These people have either worked in the business or had an encounter at their place of work, with a certain celebrity. While some may have preconceived ideas of how their favorite star is really like, these stories will make you rethink everything. Stories have been edited for clarity.
Pink Tipped How Much?
“I used to work in a super fancy very expensive high-end restaurant when I lived in LA (Beverly Hills, go figure).
Anyway, I met P!nk once, she was so nice! She tipped $100 and didn’t mind when people asked for a picture or something, her daughter was with her, too, and the kid was so polite at such a young age.
Jessica Simpson was insanely self-entitled, called each of the servers her ‘slave’ and various other names, just an all around witch. Other celebrities came in and they were all polite, but it’s been a couple years.”
Ian Somerhalder Apparently Gives Off A Creepy Vibe
“These are the people I’ve worked with at some point:
Rhetta – Very pleasant and absolutely hilarious, but her knees are shot so she had to sit with ice packs between every shot.
Zoe Saldana – The sweetest ever. And totally adorable with her weirdo artist husband and cute kids. Personally thanked every single crew member after we wrapped the shoot. Also, she touched me. So not a bad day.
Natalie Dormer – Also incredibly sweet to the entire crew, despite it being clear that she was exhausted from shooting something else. I don’t get flustered by celebrities often, but there is just a cloud of sultry surrounding this woman at all times and I’m amazed I held it together.
Vince Vaughn – Ran into him at an indoor shooting range, of all places. He was just out having a good time on a down day, apparently. Very pleasant to the staff and other shooters, but I didn’t really engage him since it was clearly a day off for him.
Kim Zolciak (from Real Housewives of Atlanta) – She was easy enough to work with, but showed up to her photo shoot 4 hours late and took her sweet time getting ready without apologizing for keeping the entire crew waiting. Billed OT, so no big deal. Just annoying.
50 Cent – Completely self-absorbed clown. Made all 200+ cast and crew members leave the set (that we had just spent six hours setting up and blocking before he arrived) so he could ‘be alone’ for a few minutes. Also, he was playing the part of a college football player, but he’s got skinny little chicken legs and can’t run and can’t catch a ball, so every single scene where he didn’t have ‘dialogue’ was played by a stunt double.
The entire cast of ‘Love & Hip Hop Atlanta’ – Absolutely awful. Every last one of them. It was the only production I’ve ever been on in which security was required to protect the crew from the cast, and to keep the cast from attacking each other. Literally the lowest form of human life I can imagine.
Ian Somerhalder – Pleasant enough but friendly in a very seemingly fake kind of way. No specific complaints – I just got a weird vibe from him. Dude has amazing bone structure though.”
Julianne Hough Really Is America’s Sweetheart
“Definitely ran into a lot of celebs though multiple jobs:
Tenth Avenue North (Christian Rock band) – Really cool guys, like the kind I’d want to go get a drink with. They came for a music festival and even stayed around just to talk.
Julianne Hough – Super sweet and polite. Probably ranks in my top 10 nicest people encountered at work. (I saw anywhere from 15k to 60k people a day). She was with the entire dancing with the stars crew. Due to the nature of our encounter, I spent 30 mins with her. I still owe a friend a drink for that one.
Liam from One Direction – Absolute jerk. Acted like he was too good to talk to other people. Sorry bro, didn’t even recognize you. Someone told me who he was right after he left.
David Bruton (Denver Broncos) – Not work-related but he went to my high school way back in the day. Came back to visit while I was there and was really down to earth. Came back and even substitute taught after I left.
Neil Patrick Harris – I ran into him by chance. He was with his family but went out of his way to talk to myself and my friend group. Another guy I’d want to grab a drink with.
I’ve also worked with numerous NFL, NBA, and other sports celebrities along with many TV celebrities and Hollywood people. Also made a guest appearance on Good Morning America so if you count the head anchors celebs, then them, too.”
Ed Sheeran And Other ‘A-List Stars’ Who Made The Biggest Impressions
“The vast majority of huge A-List stars are absolutely lovely people. Ed Sheeran, Rebel Wilson, Katy Perry and Christina Hendricks were standouts. Treating them like a regular person will get you so much further than gushing compliments. D list reality ‘stars’ are complete scum with an inflated view of themselves.
Justin Bieber is always late to his interviews. Russell Brand will straight up go MIA prior to an interview.
If they are doing a phone interview, sometimes they forget they are transferred back to a producer before they hang up and start ordering their daily supply of illegal substances.”
Photoshoots Can Show A Celebrity’s True Colors!
“I have worked with celebrities on a ton of photo/video shoots and have dealt with the bad and the good:
Christina Aguilera is a raging psycho. No respect for anyone and this girl literally walks around thinking that she’s the best. Our editor who booked the covers who had been in the biz over 25 years could refer to her as nothing but a raging witch.
Rihanna–She literally fell asleep in the makeup chair in full reclining position. She spoke to NO ONE and had her assistant go out and get the stankiest takeout food, even though there was a ridiculous spread there for her full of both healthy and kinda not health stuff.
Nikki Minaj is an entitled, self-absorbed brat who will not be famous in 5 years (guaranteed)
Padma Lakshmi–Honestly she’s just not that pretty, has a serious attitude if you aren’t ‘fashion famous’…she was only nice to our creative director and photographer, everyone was just a minion to her.
Lauren Hill–She performed at an event for us and all her ridiculous entourage did the whole ‘Ms.Hill is not ready yet,’ ‘Ms. Hill doesn’t want to pose for photos,’ after everything had been agreed upon before the event. And this was several years after she fell off the scene…
Victoria Beckham–she didn’t like the way that an assistant was folding up clothes after the shoot was done and she said, ‘You are not being respectful of these clothes! I know these designers and I will tell them how their clothes are being treated!’ The poor assistant was reduced to a puddle of tears. See below for review on her husband.
Here are some of the NICEST: Mariah Carey (love my MiMi–but she is cray, at least she’s a nice cray. She offered drinks to everyone on set. LUV U MIMI!!)
Ellen Pompeo
Leighton Meester
Even Jen Aniston was nice and respectful
Mary J. Blige
Kim Kardashian (she was nice and funny, but this was pre-Kanye)
John Legend… a class act and totally handsome.
David Beckham–This man is tall, handsome and loaded. He has a great life. He also has manners and respect for the process and work that goes into events he shows up to for an hour. I was at a party thrown for him and his wife, and as they left, he came up to all us minions and shook our hands and said thank you for the evening. Wow…he’s handsome.
Blake Lively: Girl is fine and our shoot was on a boiling hot day and there was no AC….she wanted ice cream but would only agree to it if she could buy it for everyone on set.”
Kelly Clarkson And Her Humble Nature
“I’ve worked with a lot of celebrities but became personal friends with Kelly Clarkson.
She is without doubt the nicest, most humble person I have met in this industry. She’s incredibly sharp and witty and has a very dry and often dirty sense of humor, which I have to admit I was surprised by. Honestly, none of her success has affected her ego. She’s also the most personally secure person I’ve met in this industry. She really doesn’t care what people have to say about her body, whether she’s gained weight or lost it. She almost never wears makeup and she doesn’t care if the paparazzi catch her without any. Most of the pictures she posts herself are without makeup. She has a thyroid issue, which causes her body weight to fluctuate, by the way. But she doesn’t let what other people think have any influence on her life. She’s also an amazing mother. She doesn’t just hand her kids over to other people. She has help when she’s working but when she’s not, she and her husband are the parents and are doing a fantastic job. She’s also VERY generous. She leaves very large tips to servers in restaurants/bars because she used to be a waitress herself. She and her husband also pay for their entire family, band, crew and friends to go on incredible vacations at least once a year. As in my case, she’s the kind of person that you start out working with but soon becomes a good friend. Her husband is a great guy also. Manages both her and Blake Shelton. Nice man.”
Emma Roberts Had A Real Attitude Problem
“I was an extra in a movie starring Emma Roberts. She’s incredibly immature and childish. The whole time on set she clung to the male actors and spewed out drivel. She sounded like an 11-year-old girl attempting to talk like how she imagined a sorority girl would talk.
Before filming, I ran into her in the back while looking for the bathroom. She walked out of a door and I didn’t know who she was, just thought it was some blonde extra. I asked her if she knew where the bathroom was and she looked at me in disgust and said, ‘I don’t know…’ and rolled her eyes. The door to the bathroom ended up being on the other side of the door she just came out of. I’ll never forgive you, Emma Roberts,
As an example of how annoying she was, she was clinging to the leg of the director and screaming and giggling while he dragged her around. Like what a 4-year-old does with their dad. I also overheard her saying how she ONLY drinks shots because other drinks make you fat. She was 17 at the time, I think. She also demands toast everywhere she goes. When she first entered the room, she marched over to a couch in the center of all the extras while this woman ran over to her and gave her a plate of toast. She lazily ate a piece while staring at us all (we were waiting for her to be ready to film the scene), threw the toast back on the plate, and said she was ready. At the time, I still thought she was just an extra, so I thought, ‘What the heck? Where’s my toast?’
The movie was ‘Adult World’ for anyone curious. Evan Peters was in it, too. I didn’t realize he had so many fans! He was really quiet and seemed okay. But I only saw him in one small scene, though. I never got to meet John Cusack, though a few of my friends did (they said he was awesome). I still haven’t watched the movie even though it’s been out a while because while I was there it seemed like it was going to be terrible, though I’ve heard it’s pretty decent from some people!”
The Celebrities You Meet At Fashion Week Are Not Always The Happiest…
“Fashion Week worker here, I was an intern. I had it pretty easy, all I did was greet and answer questions. I had a head set to talk to my boss. One of the channels was the celeb wrangling station. Sometimes I would switch over to that station to see who was coming. For big shows, some pretty big stars would come.
There are a back entrance and a lounge so usually famous people came in the back, sat in the lounge, were escorted in saw the show, and left out the back with their PR person. They were there half an hour tops.
After one really big show, I switched over to the celeb channel to see who was coming for the next big show. All I heard was, ‘No, he can’t go out the front’ and more arguing until finally, ‘We can’t confirm that no one is going to ask for a picture or approach him.’ It sounded like someone rather famous wanted to come out the front, and it was literally packed with people, and he didn’t want anyone to look, speak, or approach him.
Not 20 second later, I looked up and Kanye West was charging his way through a packed room of people just wanting to take a picture of him. Security guards pushed people back to make a path. Apparently, he had INSISTED going out the front, but no one was allowed to look or talk to him. It was just annoying.
On the other hand, I had the chance to take Russell Simmons backstage for his interview with Tommy Hilfiger and he was just delightful! He introduced himself and shook my hand, asked me about myself. We stopped by a booth for him to get a coconut water and he got one for me. Overall, a really nice guy.”
Chris Brown’s Taco Bell Order Didn’t Go Exactly As Planned
“When I was in high school working front register for Taco Bell, Chris Brown and his crew came in. Chris Brown himself was okay, paid attention to me when he gave his order, unlike his crew. Pretty respectful. One thing that was odd was that his card ended up getting declined. His order was less than $20. One of his buddies ended up paying for the meal, they stayed in the lobby for like 20 minutes. It was at night, so there weren’t many people around. They did leave behind a huge mess at the table, though.
He has a line in one of his songs where he mentions a black card getting declined. Which reminds me of this everytime, because the card he used was black. I’m sure he wasn’t hurting for money though.”
Reality Show Celebrities Think A Little Too Much Of Themselves…
“I used to work for a talent agency.
Angelina Jolie and Kevin Spacey are apparently the two biggest nightmares to work with, in the industry. They both had a lot of random requests and conditions (like a specific food and beverage must be on set, or they walk). I just heard this as I was never senior enough there to work with the A+ listers.
I did work with Nicole Scherzinger though. She only employed unattractive and overweight girls as her personal assistants, like she needed someone with her at all times that couldn’t possibly take her spotlight. She’s super ‘loopy,’ said a lot of nonsense, but really nice and quite funny.
The general, the ‘B-list’ are always the rudest. They’re so desperate to make it big that they treat all non-celebs like crap. I was in a meeting with a girl from TOWIE (a reality tv show) and she refused to look at me or speak to me. Even when I asked her a question, she would say the answer to the two men in the room. She only looked at me once when she came in to ask for a coffee and water.
I was on a video call with someone quite famous, who I won’t name, and six other people. During the call, when I started speaking, the video zoomed to me. He interrupted and said I was so beautiful and asked me when I was in LA or Vegas next, and if he could take me on a date…in front of all the other callers, including my boss! When his mother passed a few months later, he called me in the middle of his night, absolutely wasted, just asking if I could talk. This was actually pretty sad and made me feel really bad for him, and how lonely he must have been. I had only spoken once to him, and I was the person he called for help or maybe on a long list of people he tried before. I awkwardly just sat at my desk, trying to tell a man I barely knew things would get better. We haven’t spoken since, as I was put on another account.”
Dealing With An America’s Next Top Model Winner Can Be A Real Pain
“I used to bartend in a really popular nightclub back in Canada that would have a bunch of those B-List celebrities come and do night time appearances. Think winners of Big Brother, America’s Next Top Model, The Bachelor, Instagram famous people, etc.
There were a few that were pretty normal, but most of them acted like they were the best. I had the guy who won cycle 21 of ANTM call me at 5 am once. I was asleep after my shift (seriously don’t mess with anyone in the industry when we finally get some precious sleep) and he demanded I come to his hotel room. It was ridiculous. Most of them have been very entitled and seemed focused on making sure I knew just how ‘famous’ they were.
On the much less frequent occasions where we had real and proper celebrities for the concert after parties and stuff like that, they were just like normal people.”
Charles Barkley Walks Into A Restaurant…
“Charles Barkley is a salt of the earth human being with a sweet family. I was the host at an Italian restaurant when he, his wife, and two children came in.
He made a point to shake my hand (I’m the lowest on the totem pole, as the host) and tell me he really appreciated me sitting him in the back away from people. He waited for the kitchen crew to get basketballs from their cars to sign. The loudmouth on the court and TV is a persona that his job requires/required. Dude is very kind.”
Wasn’t Expecting The Lead Singer Of Nickelback To Act Like That!
“As an audio engineer, I have worked with countless names including Justin Timberlake, Bieber, Metallica, Slayer, Diplo, Frank Ocean, Ariana Grande, Imagine Dragons, Steven Stills, Skrillex, Linkin Park and so so many more.
The one story I always like to bring up is working with Nickelback. I was told they would be with me for a week and my first reaction was, ‘Great, just what I needed on my resume.’ I won’t leave you all in suspense. They were by far my favorite band to ever work with. Usually, in every band, there is one guy who is a total jerk.
First, the drummer shows up. He starts setting up his kit and is just the nicest dude. He asks me all sorts of questions about my life and shows a genuine interest in who I am as a person. One by one, the rest of the band rolls in, each one as nice or nicer than the last. I used to play in a horrible, metal band and every one of the guys is into metal and we have a great convo about music in general.
Finally, the whole band is there but Chad, so I think, well he’s the one then…he’s the jerk. Chad finally comes strolling in and he’s the nicest one of them all. They’re all Canadian and the Stanley Cup finals are on. They just wanna drink, hang out, and make music. At one point, Chad even does an impression of Patton Oswalt doing an impression of him, which by the way, was spot on. They laugh at people making fun of them because well, they are making music for a living and having a great life. They like music, chicks, and money and making Nickelback songs is how they live. They like what they do and have no shame. All around they were one of my favorite experiences in the music industry. 10/10 would work with again.”
Working In The Film Industry Can Lead To Some Interesting Encounters
“I’ve had some small run-ins with semi-famous people in my days. I used to work in the film industry, and then when that failed, I worked at a certain fashionable grocery store in West Hollywood. A lot of brief encounters.
Faye Dunnaway threw a temper tantrum because she was asked to show ID. Like full on, ‘Do you know who I am?’
I saw a very bearded and miserable looking Craig Kilborn. This was around 2009.
The principal from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off used to come in and buy Grant’s drink, and that was about it. If you are familiar with his particular flavor of legal issues, you wouldn’t be surprised to know that he looked like an absolute nightmare. Great on Deadwood though.
Laurence Fishbourne is intimidating but seemed pretty nice.
I had to listen to a conversation between this idiot producer I was working for and Sumner Redstone. It was a freaking trip. I learned that a lot of rich people are not as rich as they want you to think. I think Redstone was keeping a lot of people afloat. Hollywood people sometimes make their assistants take notes on all their conversations, in case you are wondering.
I packed a lavender plant for Suzanne Summers once, and I got to look through Sidney Poitier’s iPod. No interaction, but it was amusing.
I transferred a call from Judge Judy to my boss. She didn’t seem all that friendly.
The lead singer from System of a Down was really nice. Shook my hand and asked me my name. Not sure why he asked me my name especially because I was wearing a name tag, but hey, at least he wasn’t a jerk.
I had to read a treatment written by Gerald Butler. Dude wrote in all caps for some reason and his spelling and grammar were not impressive.
F. Gary Gray was nice to people in the office, but I didn’t meet him.
The music video director Dave Meyers was annoying, but not a bad guy. He asked me why I was so good at slicing tomatoes (this production house had free bagels and lox in the morning) and asked if I was Italian. It seemed a little condescending, but I gave him the benefit of the doubt.
I worked on a Miley Cyrus music video but had no interaction with her, though people said she was a terror.
I gave this actor, Tony Curran, a ride from the airport to his hotel, then the hotel to set. But unfortunately, I got lost and he got angry, not so much at me since he knew I was not getting paid, but he was livid. This was back when MapQuest directions were still a thing.”