A Celebrity Sighting

The Mrs. and I had a night out on Saturday. Her birthday is coming up, so for a slightly early present, I had gotten us tickets to see Kathy Griffin at Symphony Hall. I know she's one of those performers that people either really enjoy or can't stand, and I totally get why that is. We count ourselves in the first category. The show was hilarious, and there's no way I could do justice to it by trying to summarize or paraphrase any of her stories, but I will say that her observations tend to be on target.

We arrived fairly early, due to the need to build in enough time to find a parking spot. A Saturday night Red Sox home game made things a little more tricky, but we prevailed (tip: try Columbus Ave. west of Mass. Ave.). The show started fairly early, even though there was no later show scheduled, so we decided to go inside and have a drink, and wait until afterward to eat.

We got our drinks but all the tables were occupied, so we stood to the side of the bar, where we were out of the flow of patrons and would not have to move unless the bartender needed to come out from behind the bar, which was unlikely due to the brisk business he was doing. (I did not know that Symphony Hall had full bar service, it's a nice amenity.) We were positioned in such a way that we were looking across the corner of the bar to where other patrons were ordering their drinks. I was kind of looking around, people-watching, when the Mrs. grabbed my arm, pulled my ear down closer to her mouth, and said, "Ricky Gervais is standing right in front of us."

I looked across the bar, and he was maybe six feet away, waiting for his drink. My wife said, "I couldn't think of anything clever or interesting to say, and I don't think he would have wanted to be approached anyway." He was definitely giving off a vibe of wanting to blend in and not be noticed. As soon as he got his drink, he and the two people he was with slunk away to a far corner. Of course, they managed to find an empty table.

I seem to remember hearing that Gervais is working on a movie up in Lowell, and Kathy Griffin performed in Lowell on Thursday night, so you'd think he would have caught one of those shows. Maybe he was too busy, or maybe he's staying in Boston and traveling back and forth to the set every day. Probably not on the commuter rail, though.