Martin Landau Popped My Cherry

...my celebrity-encounter cherry, that is! Picture, if you will: a sleek, sunlit Mediterranean restaurant on a tucked-away Beverly Hills street just East of La Cienega. Walking distance to that great shop "Trashy Lingerie," but at LEAST a hundred-dollar cab ride distance in terms of "Class."

"Class" was a new concept to me. I still don't think I get it. I gawk, I cough, I crack my knuckles... especially back then. It was December 1999; I'd been in LA for 3 months and just snagged a hideous job as an Assistant Media Buyer. Basically, we represented advertisers, and we decided which TV networks to "buy time" on. So, naturally, the TV network sales reps were required to kiss our asses, shower us with promotional schwag/tchotchkes (any journalists in the house will know what I'm talking about).

They also wined-and-dined us. Which brings us back to the sleek, sunlit Mediterranean restaurant off La Cienega. The MTV ad salesman had booked us a table for 5. Me, a few other $23k-a-year grunts, and a few burned-out bosses. The salesman looked like Joey Lawrence, but he wasn't. "I get that a lot," he scoffed, with a grin that said "Buy advertising time on my network! I have a quota, dammit!"

Anyway, the dickhead ordered that nasty carbonated water for the whole table. NO, I wasn't hoping he'd pop for a bottle of Merlot. (This was just before my alcoholism flared up like Paris Hilton's herpes.) But I hate that bubbly water. Europeans, explain it to me.
On second thought - DON'T. The shit is gross, end of story. USA all the way.

The meal resembled dandelion leaves and carrot peelings ornately drizzled with KY jelly on a grossly oversized, gleaming white plate. The napkin was thicker than my "casual Friday" khakis and whiter than my ethnic roots. As I placed the napkin daintily on my khaki lap, the MTV guy leaned across the table and whispered:
"Do NOT all look at once. But that's Martin Landau by the window."

Naturally, I was the first to start whipping my head in every direction, demanding "Weer?" (I still had that Wisconsin accent, dontcha know). But wait. It gets worse. Actually, looking back - it gets better.

I finally spot the old codger dabbing the corners of his thin lips with a thick napkin.
I squint at him for way too long. Eye contact was made. And then I blurt loudly at the MTV guy, in a most accusatory tone:
"THAT's not the guy from 'Grumpy Old Men'!"
I was thinking, of course, of Walter Matthau. I STILL insist that Mr. Landau was amused by my gaffe. Because of course I kept squinting at him and all of 90212 could hear me. (Or is that WeHo, 90069? Eh, who keers.)
ANYhoo, my tablemates were not amused. But at least we got to high-tail it out of there without sipping that nasty carbonated water and talking about the Nielsen ratings "Celebrity Death Match" had scored among the 12-22-year-old male demographic in Q4 1998.

Who puts bubbles in water, anyway? It's simply uncivilized.