Way back in January 2004 I began thinking of what I could buy my friend Laura for her birthday. I came up with the crazy idea of trying to get us tickets for the London Premiere of the Prisoner of Azkaban. As I came up against numerous brick walls, we decided to go stand on the red carpet instead.
Since we had never been to a premiere before we had no idea what to expect. We imagined the actors would get out of the cars, wave and enter the cinema. We debated whether to make a ludicrously large banner to attract Alan’s attention, in case he thought he was going to walk on by us without stopping. Little did we realise that he was a true gentleman dedicated to his fans and had no intention of ignoring us, banner or not.
We had gone all the way to London and didn’t even know if Alan was going to be there. By 5pm, when most of the actors had arrived, I was getting a little nervous in case he wasn’t going to attend.
Then, on the giant screens they had erected at the entrance to Leicester Square itself, I saw Alan getting out of the car and heading straight for the fans. Gradually he made his way around the square. I was surprised to see him do this. I had watched Robbie Coltrane, Gary Oldman, Chris Rankin, Tom Felton and JK Rowling to name a few, sign some autographs as they got out of their cars and head for the press. Alan seemed to distinctly ignore the gathering media and was more interested in meeting his fans. As he got nearer (and we got more excited!) I did noticed he seemed to be doing a very good impression of Snape, with a stony expression on his face. Making little or no eye contact, he took the notebook/book/poster/photo, squiggled his name and moved on.
As he got even closer, I wondered what I should say. My mind filled with silly things, then complex questions that he wouldn’t have time to answer, then ludicrous things that would probably have made him run away! In the end I opted to say nothing and just watch. As he got to the person next to me, someone shouted “I love you Alan!”. There was a flicker in his eye and he smiled, replying with “thank you”. Someone from behind asked if they could take his photo and would he smile. He looked up and gave us a big grin.
When he came to sign my book (to which I had reserved the front page) I handed it over and stayed silent, just looking, and it was a very good look, since he was inches away! He looked very suave in a black suit and dark navy striped shirt. He gave me back my book and I must have said thank you about three times, just to be sure. He went on to use my pen to sign a few more autographs along the line and I ended up grabbing it back from his hand. I wanted to keep it as a souvenir (to have mounted and framed on the wall as “the pen that Alan used”).
We were at the end of the square and it wasn’t long until he posed for the press outside the cinema, at one point holding out a large banner given to him by some ladies from Lynchburg, Virgina, USA and disappeared inside.
I was so impressed with his dedication to the fans that had waited all day, taking the time to see as many of us as possible. He made us one very happy crowd :)
