knocked him spark out.

 

[shingle]

Also weirdly enough, I was photographing a hotel in either Sharm or Hurghada in Egypt and the eastenders actor James Alexandrou or something came over and asked me not to photograph around the pool as his girlfriend was sunbathing topless and he thought I was a paparazzo, to be honest I hadn't even noticed her.

 

[Raleigh Chopper]

Well my Hugh Bonneville has been comprehensively trumped by the rest of this thread...

Perhaps I should have titled it Which Famous Person met You for Your COVID Jab?

I have not had my jab yet so the answer is nobody.
But I am really hoping that it will be Kelly Brook in a porno nurses uniform and offers extras afterwards.

 

[jakarta]

I have not had my jab yet so the answer is nobody.
But I am really hoping that it will be Kelly Brook in a porno nurses uniform and offers extras afterwards.

Well we can all dream can't we?

Personally 3 points from the Croydon Scum will do for now...

 

[Cowfold Seagull]

I was at Heathrow when Mike Tyson came out through arrivals for the Bruno fight, total mayhem ensued with press and public and he was rushed by a huge security team through the terminal.
Unfortunately for Mike, in the melee he was shoved into me so I chinned him and knocked him spark out.

Quite honestly l'm far more inclined to believe you than some of the other posters on here!

 

[Weststander]

NSC has had such threads in the past.

We were personally served afternoon tea by Terry Butcher in 1995, when he owned a lovely hotel in Stirlingshire. A gent, we chatted about some footballing highlights.

Ten years ago in a cable car in Courmayeur, Italy I stood next to the distinctive Ian Dowie (ugly), who was with a large party of cockney hanger ons. I started a brief conversation. He was a charmless ****, mainly boasting about a goal scored against us.

Albion - chats with Peter Grummitt (brilliant goalie), Peter Ward and many meetings with Dick Knight. I’ve trained at Withdean Gym next to Muzza who was working out in the closed season, but I didn’t want to interrupt him with a chat.

Also the ex-footballer Ian Callaghan.

Interesting chats with the football writer Paul Hayward, in hospitality at SCCC.

 

[Cowfold Seagull]

Well we can all dream can't we?

Personally 3 points from the Croydon Scum will do for now...

Yeah sod Kelly Brook, three points on Monday night far more important!

 

[W3 BHA]

Shook hands and had a brief few words with Muhammed Ali in Waterstones a few years back.

Met Ian Poulter in the PGA Superstore in Naples. Had quite a chat. Thoroughly bloody nice chap.

Sat next to Carol Decker (T'Pau) on a flight to LA a few years back. She didn't stop talking! A really nice and unassuming person - more interested in my wife and I than she was talking about herself. Very self deprecating. Kept in touch for a while after.

However - my wife is a hostie on Virgin and a few years ago, before he came back to us, she had Bobby Zamora on a flight. They are not supposed to engage the famous in chats etc but she asked for an autograph for her husband as Bobby was a hero of his. Bobby immediately cottoned on and said, "Albion is he?" She said he was a very nice, very polite chap!

 

[Seagull]

Offered to buy Morrissey a drink in the Edinburgh Castle in Camden. I didn't realise till I spoke to him that we was sitting with Chrissie Hynde.

 

[PILTDOWN MAN]

My parents had a real claim to fame for a long period they used to drink in a small village pub, there were a couple of young brothers who used make a beeline for them and spend the evening talking. The brothers often were falling out and one used go up to the other pub up the road.

One Sunday I popped over to see my parents and my mum said you'll never believe this and showed me an exclusive in the paper accusing one of them of damaging property and so on. Anyway when he was supposed to have done he it was sat in this local pub with my mum. It was only then my parents truly realised who they had got to know.

They were staying in the area to complete the recording of an album. My mum used to say what a lovely lad Noel is but Liam could get stroppy.

 

[Ooh it’s a corner]

I bought Noel Edmunds a gin and tonic 42 years ago.


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Was this in Kent?

If so was it Deal or not Deal?

 

[bhafc99]

Royals
Prince Charles
Prince Andrew

Politicians
Gordon Brown. I was on a packed BA flight from Heathrow to Edinburgh one Friday night, pleasantly surprised that the seeming-only unoccupied seat left was the one next to me. Ten minutes after everyone else had boarded and we were about to leave the gate, on rushed a flustered Gordon Brown. No bodyguards, nothing. And promptly sat next to me, in the middle seat of a bog-standard Economy row. He was a big guy, but not the worst elbow tennis player ever.

Entertainers
Ernie Wise. My first boss was Michael Barratt of 1970s Nationwide. Ernie used to pop into our office to use the fax machine. Constantly.
My colleague and best mate at that job was Will MacDonald, who went on to be Willllll of TFI Friday. Regularly got me onto the guest list for the upstairs bar bit. Hence also Chris Evans and Danny Baker.
Eddie Izzard. He was a couple of years above me at school. Though I think my only real interaction with him was when he told me and my friends off for jumping the lunch queue.
David Suchet. School outing to see him play Iago in Othello. He came and gave a talk to the class about the play beforehand. Nice gesture.

Sportspeople
David Seaman
Frankie Dettori
Neil Smilie, ex Brighton. I served him on the tills at Reading Asda. We had a good chat about his time with the Albion.
Ed Giddins. A couple of years below me at school. A bit of a cheeky shit.
The Leicester Tigers rugby team, including England captain Martin Johnson. I was in the bogs at a motorway service station once when they came in en masse. Felt like scene from a mob movie.
Ellen MacArthur. Kind of. Helming a Swan 45 in the Round Isle of Wight race one year, I was trying to cope with the crowded start line when a bigger yacht almost came into my path, before tacking smartly away just in time. I was literally just calling 'starboard' at them to point out I had right of way, when "I know! Sorry!" came a cheery reply. I looked over and got a friendly wave from their helm. It was Ellen MacArthur. ****ing amateur.

Others
Richard Branson. Went to a couple of meetings at his Notting Hill house, and met him again at couple of functions.
Melinda Messenger

Musicians
Kristin Hersh and Tanya Donelly of Throwing Muses
Rachel Goswell of Slowdive
Once ended up squashed next to Miki Berenyi of Lush in the crowd at a gig, if that counts. (It did for me.)
Lisa Scott-Lee of Steps. Her daughter was in my son's class for a couple of years, and she became part of the same "parents" social circle here in Dubai as us – house parties, kids parties, beach days etc. She was actually really nice.

Total wankers
David Bellotti. Twice. Once in M&S in Eastbourne. I told him I thought he was a spineless shit. Again at the 'Goodbye Goldstone' TV taping. I was sat behind him and his wife, and got my petty revenge in by pointing out to the entire studio during one of the breaks in filming that Jo had really bad dandruff.

 

[Raleigh Chopper]

Quite honestly l'm far more inclined to believe you than some of the other posters on here!

The first bit is true I made the last bit up.
Meanwhile up North I was in a nightclub in Alderley Edge, I used to go there once a month on business.
It was always full of Manchester/Cheshire celebs.
Once it had many Manchester United players at that time when most people hated them, Roy Keane was with them.
It was a cracking club though, I was sitting at a table with a customer and a bloke on the next table was getting a blowie from a page 3 type girl who was on her knees under the table.
This is all true BTW

 

[Deleted member 2719]

I nearly forgot, back in the day me and my brother spent an entire night in the Zap Club annoying Chesney Hawkes to the point where his entourage were starting to get quite moody.

Who would have thought it?

I did a similar thing to Jamie Theakston at Loftus Road when he sat next to me, he enjoyed the experience so much he encouraged his mate to sit next to me the whole of the 2nd half.

I suppose the main difference was, mine was not preplanned I was just hammered.

 

[Mr H]

I sold Des Lynam a Barbour jacket in Harrods a week or so before the Grand National that was abandoned due to an IRA bomb threat - managed to get in some Albion chat, all good!

I played football against Des when he was at Varndean and I was at Chi High

 

[lawros left foot]

Also weirdly enough, I was photographing a hotel in either Sharm or Hurghada in Egypt and the eastenders actor James Alexandrou or something came over and asked me not to photograph around the pool as his girlfriend was sunbathing topless and he thought I was a paparazzo, to be honest I hadn't even noticed her.

 

[Eeyore]

I nearly forgot, back in the day me and my brother spent an entire night in the Zap Club annoying Chesney Hawkes to the point where his entourage were starting to get quite moody.

I do believe you told him I was a fan...

I was on a train back from a match at a northern outpost in 1992/93 when I sat in the only available seat in a carriage which was on a table of what appeared to be college students with embroidered blazers.

When I sat down I noticed that the blazers had Manchester United crests on. It was a Saturday evening and the lad in front asked me what game I'd been to and told me they were on their way to London.

We talked football for the entire journey to London and it really struck me how articulate and knowledgeable he was. He told me that he had already played for the first team in a European game. His name was Gary Neville.

They took the piss out of one of the poor mites though. He had recently made his debut against Brighton, taken up the wrong position, and Albion scored. Not sure what happened to him. His name was David....

Years later I told of this meeting to a United supporting work colleague. We worked out the names of the others who were probably present. A few future England players in that group.

 

[Herr Tubthumper]

Oh. I completely forgot and this is a really random one.... Stuart Storer in a beer garden in Berlin. There’s a few NSC posters who were also present.