Tuesday, March 06, 2007

The guy in the Vorlon suit

I'm taking a break from playing in the mud. Since this one only got one vote and will not be the 100th post, here it is now.

I think I picked a bad time for a 100th post. One of my readers will be away partying for several days. Playtah hasn't posted on her own blog for five days, and the last post sounded like she was depressed, so I hope she's okay now. I think that except for Rachel everyone who has ever read my blog is having a bad time or out of town or something this week.

But never mind about that. This post is about the guy in the Vorlon suit.

I think it was back in 2000, at a Stellar Occasions (or maybe Uncommon Con). I had this Babylon 5 poster that I got at the first Stellar Occasions. It was an old picture, not pilot old, but old enough that it had a picture of Sinclair instead of Sheridan, and Delenn's picture was bald. So I took the poster around and tried to get a lot of Babylon 5 people to sign it. The first year I got autograph's from Claudia Christian (Ivanova), Producer and Creator J. Micheal Straczynski, and Script Writer D.C. Fontana. Later I got other people to sign it: Michael O'Hare (Sinclair), Stephen Furst (Vir), Mira Furlan (Delenn), Walter Koenig (Bestor), Ed Wasser (Mr. Mordan), and Peter Doyle (Garibaldi).

So at this convention I was going to try to get autographs from Jason Carter (Marcus Cole, one of the human Rangers) and Patricia Tallaman (Lyta Alexander, the first and last telepath). And at the last minute Robin Atkins Downes (Byron, another telepath) was added to the guest list. So I'm very happy fan, walking around the convention with a poster I'm probably going to get three autographs added to.

The actors talk about some personal stuff. Jason Carter doesn't think much of the American University system. He went on about how in England you have your finals just before you get your degree. What is the nonsense about taking finals at the end of each semester. And then he read us this silly poem he wrote about grandma falling in the loo.

But mostly, they talk about behind the scenes stuff on the set. So Patricia Tallaman and Robin Atkins Downes are talking about a love scene that they filmed. It was directed by Tony Dow (Wally Cleaver from Leave it to Beaver). Apparently Robin didn't look like he was having much fun. When Patricia is on top of you naked, shouldn't you look happy? How bad do you have to be that Wally Cleaver thinks your big love scene looks boring? Robin said he was embarassed that he would get a stiffy in front of all those people. Patricia said when she's doing a love scene with someone he'd better get a stiffy.

Patricia also has stories of being a stunt-woman, which she decided she would probably have to give up since coming home with bruises would probably upset her child. Also, Patricia seems to think that she has a big butt. She doesn't really. Maybe she's just getting material ready for a comedy routine. So she's telling us about this stunt where she has to run in high-heels and jump onto the back of a truck. And the jump is okay, but not graceful since she's wearing these high-heels. So she lands on the truck with her butt in the air, and she isn't happy with it at all and wants to try it again. But the director is happy with it and doesn't want to waste time and money on a re-shoot. So she goes home and calls a friend and cries about the stunt and how big her butt is going to look on the film. And her friend is like, who cares, everyone will think it is the other actress' big butt. So then it was okay.

And I am just having a wonderful time. There's a line for the autographs, but not a huge line, and I'm going to get autographs from Patricia and Jason and Robin. And I've got my poster out and I'm about to talk to Patricia. And there's this guy sitting next to Patricia, but I don't think anything about it because there is often a volunteer sitting with the actor to help them and maybe sell pictures and stuff like that. And I put the poster on the table, and the guy asks if I want him to sign it. And I don't know who the guy is, and I don't know what to say. I don't recognize him, so maybe he's one of the writers, and I've already had a couple of writers sign the thing so that would be okay. But I don't know what to say, so I finally just blurt out something like, "Who are you?" And he picks up this name card that has Jeffery Willerth Kosh printed on it, and he waves it and says "I'm Kosh! I'm Kosh!" And I'm like, that's great, cause I'd love to have Kosh sign my poster. But I'm so embarrassed that I didn't know who he was.

So he signs my poster and Patricia signs it and I move on to another table and get Jason's autograph and Robin's autograph. Then I put the autograph stuff away and go look for some of my friends. Caught up with Melissa from the club and hung around a bit with Myrh the cat.

Melissa and I tried to get something to eat before the costume contest, which I wasn't in for a change. Myrh was the MC, and he should have been testing the microphones and such, but he was in the bar instead. Melissa said "Look, a drunk bobcat." Myrh just smiled. Not exactly drunk, just a bit mellow. Melissa said "That's what you get for drinking alcohol through a straw." Not that he has a choice about drinking through a straw with the cat makeup on. So Myrh went to get ready for the contest, and Melissa and I finally gave up on the idea of being served food within a reasonable amount of time and went to find seats to watch the contest.

I don't remember much about the contest, except that Myrh missed some cue from Skippy the Klingon. But, Skippy didn't get mad or anything. Then we all went back to the bar and tried to get something to eat again. Jason had a few drinks and probably said a few words about how Americans couldn't properly play pool or darts or anything else that one does at a bar. I heard that he had a few more poems, about worse things than grandma in the loo, but I didn't hang around to listen to them. Myrh went off to talk to some other people, which left four empty seats at our table.

Some guy that I didn't know at the time came in with his wife and asked if they could sit at the four empty seats, and we said sure, no problem. So he waves at someone at the door to come in.

And the person at the door is Jeff Willerth, Kosh, the guy in the Vorlon suit.

So Jeff sits in the chair next to me and apologizes for being late and missing the costume contest. He said that someone took him and his wife to a Japanese restaurant, and that they drove a long way to get there. He said maybe the restaurant was in Iowa. Now, if he'd said Oklahoma, I might have thought he was serious, so I'm glad he didn't say that cause I was embarrassed enough already. So the other guy asks if his wife is coming, and Jeff doesn't think so, because she had too much sake.

A bit later, Patricia comes in with this man, and says "Gimme the keys, gimme the keys," or something like that. (I would see this several more times that weekend, and I'm not sure if it was the same man each time or not.) So that was odd, but Jeff gave her the keys and she left with this man.

The five of us talk for hours. Jeff offers to buy me a drink, but I don't drink alcohol, and I didn't think that I should have any more caffeine, so I just kept drinking water. Then the guys are teasing me about how drinking too much water can hurt you. Then he was telling us something about some of the people who worked on the show. The other guy was talking about a Deep Space Nine script that he sold, but was never filmed because he missed some deadline. And then we were talking about Bruce Boxleitner working on some things with his wife Melissa Gilbert, and I said I'd seen them on Touched by an Angel, and I think that they used some video of the Babylon 5 Christmas party.

We finally had to leave. Being at a bar isn't something that I do very often, much less stay til closing. Melissa went home. The other guy and his wife went up to their room. I left Jeff talking to some fans and went to make an appearance at a couple of parties. I ran into Jeff again, just as I was leaving and he was going up to his room. I think that was a little bit after three in the morning.

So while it isn't exactly what it sounded like, the next day I had this to say: I spent most of the night with the guy in the Vorlon suit, I had more to drink than anyone else at the table, and we closed the bar.

8 comments:

Rachel said...

I am not very well versed about sci-fi shows so I don't know who most of these people are.
I do understand being excited about meeting people that you are a fan of so it was a great story.
Sometimes Playtah gets blogger block so even if she isn't writing she is reading.
I just sent her an email to make sure that she is still alive.

laughing said...

It was a lot of fun. I'll probably post some pictures of these guy tomorrow.

I see that Playtah posted something today. I hope she doesn't know anyone from that place. That would make a person depressed.

Anonymous said...

cool beans. I will have to read it tonight. I was such a fan of Babylon 5. I was a couple of years too late, but a fan nonetheless.

Anonymous said...

Also, if you are a telepath, and you work at it, nobody has to know you have a big butt.

Yeah, I am traveling. Not partying though.

Anonymous said...

Woo! I'm back :) Great post, and great story! Did you and Kosh ever talk about the "Who are you" incident, or did that subject not come up once you got to talking? Sounds like a fun time, either way!

laughing said...

Actually, Jeff does something called Babylon Park(that's a sci-fi comedy thing with everyone changed into a South Park type character), and he talked about that a lot when he was scheduled to speak. And he talked about Patricia and her baby, and how he didn't really get to know Patricia until near the end of the series.

At the bar he spent a lot of time talking about someone the other guy knew. Neither of them thought highly of her.

He was just so nice to try to include me in everything. I thought he wouldn't like me cause at first I didn't know who he was, but I don't think he even mentioned it. Maybe he did kid around about it a bit, but if he did it wasn't anything mean and I don't remember it. But when I first saw him walk to the table, I just wanted to crawl under it or something.

Anonymous said...

When I was a major B5 fan, I went onto the web to find what was there. I kept finding things like Londo and G'Kar Southpark characters on broken pages. These must have been taken from Babylon Park.

I'd really guess that Jeff did not care and does not mind at all that he is not recognized because he must realize that it's not like his face appeared on the show or something. I also have to admit myself that his name was not one of the names I knew from the show, and I knew most of the actor names.

I'll have to comment on the Shat Chat now.

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