Person of Interest Tribeca NYC Premiere Screening Memories
It has been almost a week and I am finally able to sit down and record my impressions of the fantastic NYC Tribeca Person of Interest screening event that I had the privilege of attending. Both aprilvalentine and blacktop50 have recorded more substantial impressions of the details from the event. Their accounts can be found here and here. http://aprilvalentine.livejournal.com/112380.html and http://blacktop50.livejournal.com/11201.html
So I am simply going to record my visual and emotional impressions from being there. April and I arrived fairly late to get in line, but met up with Blacktop who was lucky enough to have seen Jim and Michael arrive. As we stood in line, we got to know several of the other people around us. I recognized Caviezus and Screamsofsorenson, who were standing on either side of us, from their photographs I have seen on their Tumblr blogs. We met another Tumblr blogger that I had not known before, Looneyluna00, who got a pretty good picture of Jim arriving. We also spoke with Kathleen, a wonderful Irish woman who now lives in NYC, who is a lurker on Tumblr and the comm. Kathleen, I’d love to keep in touch with you, so if you see this please send me a message. I was disappointed that I was unable to meet up with Jimcaviezelfan and Eyesofwitt from Tumblr - it was a crazy day and we had lots of logistical issues before we finally made it to the event.
While we were standing in line and fangushing to each other, we did see Kevin Chapman arrive. He took a long time walking down the line and shaking everyone’s hand, including mine, as he thanked everyone for coming. What a great guy - more about him below.
During the screening of Contingency, the audience would gasp and laugh together at all the appropriate moments. Every time the show faded to black in the places where commercials would be inserted, we would all applaud, as if we were watching a play and it was the end of a scene. There was such a great feeling of camaraderie, energy and excitement in the theater. And of course, we were all PSYCHED after seeing the fabulous season opening episode.
After the screening, the cast and producers walked out onto the stage to take their seats for the question and answer session. You all know how gorgeous Jim and Michael and Taraji are on television, but you simply CANNOT IMAGINE HOW STUNNINGLY BEAUTIFUL THEY ARE IN PERSON!! And Kevin Chapman is an absolute sweetheart and very, very funny.
Michael is surprisingly even smaller in person than he looks on screen. He is very slight and thin, with huge expressive eyes and face. That color-soaked, violet-blue suit and paisley patterned tie he was wearing was AMAZING. It was even more vibrant in person than in the pictures. We saw his beautiful wife Carrie Preston very briefly from the side at the end as she was ushered into the backstage area by the bodyguards. She is TINY and wore a chic black dress with her signature flaming red hair. The two of them together remind me of two small, bright birds (LOL!).
I loved how Michael and Jim's suits and ties were semi-matching in cut, style and tie patterns. JIM IS REALLY, REALLY, REALLY TALL, and EXTREMELY, BREATHTAKINGLY GORGEOUS IN PERSON!! You could cut paper on his cheekbones. His salt and pepper hair just itches to have fingers run through it. His face was also very expressive as he reacted to the others and as he talked animatedly during the questions directed to him. He seemed very relaxed and happy, and did not get as tongue-tied as he sometimes does during interviews. And when he was sitting in his chair, his legs were so long that he couldn't really fit in his chair nicely. (Jonah Nolan had the same problem). As a result, Jim had his legs spread out really wide. Yes, I was actually listening to what they were saying, but the view was very pleasant, to say the least. I had the perfect vantage point (purely accidental but handy), because we were on the side facing Michael and Jim as they looked to our right towards the moderator and therefore were facing us. :)
Taraji is very petite, short, and VERY CURVY. She was wearing a black dress that I don't think photographs very well. But in person you could see that her gold belt cinched in her TINY, TINY waist. She was very funny and bubbly. I actually really like Taraji as a person better than I liked the character of Carter in Season 1. But I have high hopes that this season will be better for her because they are all four working as a Team now. I thought Contingency did a great job with that.
Kevin Chapman is just exactly how he looks on screen - short, stocky, with a broad, wrinkled face and aggressively curly hair. During the question and answer session, Taraji teased him about having a 'fro, so that maybe Fusco is actually Taylor's father. Kevin is also EXTREMELY funny. His eyes are very twinkling and sparkling all the time. You can tell that he, of all of the 4 main actors, is absolutely LOVING the fact that he is on a hit television show and determined to make the most of it. At the end of the panel discussion, he was the ONLY one of the 4 main actors to actually come down and stay at the edge of the stage to shake hands, give autographs and allow photographs. Also, you can tell that Kevin has a great relationship with the rest of the cast, but I think especially with Taraji. This makes sense because at least last year, he probably shot more scenes with her than with either Jim or Michael.
You can tell that the whole group is really bonded now and feed off each other’s humor and energy. It was just an amazing thing to see them all interacting and having so much fun together.
We were very disappointed that the rest of the cast did not come out to make a further appearance for pictures or autographs. Michael definitely would have come down if he could have. In fact, he did come to the front of the stage briefly to stoop down shake a couple people’s hands. But by the time I reached down to grab my camera, because he was only about 5 feet in front of us, the “handlers” had come over to him and were escorting him backstage. Several of us hung around for quite a while in the theater area just in case they would bring the cast back out the way they had come in - through the theater. But they must have taken the cast out a back way.
However, Jonathan Nolan and Greg Plageman did come out from the back and stood around with talking to many of their friends and colleagues. We were closest to Greg Plageman so we went over and started talking to him. He was very gracious and friendly. We complimented him for trusting the audience enough to have a smart show that doesn’t answer all the questions and lay out everything in black and white. He said that they had had several “discussions” with the network about just that fact, and that he was glad we enjoyed and “got” the show so well. He said the fan base was really important to them and thanked us again. Grey Bard, a NYC resident, thanked him for using the city so well and having such recognizable parts of the city as backdrops for the scenes. Greg was again gracious enough to sign April and my cast photograph, and Blacktop took the wonderful photograph you see below - THANK YOU AGAIN BLACKTOP!
After the event was over, we said goodbye to Blacktop and the wonderful grey_bard took April and me on the subway to her cute little apartment in Brooklyn that she shares with her roommate. Thank you again to both of you for opening your home to us and being such great hosts.
Here are a few pictures from the event. This is Blacktop's picture of me and Greg Plageman.
This is Loonyluna00's picture of Jim arriving:
This is Caviezus' picture of the panel discussion. She was sitting at the end of our row, two seats away from Blacktop, 3 seats from me and 4 seats from AprilValentine. So the view is very similar to ours. They had strictly warned us that there should be no photography or videos. But she was brave enough to take this picture despite NUMEROUS bodyguards/security guards lurking all around the room.
I will DEFINITELY plan on attending any such event in the future if it is in held the NYC area. It was certainly worth the logistical challenges to get there to see our heroes in person. Hopefully, next time I will be able to take more time off of work to stay a few more days in order to stalk the filming set! It’s good to have a goal, right?!
So I am simply going to record my visual and emotional impressions from being there. April and I arrived fairly late to get in line, but met up with Blacktop who was lucky enough to have seen Jim and Michael arrive. As we stood in line, we got to know several of the other people around us. I recognized Caviezus and Screamsofsorenson, who were standing on either side of us, from their photographs I have seen on their Tumblr blogs. We met another Tumblr blogger that I had not known before, Looneyluna00, who got a pretty good picture of Jim arriving. We also spoke with Kathleen, a wonderful Irish woman who now lives in NYC, who is a lurker on Tumblr and the comm. Kathleen, I’d love to keep in touch with you, so if you see this please send me a message. I was disappointed that I was unable to meet up with Jimcaviezelfan and Eyesofwitt from Tumblr - it was a crazy day and we had lots of logistical issues before we finally made it to the event.
While we were standing in line and fangushing to each other, we did see Kevin Chapman arrive. He took a long time walking down the line and shaking everyone’s hand, including mine, as he thanked everyone for coming. What a great guy - more about him below.
During the screening of Contingency, the audience would gasp and laugh together at all the appropriate moments. Every time the show faded to black in the places where commercials would be inserted, we would all applaud, as if we were watching a play and it was the end of a scene. There was such a great feeling of camaraderie, energy and excitement in the theater. And of course, we were all PSYCHED after seeing the fabulous season opening episode.
After the screening, the cast and producers walked out onto the stage to take their seats for the question and answer session. You all know how gorgeous Jim and Michael and Taraji are on television, but you simply CANNOT IMAGINE HOW STUNNINGLY BEAUTIFUL THEY ARE IN PERSON!! And Kevin Chapman is an absolute sweetheart and very, very funny.
Michael is surprisingly even smaller in person than he looks on screen. He is very slight and thin, with huge expressive eyes and face. That color-soaked, violet-blue suit and paisley patterned tie he was wearing was AMAZING. It was even more vibrant in person than in the pictures. We saw his beautiful wife Carrie Preston very briefly from the side at the end as she was ushered into the backstage area by the bodyguards. She is TINY and wore a chic black dress with her signature flaming red hair. The two of them together remind me of two small, bright birds (LOL!).
I loved how Michael and Jim's suits and ties were semi-matching in cut, style and tie patterns. JIM IS REALLY, REALLY, REALLY TALL, and EXTREMELY, BREATHTAKINGLY GORGEOUS IN PERSON!! You could cut paper on his cheekbones. His salt and pepper hair just itches to have fingers run through it. His face was also very expressive as he reacted to the others and as he talked animatedly during the questions directed to him. He seemed very relaxed and happy, and did not get as tongue-tied as he sometimes does during interviews. And when he was sitting in his chair, his legs were so long that he couldn't really fit in his chair nicely. (Jonah Nolan had the same problem). As a result, Jim had his legs spread out really wide. Yes, I was actually listening to what they were saying, but the view was very pleasant, to say the least. I had the perfect vantage point (purely accidental but handy), because we were on the side facing Michael and Jim as they looked to our right towards the moderator and therefore were facing us. :)
Taraji is very petite, short, and VERY CURVY. She was wearing a black dress that I don't think photographs very well. But in person you could see that her gold belt cinched in her TINY, TINY waist. She was very funny and bubbly. I actually really like Taraji as a person better than I liked the character of Carter in Season 1. But I have high hopes that this season will be better for her because they are all four working as a Team now. I thought Contingency did a great job with that.
Kevin Chapman is just exactly how he looks on screen - short, stocky, with a broad, wrinkled face and aggressively curly hair. During the question and answer session, Taraji teased him about having a 'fro, so that maybe Fusco is actually Taylor's father. Kevin is also EXTREMELY funny. His eyes are very twinkling and sparkling all the time. You can tell that he, of all of the 4 main actors, is absolutely LOVING the fact that he is on a hit television show and determined to make the most of it. At the end of the panel discussion, he was the ONLY one of the 4 main actors to actually come down and stay at the edge of the stage to shake hands, give autographs and allow photographs. Also, you can tell that Kevin has a great relationship with the rest of the cast, but I think especially with Taraji. This makes sense because at least last year, he probably shot more scenes with her than with either Jim or Michael.
You can tell that the whole group is really bonded now and feed off each other’s humor and energy. It was just an amazing thing to see them all interacting and having so much fun together.
We were very disappointed that the rest of the cast did not come out to make a further appearance for pictures or autographs. Michael definitely would have come down if he could have. In fact, he did come to the front of the stage briefly to stoop down shake a couple people’s hands. But by the time I reached down to grab my camera, because he was only about 5 feet in front of us, the “handlers” had come over to him and were escorting him backstage. Several of us hung around for quite a while in the theater area just in case they would bring the cast back out the way they had come in - through the theater. But they must have taken the cast out a back way.
However, Jonathan Nolan and Greg Plageman did come out from the back and stood around with talking to many of their friends and colleagues. We were closest to Greg Plageman so we went over and started talking to him. He was very gracious and friendly. We complimented him for trusting the audience enough to have a smart show that doesn’t answer all the questions and lay out everything in black and white. He said that they had had several “discussions” with the network about just that fact, and that he was glad we enjoyed and “got” the show so well. He said the fan base was really important to them and thanked us again. Grey Bard, a NYC resident, thanked him for using the city so well and having such recognizable parts of the city as backdrops for the scenes. Greg was again gracious enough to sign April and my cast photograph, and Blacktop took the wonderful photograph you see below - THANK YOU AGAIN BLACKTOP!
After the event was over, we said goodbye to Blacktop and the wonderful grey_bard took April and me on the subway to her cute little apartment in Brooklyn that she shares with her roommate. Thank you again to both of you for opening your home to us and being such great hosts.
Here are a few pictures from the event. This is Blacktop's picture of me and Greg Plageman.
This is Loonyluna00's picture of Jim arriving:
This is Caviezus' picture of the panel discussion. She was sitting at the end of our row, two seats away from Blacktop, 3 seats from me and 4 seats from AprilValentine. So the view is very similar to ours. They had strictly warned us that there should be no photography or videos. But she was brave enough to take this picture despite NUMEROUS bodyguards/security guards lurking all around the room.
I will DEFINITELY plan on attending any such event in the future if it is in held the NYC area. It was certainly worth the logistical challenges to get there to see our heroes in person. Hopefully, next time I will be able to take more time off of work to stay a few more days in order to stalk the filming set! It’s good to have a goal, right?!