The Day of Acceptable Celebrity Stalking (aka the BAFTA Awards)

Today I went to the BAFTA red carpet (The British Academy of Film and Television Awards). I am still a little in shock, because today will be an experience I don't think I will ever forget.

The whole idea of even going to the BAFTA red carpet started a couple of weeks ago, when two girls from my program and I went to a movie and saw a preview for the BAFTAs. My friend and I kind of joked about going to the actual ceremony, because we thought maybe we could get tickets. I looked it up, and saw that tickets were not available to the public, but the red carpet was open for all. So we and another friend decided to go.

As we did more research, we realized that you needed a wristband to get into the red carpet area, and those were handed out at 8am on the morning of the ceremony. I knew that if this was anything like the SNL line, people would be waiting at least a night in advance. Turns out, we were right. We at first were planning on going down there after our trip to Cambridge at 10pm last night, but decided against that once the idea of sitting in the freezing cold became more real. So we compromised, and decided to get there at 5.

Us and our early morning line buddies!

After a 4:30 wake-up this morning, we taxied out there and found a decent sized, but not massive line. We were numbers 197, 98, and 99, and after seeing the amount of people smashed into the pens today, I'm glad we were so low in the cue. We managed to get right up next to the barrier!! It was a little smooshed, and there was a group of guys next to us who I'm pretty sure were just paparazzi in disguise, because they had a giant binder of posters of all the different nominees that they kept shoving over my head. They also booed Michelle Williams when her handler person ushered her away and wouldn't let her sign any more autographs. That was kind of mean.

So we waited from about 1:00 to 4:45, when the first guests started to arrive. At first it was a lot of normal looking people, but then the big names started to arrive. First up was the cast of The Help, including Viola Davis, Octavia Spencer, and Jessica Chastain. Viola Davis signed a few autographs, Octavia Spencer signed quite a lot (sadly didn't get all the way over to us) but Jessica Chastain was the sweetest! She went up and down the line, taking pictures with anyone who asked. Including me! I look horrendous (getting up at 4:30 am and being outside for half the day doesn't do wonders for the appearance) but here it is anyway:

 

So cool!! 

After that, things really picked up. It was a big change from the early afternoon when the area looked like this:

Then changed to this:

It was really cool to see all the work that goes into creating the magic. The carpet itself is pretty basic, not too plush looking and just sprayed onto the concrete. One of the workers cut out a piece for us and we split it into three pieces, so now I have my own piece of red carpet! I also was surprised as to how unglamorous the walk the stars took was. They all looked amazing (although pretty cold) but the area around was a lot of scaffolding and people walking around with walkie-talkies and orange lanyards. 

I think my favorite part of the night was getting to meet the infamous George Clooney and Brad Pitt. Both men are a little older now, but still incredibly sexy. I already had a thing for Clooney, but Brad Pitt has grown on me after tonight. His voice is very nice to listen to, during the little we talked. I said "Hi" to both of them and then just laughed. Sounds about right.

I also (only from far, far away) got to see Jon Hamm. Call me weird, but I am pretty much obsessed with him. It's probably good that he was on the other side of the carpet, other wise I think I would have jumped over the gates and into his arms. Probably wouldn't have been looked very highly upon. I saw another Mad Men star, Christina Hendricks. She is seriously so awesome. And of course Meryl Streep, the classiest lady around. So with that and about fifty other celebrities, I'd say my night was pretty successful.