Apple Store: Celebs Gone Wild (Or Levar Burton's neck pulse)
Posted: 2005-02-14 10:05pm
Wired just ran a very interesting article on celebrities in Apple Stores.
Wired wrote:Stars Take a Shine to Apple
Apple has four retail stores in the Los Angeles area, which give the sales associates ample opportunity to rub elbows with Hollywood celebrities. It isn't always pleasant.
Out of respect for the celebrities' privacy, Apple forbids the stores' sales associates from talking to the press. But that hasn't stopped several staffers from sharing their celebrity anecdotes with Wired News -- stories that reveal Tinseltown's good, bad and ugly.
First, the ugly.
Melanie Griffith threw a tantrum when she was unable to buy a pink iPod mini early last year, according to the sales associate who tried to serve her.
The associate, who asked to remain anonymous, said Griffith came right up to him and "pretty much demanded" a pink iPod mini. The mini was in short supply, and the associate told her there were none in stock.
"She then proceeded to get pissed off at me personally because we didn't have any in stock," the associate said. "She said we have a special stock of iPods for people like her.... I hadn't seen any celebrities there up until then, so at first I was like, 'Oh wow, cool, Melanie Griffith.' But then she opened her mouth and used me as a doormat, and I was like, 'What the fuck is this shit? Milk Money sucked.'"
Another sales associate said he got a tongue lashing from LeVar Burton, presenter of Reading Rainbow and a member of the Star Trek crew.
The associate, who also asked to remain anonymous, said he made the mistake of asking Burton for some ID when the actor was making a big credit card purchase. The associate said he recognized Burton, but wanted to reassure him he was doing a thorough job of checking credentials.
Burton "began shouting at me to ask anyone in the store who he was, all the while telling me that he left his ID in the car and he didn't want to have to go get it," the associate said. "I finally caved in, only because I could see a vein pulsating in his forehead and I didn't want to be the one responsible for causing the blind dude from Star Trek to have a stroke."
Representatives for Griffith and Burton did not return calls asking for comment.
Some stars have let their fame go to their heads, one of the staffers said. The singer Pink, for example, isn't very popular because she shops with a posse of handlers, who demand the manager give her "special assistance."
Some are weird. Val Kilmer, star of The Doors, "looked like he was still in the role of Jim Morrison -- high, spaced out, wandering around the Grove," one of the associates said.
The sales associates said some celebrities can be unbelievably cheap.
Fred Durst, the Limp Bizkit frontman, always demands a discount, said one of the salesmen. His record company has a special 5 percent discount at the store, and Durst demands it for every purchase, including for a $20 iPod cable -- a saving of $1. Public relations representatives for Durst did not return a call asking for comment.
Another associate said trying to explain wireless networking to actor Jerry O'Connell was "quite the ordeal" because he had "no clue" what Wi-Fi was, but he was friendly and thankful.
In fact, staffers said most stars who come into stores are nice and friendly.
Andre 3000 from Outkast graciously posed for one photograph after another.
The Daily Show's Jon Stewart "finds what he wants, smiles and leaves."
Trent Reznor is "super nice" and is always buying gifts for his band.
Robin Williams took his picture on every computer with a camera attached and left the portraits open on the desktops. "That was truly great," said one of the anonymous associates.
Kiefer Sutherland "thanks you like 40 times when you're helping him," said another. (In the first season of Fox's 24, Sutherland and the other good guys used Macs, while the villains used PCs.)
Saturday Night Live's Kevin Nealon is "probably the most genial celeb who comes in on a consistent basis.... (He is) always patient and receptive," the associate added.
Apple's store at The Grove mall is particularly star-studded, thanks to nearby studios and production houses.
Regulars include Seal, who is always polite and courteous, and the Wayans brothers, Marlon and Keenan, whose production facility is in the same complex.
"They are in there all the time buying whatever is the newest and coolest thing for their entourage of iPod carriers," one associate said of the Wayans. "They rarely come in on their own, always try to talk us into getting discounts, especially Marlon, who never really knows what he's buying. He just has to be reassured that the money he is about to spend is going to keep him on the trendiest technology list."
Director Kevin Smith is also a regular, but tends to head for the Genius Bar because his wife's PowerBook is on the blink. "He rarely has anything to say, but always looks pissed off when he is forced to wait at the bar just like everyone else," said the associate.
Another frequent shopper is Fabrizio Moretti, drummer from the Strokes, and his girlfriend, movie star Drew Barrymore. The couple seem to be constantly buying new PowerBooks, one of the associates said.
"He came in once with a cast around his leg, on crutches. He was perusing the 17-inch PowerBook and asked me if I thought it was greedy of him to want that 17-inch even though he had just purchased the 15-inch PowerBook not a month earlier. I let him know that he had no reason to feel this way and that if he wanted to balance out the universe, he might want to consider giving me his 15-inch and therefore be able to buy the 17-inch with a clear conscience."
The associate said Moretti chuckled but told him he was probably going to give the month-old machine to his dad.
But it's not all glitz. Washed-up Vince Neil, the former Motley Crue singer who is getting a career makeover for VH1's Remaking, bought an iMac G4 just so the camera crew could "see something cool-looking in his shanty pad," the associate said.
Gary Allen, the leading expert on Apple's retail stores who runs ifoAppleStore, said celebrities are a daily fixture in Apple's stores because of all the shiny toys.
"(They are) attracted by the style of Apple's products and their high-tech features, and they have the money to buy the very best technology," Allen said. "Baseball players in particular seem to like visiting the stores, looking for music or games to help keep them occupied through a season that includes long road trips."
Allen said he knows of private collections of photos and videos of celebrities who have visited Apple stores, taken by store employees and passed around.
"Otherwise," he said, "celebrity stories are kept pretty quiet by the store employees. Apple's no-comment policy on celebrities seems reasonable."
