Monday, April 09, 2007

I Still "heart" Kathy Griffin


(Note: This is old, but I'm finally getting around to posting stuff again.)


Kathy Griffin. I adore her. To me she is one of the funniest people on the planet. No lie. A long time ago I wrote a post called “I Heart Kathy Griffin” and a comment was left saying that they hoped I would someday meet her.

Well I did.

It’s a crazy story…so hang with me. It all started in a forum on her website. She was performing at The Pantages Theatre in Minneapolis in April 2006. I had posted in her forums that I was going to see the show and how excited I was. During the show, in the middle of one of her bits, she stopped and said “Is Jason here?” Now the Pantages seats over a 1,000 people so there were probably about a hundred different Jasons there. So no one said anything. We were all just trying to figure out what was going on. Then she says “Jason from my website, who posted that he was coming tonight”. Well…at that time, I was the only Jason on the board so I knew she was talking about me. So I yelled out “Yes, I’m here!” from the balcony and Kathy yelled back “thanks for coming and for posting on my chat boards! I love you!”. I just about died. I got a shout out from my favorite comedian of all time in the middle of her show. Amazing. I tried to meet her after the show, but she bailed out of the theatre immediately and I was coming down the block as she was getting into the car. Some guy threw himself in front of me and shouted “Back away from the car! Back away now from the car!” the funny thing being the fact that I was nowhere near the car, but rather in the middle of the sidewalk. I found it to be wildly hilarious.

Now fast forward to June 2006.

Kathy returned to the Twin Cities for yet another show at The Historic State Theatre. This time I wanted to get her to autograph my DVD of “Allegedly”. So I waited outside the stage door with a friend of mine for her to arrive for the show. About 15 minutes before the show was to begin, a black car with tinted windows pulled up. I knew it was her. The back door opened and Kathy stepped out. She looked over to my friend and me and said “Hi boys.” I said “Hi Kathy! Could I get your autograph?” and she said sure and then started some small talk. It was just the three of us at first. She signed the DVD “To Jason: Thanks for posting on the website. Love Kathy”. Then she asked if we wanted to do some pictures, of course I jumped at the chance. Slowly more people started to group around. I told her that I was at the show in April and that she had given me a shout out in the show. We talked about that show for a few minutes. I then went on to tell and reenact the after show incident of “step away from the car” bit. She laughed pretty hard and had no idea who the guy was. We came to the conclusion that it was probably just a person from the theatre or a crazy homeless person. The show that night was awesome. No other word to describe it. Laughed so hard, I cried.

Kathy Griffin is a riot. And a genius. If you get a chance to see her live…go. I hope she returns to the Twin Cities on her current tour,

I still “heart” Kathy Griffin.

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