Two years ago today, on July 16, 2016, I met Boba Fett actors Daniel Logan and Jeremy Bulloch in London. Boba Fett is my favorite character in Star Wars, and I had always wanted to meet the actors who played him. I couldn’t begin to tell you how excited I was when I got the chance to take this picture and how proud I was after.
I actually had seen Jeremy Bulloch once before. I saw him in Trondheim, Norway, back in 2006. I was only in the same room as him then, but did not speak with him.
When I attended Celebration in London I had never met Daniel Logan and it had been over a decade since I last saw Bulloch. I was almost giddy.
I don’t recall much from the photoshoot itself, but I remember every sensation leading up to it. I remember the faces of all the strangers in the queue with me. The young woman in the insanely cool casual Sabine cosplay. The boy with the green backpack. The guy in the full ESB armor. I remember the smell of the concrete hall. I remember the noise, the lights, the shadows. And most of all I remember the butterflies in my stomach.
These kinds of photoshoots are quick. You go in, the photographer yells “Aaand smile! *click* Thank you — next!”, and you go out. Most of the celebrities doing these, also does autographs. And at the autograph stand they will talk a bit with you. Maybe not a long conversation, but most of them will take some time to say a few words.
I got my photo signed the next day.
I remember that the autograph hall. We lined up in a hallway made from barriers like you find in airports. At the end, a long table was set up, and behind it and on each side, a tall, black curtain. There was an entrance behind the curtain for the actors, and the tables separated them from the fans.
Two huge, muscular guards was there that day. When Daniel Logan came out from behind the curtain, he jumped over the table, and came down the line, dealing out high-fives and greetings along the way. I’ve never seen guards so stressed out before. Both of them just looked at each other, with all of the color in their face just gone. But everything went fine, Logan jumped back to “his” side of the table, and started signing.
When it was my turn, he talked a bit, I stuttered some sounds that could be construed as words, and he signed the photo. He asked me if that was all. I wanted to tell him how much I admired his devotion to the character, but what I said was “ja” — yes in Norwegian. He looked confused. I nodded, smiled and picked up my photo. He smiled back and said “take care” as I was leaving.
Something similar happened with Bulloch. He asked me how I was doing, I pointed at the picture and said the word “bowtie” in my heavy Norwegian accent, and he said something about him being prepared if anyone needed a waiter, and then he signed the photo. I just nodded and said “thank you”.
Even though it didn’t play out exactly as I had imagined it, it was a wonderful experience. I smiled from ear to ear.
Today the picture hangs in a pretty frame up on the wall, and I can look at it whenever I want, and remember that time when I went full fanboy and suddenly forgot how to form words 😀