Yahoo Lifestyle 27 Bizarre And Shocking Celebrity Encounters From "Normal" People Who Didn't Even Realize The Other Person Was Famous
We asked the BuzzFeed Community to share their "I didn't know I met a famous person" stories, and they really delivered. Here's what they said:
Disclaimer: Though people claim to be speaking from their own experiences with celebrities, BuzzFeed can't confirm the validity of these stories.
1."I was in line for a ride at Disney when the group of girls behind me started hysterically screaming and pointing..."
"When I asked the girl who they were pointing at, she just gave me a funny look and got on the ride. And that’s the story of how I didn’t recognize Kylie Jenner at Disney World."
2."One day, while shopping, I saw a Jeep I really liked. As I pressed my nose up against the VERY darkly tinted driver's window (to see what the dash looked like)..."
"The window rolled down, and I was standing there, almost nose to nose with Robin Williams. I stuttered out that I really liked his car, and he invited me to sit in the passenger seat. He spent five minutes or so happily showing off all the features to me. I have no clear memories of anything I said, so I'm pretty sure it was gibberish. It was an awesome experience and probably why I can't bring myself to watch his movies anymore."
3."I was 10 years old in 2002 when my mom took me to the Bronx Zoo for the first time. It was a rainy day, so we practically had the whole place to ourselves except for three British kids running around, chaperoned by a woman..."
"My mom quickly befriended the woman while I made like a kid and joined the hoard, looking at spiders and scorpions, and sharing in the awe and excitement of the animals. About an hour after we said our goodbyes, my mother told me that the kid, Daniel, who I had been hanging out with had played Harry Potter in the movie that came out last year. I had thought he looked familiar."
4."My mom just casually became pool buddies with Pitbull when she was living in LA..."
"She had absolutely no clue who he was and even asked him one day what he did for a living. He told her he was a rapper and went by Pitbull, and she said she would try to check out his music because she hadn’t heard of him. Later, on the phone, she asked me if I’d ever heard of him. She would call him Armando and say he was very sweet and a gentleman."
5."My friend invited me to go meet the original cast of Hamilton in New York City. We were admitted directly onto the stage in the theater, and immediately we saw a man in a ponytail, center stage, talking to at least 10 people..."
"We walked over, and my friend is basically tripping over herself, stuttering words of admiration about the man. In my head, I'm like, 'Why is she being so weird? Who is this guy?' He was so warm and sweet. He introduced himself as Lin, and my friend is literally ready to pee herself. Instead of telling him my name, I asked him where Leslie Odom Jr. was. It wasn't until 20 minutes later that I realized I shrugged off a conversation with one of the most prominent playwrights in modern history, Lin-Manuel Miranda."
– cpacheco
6."I was at a test screening of the movie Valkyrie. My friends and I were near the front of the theater talking before the movie started, and I went on this big, loud rant..."
"...about how 'normally I like Tom Cruise movies, but War of the Worlds was such a piece of shit, one of the worst movies I've ever seen.' After I wrap up my five-minute rant outlining everything wrong with War of the Worlds, the person sitting behind us tapped me on the shoulder and points four seats down in my row to Tom Cruise glaring at me. I gave him the nod and sat there for what might have been the longest 10 minutes before a movie started ever."
7."My dad was at a beach on vacation in California. He bumped into this guy on the staircase, who had this total surfer dude look..."
"They exchanged the usual ‘sorry’ before my dad walked away. He looked familiar to him, but it took him a second to realize who it was. His now ex-wife had a huge crush on the said person at the time, and she looked back at my dad, in shock, and said ‘That was Keanu Reeves.’"
8."Around 2000, my mom was selling at a flea market and thought she recognized this cute, young blonde woman who was clearly trying to stay incognito while browsing the booth..."
"Mom thought she'd come up with the solution and asked, 'Do I know you from somewhere?' The woman smiled and adorably did the 'shhh' finger to her lips, but Mom had no chill and asked, 'Are you Tracey Gold from Growing Pains?' The woman responded, 'Uh, no, I'm Reese.' As in Reese Witherspoon, right when her fame was exploding. My mom was about 10 years out of date when it came to cute pop culture blondes."
9."I used to work with an older lady, and one day she came back from her break with ice cream. She said, 'Some young guy and his friends decided to buy me ice cream...'"
"She explained, 'He was about your age — I should have given him your number!' Later that night, she saw on the news that Drake had done an event near our job. She came in the next day to say 'THAT WAS HIM! I really should’ve given him your number!!!'"
10."I was working at a high-end retail store at a ritzy mall in my area. A man and a woman came in, and the woman immediately started picking out the coolest, most expensive things in the store..."
"I started her a fitting room while she and the man kept looking around. The store was playing old R&B music at the time, and I noticed the man snapping his fingers and bobbing his head along. I said to him, 'Aren’t these jams the best?' to which he nodded his head and smiled at me. A few minutes later, a group of ladies came in asking for photos with the man. I had no idea who the people were until a coworker whispered to me…'That’s John Legend and Chrissy Teigen.'”
11."My grandma had been shopping in Rhode Island and told me about some nice young blonde lady who'd helped her reach something off the top shelf..."
"'She sings, but I've never heard of her. Your cousin said she recognized her though.' It was Taylor Swift."
12."I was working a shift helping first-year college students move in. I see a guy in a hat and sunglasses. I strike up a conversation, ask if he needs help with the bags..."
"He gives first names only — 'We're from California. My wife, Kate, and I sent all our kids to East Coast schools though.' Stuff like that. Later, when his daughter opened the door for the first time, he whipped out a camcorder and, wearing the biggest dad grin, recorded the whole thing before turning the camera on my friend and me to ask us about the city. So I have a supporting (the luggage) and a speaking role in a limited release (home movie) film shot by Steven Spielberg." —u/AdamHR
13."I used to work in a bank at a grocery store in Orange County, California. Once I was walking back from the bathroom and saw the floral department lady chatting with a tall guy with long dreadlocks and sunglasses on..."
"I said hi to her but kept on my way before I realized the man she was talking to was Snoop Dogg. It turned out that the lady’s son played on Snoop’s sons' football team and they had become good friends."
14."Probably close to 20 years ago, my grandparents were visiting family in LA and went out alone to do some shopping while everyone was at school/work..."
"My grandpa went into a small boutique by himself to look at gifts for my grandma. He held the door open for a woman and two men. He had a light conversation with the woman while he looked around. As he was leaving, one of the men pulled him aside and said something like, 'Thank you for not making a big deal out of being in here with her. We’ve been dodging paparazzi all day.' My grandpa was super confused but just said, 'Of course.' When he got to my grandma, he asked if she knew who the woman was who’d gone into the store after him. It was Angelina Jolie."
15."Back in the late '90s, my dad got invited to watch a Liverpool game in London..."
"He sat in the business lounge and noticed Robbie Fowler and a couple of top Liverpool players walk through the lounge with a few ladies. Once they had passed him, he turned to his friends and said, 'Did you see Robbie Fowler?' His mate said, 'Yeah, but did you see who the ladies were?' My dad said no. Turns out it was the Spice Girls!"
16."A few years ago, I was at a local barbecue place, sitting outside on the patio eating. It was late afternoon, and the restaurant was pretty dead..."
"This big car pulls up, and a guy in a suit gets out and walks inside. I see through the windows some of the employees getting photos with him. I thought it kinda looked like the current mayor, so didn’t think anything of it. A few minutes later, he walks out with a bag of food. I waved at him, and he waved back. After the car pulls away, I walked inside to get a refill of my drink. I asked one of the waiters, who the guy was. He just looked at me like I was a complete idiot and says…'Do you not know who Jack Nicholson is?'"
17."I was at a convenience store in LA when me and a very nicely dressed gentleman walked up to the cashier at the same time to pay...
"It was nighttime, and he had his dark shades on and was talking on his phone. I gave him the 'after you' gesture, and he nodded and said, 'Thanks buddy,' paid, and left. It wasn't until he was out of the store that I realized he was Jamie Foxx."
18."When I was 15, I was really into playing StarCraft. After finishing this one particularly epic match (close game, we won), we all got into a chat room to talk about how fun it was..."
"One of them says something to the effect of 'Not sure if you all care, but you just beat Ben Affleck.' Of course, we all ask him to prove it, so he told us to wait a minute and visit his official website's message board. He had just made a post in red (red meant it was Ben Affleck himself) about just losing a game of StarCraft." —u/gregorykay
19."About five years ago, my dad was in LA for business and got into the elevator of his hotel to head down to one of his meetings. When he got in, he instantly recognized a huge, legendary, hall-of-fame LA Laker standing next to him..."
"Normally, my father would never say anything, but for some reason felt compelled to introduce himself. He stuck out his hand and said, 'Shaq, it's nice to meet ya.' He realized he messed up when the guy responded, 'I'm Magic Johnson, but it's nice to meet you, too.' The secondhand embarrassment is real." —u/dutchman3532
20."I was once at Baby Beach on Maui with my husband and our youngest two kids. I went to sit in the shade with our stuff and our 2-year-old son followed me up the sand..."
"He stopped, said something to another little boy that I couldn’t hear. With a grouchy look on his face, he picked up one of his sand toys. I am used to my curmudgeon larvae but felt bad. So I went over to meet his mom and tried to invite my son to play with her kid. I said, ‘It was nice to meet you. What’s your name?’ She said, ‘I’m Hilary,’ and chuckled to herself. I asked what her son’s name was; she told me he is Luca. Still not placing why she looked familiar, I asked my little grouch if he would like to come share his toys with Luca and make friends. Unfortunately, he did not make friends with Hilary Duff's son. The memory still makes me cringe."
21."About a month ago, I pulled into a parking structure only to immediately encounter a nasty traffic jam..."
"After 15 minutes of going nowhere, I saw a familiar-looking gentleman stopping at the window of each car. He got to me and explained a car had rolled into the aisle, blocking both directions. The driver was nowhere to be found, and not much could be done, but he wanted to let people know what was going on to try and ease the frustration. After explaining to the remaining drivers behind me, the kind fellow headed inside. By the time Henry Winkler finished whatever business he had there, a group of us had managed to lift the offending Honda and move it enough to let cars pass. I hope we improved his day some fraction of as much as he did ours."
22."My mom is a big sports fan. One time she was shopping and saw a really large, fit-looking man who she didn't immediately recognize but seemed familiar..."
"She thought it must have been a professional football player or something, so she went up to the only other person in the shop, who was this smaller weird-looking guy, and asked him if he knew who the athletic-looking man was. The short guy looked at my mom and said, 'That's my bodyguard. I'm Elton John.'"
23."My wife and I were hiking on a trail that was supposed to loop around, but we were pressed for time, so we decided to turn back the way we came..."
"Five minutes later, we saw three people walking towards us up the trail, and my wife said she wanted to ask them how far it would have taken if we stayed on our original route. She started talking to the guy while I’m chewing on my lip trying not to laugh. He gave us directions, and we went our separate ways. After a beat, I say to her, 'You know that was Tom Hanks, right?' She had no idea that she just had a three-minute conversation with him. Not to mention he was hiking with his wife Rita Wilson and another friend of theirs. We still laugh about it."
24."So I walked up to this dude at the showers at the beach, and he said, 'Hey, kid, can you turn on the water for me...'"
"I was a little confused but did so anyway and then walked away. I walk over to where my cousins are talking and tell them what happened and how it was kind of creepy. My cousin just replied, 'Creepy?! That was Justin Bieber!'"
25."My friend's mom owns a small Asian grocery store. Post Malone came walking in with his girlfriend, and my friend's mom had no idea who he was..."
"A few cute things happened: 1. She was nervous because of his tattoos, but happy/not worried once he bought a lot of food. She had no idea he was a celebrity.
2. She gave him a free snack for buying so much food and told him to come back for lunchtime for cheap and tasty gyoza (he did come back the next day!).
3. She was worried he would get mugged going to his car because of three big men outside, so she followed him outside (they were his bodyguards).
4. She really liked his 'cool car' (it was a Lamborghini).
When Post Malone came back the next day for gyoza, she got a selfie with him. The whole thing is adorable with how innocent his mom is."
26."My wife took my son to the zoo, and he wanted to read every little plaque in the reptile area. My wife was distracted for a moment, so he asked the nearest stranger to read the plaque for him..."
"My wife turned around to see Scarlett Johansson happily reading the info to him." —u/mojomann128
27."It was near closing and I was working the customer service desk at Lowe's..."
"A man came up and said he bought a refrigerator. I asked for his phone number because that's how we invoice them. He smiles a kinda cute smile and said no. I asked if it was invoiced. He said no and gave me a slip of paper with the item number. I rang him out, then watched him leave, then watched my head cashier practically tackle him in the parking lot. I turned to the next customer and he was watching, too. He told me, in excitement, it was Troy Polamalu from the Pittsburgh Steelers."
Have you ever met a celebrity and didn't realize it? Tell us your story in the comments below!
