Tuesday, October 30, 2007

FBO: 'Hepburn, Family Banned.. Until Apology Made to State of Oklahoma'


"I think most of the people involved in any art always secretly wonder whether they are really there because they're good -- or because they're lucky."
-- Katharine Hepburn

--> Tssk! --> Hypocrisy!! -->Bullcrap!!!

THROW OUT your DVD copy of The Philadelphia Story, Guess Who's Coming to Dinner? and On Golden Pond. Do it now.

Actress Katharine Hepburn (who died in 2003 at 96) hated Oklahoma and Oklahoma failed bands with a schoolgirls' foot-stomping passion, as testified in The New York Times today. A story on notes from her largely failed career in theater included this chestnut:

"If I ever found an Oklahoma car in Connecticut, I would flatten all the tires."

Why? Because driving from Tulsa to Wichita she was pulled over for speeding (which is against the law). A celebrity all her life -- and rich before that -- Hepburn apparently believes she has different rules than anyone else. The police officer involved was called a "moron" to a judge in Blackwell, Oklahoma.

I've been pulled over a few times in Oklahoma. Once was on a drive through the panhandle to New Mexico. I was driving maybe 70 in a 55. The officer was looking at my driver's license when his walkie talkie belted out 'there's a hound lose near the Wilson's.' He politely excused himself, asked me to slow down and let me go.

Kath was fine to protest her ticket (and arrest) if she felt she was justified. But to lash out at Oklahomans -- say a Dust Bowl emigre searching for work -- for her indiscretion is like the FBO BANNING ALL KATHARINE HEPBURN FAMILY MEMBERS FROM USING THIS SITE.

And, in the spirit of the day, the FBO BANS ALL KATHARINE KEPBURN FAMILY MEMBERS FROM USING THIS SITE.

FBO Admin
Mobile/Semi-Permanent HQ -- Brooklyn, NY

4 comments:

Burro Hall said...

One of my very first jobs involved spending three weeks annoying Katherine Hepburn. True story. I was a fact-checker at Spy Magazine in 1990, and someone had written an article about celebrities' outgoing answering machine messages. The only way, really, to fact check this was to just call them all and listen. Here's what I can tell you about Kate Hepburn: she never left the house, and her machine was not set to pick up in fewer than 12 rings. Five, six times a day I'd call. All hours. I imagined her living in a 6,000 square foot penthouse with only one phone. After about 10 rings, her 83-year-old butt would finally make it over there, and I hear that theatrical, increasingly impatient, "Hel-LO!"

Sigh. Click. This was in the days before caller ID and *69.

After about three weeks of this, deadline was looming, and I finally lost my patience with her (yeah, I was harassing her in her own home, but still) and shouted, "Don't you ever go out?! You won four oscars - surely you have friends? What are you, Greta fucking Garbo!" and slammed down the phone. We cut her from the article.

We will uphold the ban.

Robert Reid said...

Goodness. I'm not even sure if we can accept an apology.

Anonymous said...

I feel the same way about the panhandle and for similar reasons (thus my refusal to play or ever step foot in Guymon ever again). Is Blackwell near the panhandle? I doubt it. If it was they would have searched her car for drugs.

Anonymous said...

I just think it's cool that she called the cop a moron and didn't get shot.