HAVING SOME COFFEE AT BARNEY'S
I met Johnny Depp at Barney’s Beanery in Hollywood in 1993. It was about 10:30 am, and I was having coffee and – of all things – chili, because Barney’s Chili is so damn good. There were 2 other people in the restaurant besides me, and the waiter had been chatting me up a bit and had gone to the coffee station to refill my cup when Johnny Depp WALKED IN to Barney’s, and sat about twenty feet from me. He sat in a booth against the windows facing Santa Monica blvd. As he was getting settled, my waiter came back to my table when I exclaimed as quietly as I could “IS THAT…?” and the waiter told me it was [Johnny Depp], and that he comes in pretty often for coffee. I was obviously very considerably star-struck. The waiter laughed at me in something of a “tourist” laugh, and walked to the table Johnny was sitting at and filled his coffee cup. I couldn’t take my eyes off of him. They were exchanging pleasantries, chatting, when I saw Johnny lean forward in his booth from behind the waiter to get a look at me! Apparently, the waiter had said something about the star-struck idiot with the red lipstick and red hair and he wanted a look at her. His eyes met my maniacal stare, and he smiled a broad, closed-mouth smile, and gave me one of those quick head nods of acknowledgement, then leaned back into his booth seat again. I could have died right then. So what if he thought I was an idiot. It was JOHNNY DEPP. I was sharing the same air with him! The waiter left the table, and there was no longer anything at all between me and Johnny Depp; I did everything I could to NOT try and stare at him, but my efforts were proving futile. I couldn’t help myself. I sat there in front of a half-eaten bowl of greasy chili and a cup of coffee that I could no longer hold due to the shaking of my hands, just completely lost in the notion that I was sitting so close to someone I had been in complete admiration of for years and years. This stalker-maniac behavior of mine continued for probably 10 minutes when he got up, and started to walk towards my table. I tried everything I could to not look at him, trying to convince myself that the bathrooms must be at the end of the wall behind me, and he was heading there, completely oblivious to little old me sitting there, bursting at the seams. He wasn’t going to the bathroom. He stopped at my table, and my heart was pounding so hard I found it almost impossible to hear him over the deafening sound of heartbeats, but I did hear him. He said “Hey. I’m John. The waiter said you might want an autograph or maybe a picture.” To which I can’t recall my response. Maybe it wasn’t audible. I remember mumbling something, rummaging around in my purse for something to write on, and Johnny saying “this’ll work!” and picking up the napkin that was laying on my table – complete with a coffee ring-stain from my coffee cup, and – here’s the clencher – a huge, red, lipblot from when I’d finished eating my chili and reapplied my hooker-red lipstick (before he came in the restaurant). He then said “You got a pen?” and I remember saying “Oh! Yes!” and digging frantically through my purse again, when Johnny Depp ACTUALLY SAID TO ME ”You got a great set of lips!”, presumably referring to the huge lip blot on the napkin he was holding. As he said those words that are forever burned into my frontal lobe, I was retrieving the pen from inside the bottom of my purse, and replied, like a complete idiot, ”What? These old things?”, to which he gave a polite giggle, as I handed him my pen. He asked me what my name was, and I can only surmise that it came out in complete jibberish, because my name ended up NOWHERE on the napkin, but the inscription he wrote made the fact that my name wasn’t on it completely alright. It read: ”What a great pucker! Johnny Depp xoxoxoxox” I thanked him profusely, he tapped my table with his right hand while telling me I was very welcome, and turned to leave. He walked back to his booth, reached into the pocket of his Levi’s and left a few dollars on the table, turned to me while putting on his shades, waved and said “Bye”, and left. The waiter had apparently watched the entire exchange; he rushed to my table like a teenaged girl and wanted to know what he had said to me and wanted to read the autographed napkin. He said if I’d have had a camera, he’d have gladly taken a picture of the two of us for me, and that’s when it hit me: all that time I spent rummaging through my purse, it never occurred to me to RETRIEVE THE CAMERA THAT WAS IN MY PURSE. It’s okay though. That was thirteen years ago, but the memory of that event has not faded in the least. It might just be my most favorite memory of all time. By Melissa << Back to Fan Encounters |