You Guys are Stars!

Thanks to everyone who answered my blog question "Who is this?"

He is, by unanimous opinion, Eion Bailey, of Band of Brothers and various and sundry other films and television programs. And, as it happens, he is appearing in the Hallmark film, Candles on Bay Street, this coming Sunday evening. Amazing. Usually I discover something I wish I had watched AFTER it's been on. But now I might actually remember it in time to see it. I hope.

He has a certain resemblance to Flynn, as I said, though I think next week's Male on Monday at The Pink Heart will continue to be my inspiration. Stop by there next week and take a look. You can stop today and take a look as well since Ally Blake has outdone herself by providing us with three (count 'em) males on Monday today!

On the comments there, I promised I would tell my Cary Grant story over here. So for Mags, who is waiting with bated breath and for anyone else who cares, here it is:

When I was in university in California one year a friend and I were planning to travel by train up the coast to San Francisco to spend several days of our spring break there. The only train then (and maybe now for all I know) left at midnight. The dorms closed at 5 pm. We got a bus into town and had 7 hours to kill. We also had suitcases, which made wandering around a little problematic.

So we went to dinner in a rather posh place (beyond our budget, but we were celebrating a week off classes) because we figured we could sit there a long time and it would be better than standing on a street corner for hours. The waiter looked askance at our suitcases, but he stowed us in a corner where we couldn't be seen or tripped over by anyone, and we had a nice meal. And we dawdled over the meal. Believe me, we dawdled. But after nearly two hours, we had to leave.

Looking around for something to do that the suitcases could do, too, we discovered that one of the local theaters was showing a double feature -- some romantic comedy I don't remember now and a "sneak preview" of who knew what. We were not enthralled. It wasn't a romantic comedy we were dying to see, and who wanted to spend hard earned money on something that they wouldn't even tell us the name of.

But the ticket seller said yes, the suitcases could come, too, and they would store them for us behind the popcorn, and with luck it would take about 3-4 hours and we would just have time to get to the station to take the train. No standing around on corners with suitcases. A place to sit. So we went in.

We watched the romantic comedy. I can't remember anything about it now except that someone who might have been David Niven or maybe wasn't David Niven but had a moustache like David Niven (it couldn't have been Peter Sellers, could it?) was in it, and there was a lot of pink. I don't remember why there was pink.

And then we had intermission and we went and visited the suitcases, and then came back and sat down again. The lights went down, and the sneak preview came up on the screen -- on the boat in the water -- and moments later on Cary Grant in Father Goose.

It was a wonderful, fun film, though as the boozing irascisble Walter, Cary Grant was hardly the quintessential Grant hero. The warmth and wit and love of a good woman, of course, won out. And Trevor Howard's exclamation when Cary Grant's character married Leslie Caron's later in the film, "What? Goody Two-Shoes and the filthy beast?" has lived in our family quotations forever. It's also a wonderful premise for a romance novel.

We were delighted. It was a great way to spend the last two hours before we dragged our suitcases down to the station and then got to spend all night on the train. When the lights came up we were grinning and refreshed, feeling cheerful now, and that our money had been well spent.

We stood up and turned to leave -- and sitting in the seat right behind us was Cary Grant!

Not just Cary Grant, of course. They were all there in the row behind us -- Leslie Caron and Trevor Howard (I think he was there) and probably the director and lots of bigwigs and even a couple of the French schoolgirls from the story.

But who noticed? Who looked at anyone besides Cary Grant who was tan and drop-dead gorgeous (I still understand the meaning of the term from that moment), absolutely stunning, and resplendent in a cream colored suit (he wore them to much better advantage than Mark Twain or than Robert Preston in The Music Man)?

We stared. We couldn't help it. We tried not to, of course. It wasn't polite. Our mothers had brought us up right (well, sort of). But if our eyes were out on stalks and our necks on a swivel, trying to just look and look and look, well, we weren't the only ones. He got up and walked out. So did everyone else. So did we -- looking. And looking.

There were limos outside to collect them and take them somewhere. We tried to stand around and look casual as we watched (not staring. Oh, no. Not us). They shook hands and chatted with people (no, not us. We'd have been too tongue-tied anyway) and finally they all got in the limos and were whisked away. We stood there stunned on the sidewalk and watched them go, and numbly began to make our way in the other direction.

We got maybe half a block when we heard a voice yelling after us, "Hey! Girls! Don't forget your suitcases!"

By the way, Turner Movie Channel is showing it Wednesday, November 29th in case you don't already have the DVD.