Celebrities I Met at Sundance: Adam Kempenaar

A good friend of mine introduced me to Cinecast, a film podcast from Chicago, back in August of 2005. My two biggest celebrity crushes (Diane Lane & John Cusack) had made their first movie together (Must Love Dogs) and the Cinecast hosts, Adam Kempenar and Sam "Soon to be Van" Hallgren, decided not to review MLD or either of the other two big movies coming out that week (Stealth and Sky High, both of which I saw in theaters, F.Y.Information). After some convincing, I decided to look past their grievous mistake of not reviewing every project Diane Lane's even remotely involved in, I started downloading each new episode as it came out. It's been five years and I still love Cinecast (which is now Filmspotting).

[This is what a hero looks like to me.]

Whitney and I were picking up our Sundance tickets from the press office when someone I didn't recognize walked up to where we were standing. He was there to talk to us but once I read the name on his press pass, I knew I had to talk to him. It was Adam Kempenaar! I asked him if he were the Adam Kempenaar which was silly because his name is "Adam Kempenaar" and he was picking up press tickets at Sundance. What are the odds that a different "Adam Kempenaar" would be attending the country's most prestigious film festival as press? STUPID, SCOTT! HOW COULD YOU BE SO STUPID?

Adam looked past my stupid question and I told him how long I'd listened to the podcast and that I was a huge fan. He said he was only sticking around for a few days and then heading back home. He was mostly there to catch a screening of A Prophet, a film I didn't get the chance to see while at Sundance. We spoke for a couple minutes and both went on our way. It was better than the time I met Bobcat Goldthwait.