Sarah Michelle Gellar

Note: Five members of our community attended the UK premiere of Scooby Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed on March 26, 2004.

PRE-PREMIERE:

Okay, so here goes. When we were talking about the premiere afterwards, we quickly realised that despite the fact we were all standing so close together...as in we could feel-each-other-shaking-close...we all had very different memories. We were looking in different directions and we all saw slightly different things. Sonia didn’t manage to get any photos post-Tony because her camera battery ran out but Jo did get some and Leigh managed to videotape quite a lot.

We all met in Leicester Square at 11:15am. We were: Jo, Leigh, Sonia, Agnes and her friend. The Warner Village in Leicester Square had the big SD2 posters up and at first we kinda wished the premiere was going to be there. We got over that later though and looking back, we’re so glad it wasn’t there lol. So then we headed for Islington where the premiere was going to be. The nearest underground station being “Angel”: we were willing to take that as a very positive sign at the time.

So we tracked down the shopping area where the Warner Village was located. Can we just say now that it was probably the worst place on earth they could have picked when you’re a fan and trying to figure out where to stand; where the press would be; where we’d be likely to get a good view etc. There are two levels (the cinema on the upper one) and on the lower level it’s an open area with a slope at one side leading down to the shops, and stairs at the other.

The area is triangular and filters down to the escalator that goes up to the cinema. It then became obvious that they were going to barricade off BOTH sides leading towards the escalator, so at some point we were going to have to make a choice about which side to pick. [Later, Leigh psychically predicted a good spot for us after asking one of the men who were putting up the barriers because we were told that the celebrities were going to come down the stairs onto the green carpet]. Anyway, it was around 11.30am. Nobody was around. There were some workmen just starting to carry random stuff around that was obviously connected to the premiere. But unless you knew that’s where it was going to be, you wouldn’t have guessed at that time. We went up the escalator to the cinema-level and sat on the bench at the top. Then Sonia gave out the t-shirts (which were amazing by the way) and we decided we may as well be sad and just put them on. I mean...we didn’t know anyone in that area and we’d never see them again anyway. We sat on a bench and were just looking around and filling in our personal messages on the thank-you card Jo had bought previously. Were just generally hanging around, talking and making jokes. Sonia noticed a “Yo! Sushi” restaurant right next to the cinema on the same level as the sushi bar and predicted that "Sarah would so go there to eat". We still don’t know if that was true or not.

There were various people with SD2 passes on and they kept going past. We’d been there a while (and were already freezing by the way. It was very cold in London on Friday). Then at some point this woman (who later turned out to be the main organiser of the event) came up to us and asked why we were there. So we told her and she loved our shirts - apparently they were very loveable... and then she said something about having to make sure we were in a good spot where the T.V. cameras would be able to pick us up for Newsround (a kids news show here). She told us not to move and that she’d be back. We did wait for a while but we were hungry and not all that keen on the whole idea, so we eventually went off. We saw the woman a couple of times later but realised she was in panic mode by that time running around trying to sort stuff out. So we went for a wander and on the lower level below and to the side of the cinema... leading to a small car park/exit area, they were starting to put up stuff which quickly became clear was connected to the premiere. We psyched ourselves up and went over to talk to one of the guys. Sonia asked him if that was where the after-premiere party was and he said "yes". Then he was chatting and joking about letting us in etc. He was a nice guy, but that little alleyway was a wind tunnel so we couldn’t stand there for long and not require medical attention for hypothermia. We needed it later really, but other stuff was grabbing our attention by then.

At some point before we left, these random two girls (autograph hounds) came over to us asking if we were here for the premiere and if we knew who’d be there and who we were there to see. Those are perfectly fine questions, but they’d been wandering around and walking past us repeatedly for around an hour and we decided we didn’t want to hang out with them for the whole looong day so we went downstairs to try to lose them. Apparently they go to every premiere in Leicester Square and had been confused about the location for this one, and were still recovering because they didn’t get Orlando Bloom’s autograph on one of the 3 times they’ve seen him. So yeah, big Sarah and Scooby fans! There were a couple of other people hanging around who were, well, interesting characters to see the least. We went into the actual cinema and we were acting pretty shadily. We went up to the second cinema level and they had loads of Scooby stuff all over the place. HUGE posters, smaller posters. We were going to ask for some, and to be honest I’m sure nobody would have cared... but we already had enough to carry so in hindsight it was good we didn’t. Things got too chaotic later as it was.

The rain kept blowing through really lightly and we were all “Argghhh. If it’s raining they won’t stop for long,” and all that stuff. Thankfully it didn’t ever come on properly. So we were standing around chatting, wishing time would speed up. At some point, the barriers were brought down to the lower level. We’d decided for various reasons that the upper level would be for TV/media/press/photographers probably, and could even be blocked off from the view of the rest of the upper level. So we decided to wait downstairs. When they brought down the barriers, things started getting stressful. The people who’d also been hanging around started standing by places where the barriers would go to make sure they got those positions. So now came the time for us to choose which side to go for. It wasn’t a decision we all wanted to make, so Leigh went and asked the head barrier guy with the walkie talkie which side the cast would be coming down. He said (apparently very convincingly... so she believed him) that the cast would be coming down the stairs. Leigh eventually convinced us that we should stand on the side the guy said they’d be coming down. If he’d been wrong; Leigh wouldn’t have been very popular. We decided to stand in the middle since it would have been easy for the cast to walk past the people at the start as they got their bearings, and sometimes at premieres people are in a rush by the time they get to the end and so don’t have time. So we thought... middle. We had a few heart attacks when all the TV crew guys would occasionally stand right in front of where we were standing but after eavesdropping on a number of their conversations and others, we found out that they’d be setting up right opposite us, across the green carpet.

After that point, the side we were on really started filling up, and we all started to get a little restless. It was only mid-afternoon by the way...around 2-3pm. They were continuing to put up barriers, posters and all that jazz. By this time, it was obvious that people were waiting for something, but not what. And since we were near a gate to allow shoppers to still be able to move around, we were asked at least 20 times what was going on. “What are people waiting for?” “There’s a premiere.” “Oh... what for?” They were even asking that when the SD2 posters were up everywhere. It was like... “OPEN YOUR EYES.” But yeah... we’d been there for hours.

Joking around about what we should tell them kept us occupied for a while. At around this time, Geraldine (eleagold) arrived and finally Agnes was able to talk to someone who didn’t have a weird accent. Cut to Geraldine’s PoV

I arrived later than the others because I had classes until 11am on Friday morning, so I arrived in London at around 3pm. Then I had to go to the hotel to leave my bags which took me 40 min and it took me another 15 min to walk to where the premiere was. I met Agnes, Jo, Leigh, polo, Isie and her friend there around 4pm which left me a whole 3 hours to wait in the cold...but it was so worth it...

Normal narration

Not much happened for the next couple of hours. More people and press arrived. The press were standing right in front of us. So again... we began to wonder if we were in the right place. It was really too late to do anything by this point since people were hanging around all along the barriers. They brought in an INCREDIBLY fake looking Mystery Machine, but it made us laugh for many reasons so it was a good thing. It was (eventually) positioned diagonally opposite us... and we knew that as long as the photographers didn’t stand right in front of us, we’d get a pretty decent view of things. The photographers were sitting around and people were asking them who’d be coming to the premiere, and it became clear that they were all there to photograph Sarah. The phrase, “Why do you think we’re all here?” was uttered more than once. So at some point they eventually ushered the photographers over to a spot directly opposite us... and we were THRILLED about that. It was pretty clear everyone would have to walk right in front of us. But again, we got slightly agitated when the woman who was handing out press passes decided to move her table to the spot RIGHT in front of us. We were all, “Please tell us you’ll be moving. We’ve been here for [insert # of hours] hours.” Anyway, she said she was pretty sure they’d be moving. I think we’d have jumped the barrier and moved her stupid table if she hadn’t. But she did... hehe.

So the crowds were still building. We had some problems with this group of guys. The security guy kept saying that our side of the barrier wasn’t his responsibility. Gee, thanks. He was a nice guy, but this group was pushing, shoving, swearing and really causing a couple of our members some major problems. Eventually, the security guy was persuaded to send for a woman in a more senior position and she got the police over. They were removed. It’s just as well too because none of us would have wanted Sarah anywhere near us if they’d still been there. They undoubtedly would have been shouting at her and doing even more pushing and shoving. One woman with a really tiny girl (around 3 years old) left because they were becoming so unpleasant. Ugh... idiots.

At about 6:45pm when ‘celebrities’ started arriving we decided to take off our coats and bare our t-shirts to the world. We really stood out not only because of our t-shirts but also because of the fact we were in t-shirts and everyone else was wrapped up warmly in coats, hats and scarves. No joke - that’s dedication people!! By 7pm we were sooo cold - and shaking from nerves and the cold combined. Earlier in the day we’d had a chat about what we thought Sarah would be wearing. We all picked different colours and I think we unanimously agreed she’d be wearing trousers or ‘the’ jeans and probably a jacket of some description over the top. Just so cold. Jo and Leigh every so often had to stretch out their arms to release their arm muscles from cramps from holding video camera/posters etc. We constantly had to move to keep from freezing into a fixed position.

So people started arriving. Leigh only had one battery on her video camera so she’d decided to wait until Sarah arrived to start filming. Unlike what happened to Sonia’s camera, we did not need the video camera running out as well when Sarah had just arrived or something. A bunch of non-celebs were going past... including the Cheeky Girls, Jodie Marsh...

Cut to Geraldine’s PoV

The stars actually started to arrive around 7pm and not being from the UK, let me tell you I didn’t recognise most of them and had to ask who they were. People started screaming their names to get their attention and some of them stopped to sign autographs. There were also a lot of non-famous people going to the premiere and lots of kids. By the way, can you imagine some 8 year-old with high heels on? So weird...

Normal narration

We were all saving our screams for the people who counted. So then, once the Eastenders and Hollyoaks cast members had gone through and all the other non-interesting people, Leigh decided to completely break her “I’m not using the camera until Sarah arrives,” plan because she looked around and saw TONY (Anthony Stewart Head - Giles on Buffy). Leigh pointed out to us that it was indeed him with his 2 daughters as she has a slight height advantage working for her with Sonia running closely behind. We were soooo happy to see him!

So everyone was ushered in front of the Mystery Machine to have their pictures taken by the press. So he went and did that. Then he came over towards the fans (he had passed us already by this point but was going back and forward). We shouted his name a couple of time. Soon after Tony left our area we saw Raja Gosnell and were shouting his name. NOBODY else on our line knew who Raja was (and at GettyImages.com they’ve put “Raji”) so there was no one except for us shouting for him. He is awesome. We only had to shout “Raaaajjaaaa!” twice because he turned around and waved and he got his camera out (from somewhere) and took a picture of us!! Sonia wants that to be on the DVD- you never know he might do a featurette of “the fans”! Leigh just missed getting this on camera because she’d stopped filming since Tony was blocked by photographers... So Tony was signing to our left (the stars came in from our right) and I didn’t know where to look because Sarah could have arrived at any minute...

Cut to Sonia’s PoV

At around 7:25pm, flashes were going off at the top of the staircase and a massive crowd of black coats etc. ensued. Jo then spotted Sarah at the top of the staircase. I watched Sarah descend the staircase as if in slow motion as flash after flash of camera flashes found her and the fans and everyone in the area went absolutely crazy. I watched her be welcomed by fans at the end of our row. What I’m about to describe is my defining moment of the whole day. I was in front of Jo and leaning on the barrier because I stepped on my bag to be higher up and without thinking I took the pink neon sign that Jo and I were both holding and held it much further outwards and upwards and as Jo and I were screaming “SARAH!” Sarah looked up and pointed at the sign- a gesture of acknowledgment. She took a moment to read it and then laughed with her hand on her chest. She then gesticulated as if she was saying “I’ll be there in a minute”. And she was. She signed some autographs on her way over, and what happened when she reached us is a complete and utter blur. Leigh videoed it all thank god because I don’t know the order of our Sarah presence.

Cut to Jo’s PoV

So she made her way over to us (stopping a couple of times on the way). When she reached us she first of all signed our signs. People were pushing and shoving and going crazy.

I had a thank-you card for her that we all wrote in (I also put “Thank You from the SMGfan.com community” as well) and when she was right in front of me I froze and was thinking that I had to give it to her. I had to speak to her. She was about to sign for Leigh when I called her name and this is how the conversation went:

Me: Sarah (Sarah looks up) this is a thank-you card from everyone at SMGFAN.COM to say thank-you for everything

Sarah: Aww thank-you that means so much to me [at that point my knees gave out and I fell against the barrier Sarah has a powerful smile]. Where do you want me to sign (your shirt)? I am only gonna put SMG ‘cause it won’t work. Is that okay?

Me: You can do do whatever you want.

Then Sarah laughed.

When she leaned over to sign my shirt I remember thinking, "she smells so nice."

So then she also initialled Sonia’s and Leigh’s shirts. At that point she was led away to go and have her picture taken by the press (she’d walked past that area in her efforts to sign for fans and so really had to go back).

Cut to Agnes’ PoV

I had the opportunity to see Sarah, but she didn’t quite make it to me. She is a goddess...tiny and amazing. I totally loved her dress. Hopefully she knows that she has a big fan in France. She was smiling so much. She is B-E-A-U-T-I-F-U-L.

Cut to Geraldine’s PoV

Sarah didn’t make it to me either unfortunately. I was kinda surprised because I was expecting her to be very, very small and she was actually taller than I thought. Well she had huge heels on but still... I think she was so nice to spend so much time signing pictures and she was smiling all the time. If she’s afraid of crowds and premiere, she certainly doesn’t show it ! ! !

Cut to Leigh’s PoV

It was just as she was being led away after signing our shirts and was walking towards the Mystery Machine that the cutest moment of the whole night happened. Cue me saying, “that is soooooo cute,” over and over again. Tony Head had gone past with his daughters, and I’m guessing that when they heard all of the screaming etc they decided to go back and greet Sarah (and probably Seth once they saw he was there too). So anyway, she just started walking towards the photo point and she recognised one of Tony’s daughters who was right in her line of sight. So she totally freaked out, put her arms out and they grabbed each other in a really tight hug, and were doing that rocking back and forth thing. Then Sarah and Tony’s other daughter hugged really tightly too. They seemed to genuinely be delighted to be seeing each other. We’ve heard Tony say his daughters love her, and I got the definite impression that the feeling is pretty much mutual. Lucky things. Anyway, Tony was right there talking to Seth while Sarah was hugging his daughters. It was a mini-Buffy reunion. So then Sarah and Tony hugged and both had the BIGGEST smiles on their faces. You could just see how thrilled they were to see each other. So they were hugging and kissing each other on the cheek and Sarah was saying something really excitedly and he was nodding, and she had a hold of his arm and was rubbing her hand up and down his forearm...and then she reached up, grabbed his face with both hands and they both leaned in as she said something...and I swear they rubbed noses. I was dying...hehehe. Then Seth got Sarah, Tony and his daughters to pose for a pic. I was in a happy bubble at that moment. There was nothing staged about it, nothing faked, no acting involved. They were all just thrilled to see each other and it really shone through.

Cut back to normal narration

So then Sarah went over to the photographers, and there were just so many people around that we didn’t have a clear view. So then Tony started walking past us again... and we all shouted his name. So he eventually made his way over to us at some point. I think he went to some other people and worked his way towards us. And then he got to us and he signed Sonia’s shirt and then Leigh’s shirt. He wasn’t too happy about signing them though because he claimed, “it never works.” The friend that Agnes had come over from France with had managed to get her Tony’s autograph the first time he’d walked past us so she didn’t need to beg him as he walked past this time.

So at some point round about now, Sarah was getting her pic taken with the rest of the cast. Matt and Linda had seemingly appeared out of nowhere a little bit earlier. But we were looking elsewhere so that might have had something to do with it. Then the photographers wanted her on her own. And you can see on the wireimage pics she did this thing where she scrunched herself up... obviously telling them she was cold... aww. But yeah... we didn’t have a great view so we were looking up and then looking around. So then Sarah walked back past us and she was given a shawl that she put around herself and some of the journalists in the press pen across from us were asking her questions as she went past. At this point another “Sarah! Sarah!” chant broke out, but again there were just loads of people around within the celeb area. Then she went to the fans at the other side who were in the small area on that side where she could still get to them (the press were blocking the rest). People were just going crazy. At this point Seth seemed to appear right beside us!

Cut to Sonia’s PoV

I asked Seth to sign my t-shirt as I was getting quite good at that- first with Sarah and then Tony and now Seth. But he was told to go and do a group photo with Linda, Matt & Sarah over at the van. But right before he went he said “I’ll be right back” and he did- he came back to me and he signed my t-shirt! I said to him, whilst he was signing me, “I miss Oz” and he said “sorry what’d you say?” so I said it again (this time with the correct tense lol) “I missed Oz why didn’t he come back?” and he laughed and said “aww thankyou” and then Jo said “you rule dude!” and he laughed at that and said “thanks” again. Then he moved onto Leigh and she asked him to sign her shirt and he said to me “I need a pen. Can I borrow your pen for a sec?” He’s such a sweetheart - so adorable! I think he came back again afterwards for a 3rd time and signed Jo’s sign.

After Seth left you could easily see Sarah because of the spotlight of camera flashes from every direction. It was amazing to watch all that light.

Cut to Agnes’ PoV

Then Seth Green came over to where I was, and he is just really cool. He signed the t-shirt which had been made for me by Sonia. I’ll never wash it! And my friend got another autograph from him. He signed a lot for the fans. I also saw Linda Cardellini at around that time. Again, my friend got an autograph for me. Believe me guys...she is beautiful!!

Cut to Jo’s PoV

Everyone started chanting Sarah’s name again. It happened around two or three times. She was laughing and smiling and seemed to be loving every minute.

Cut to normal narration

Sarah was still signing away, and was crossing from side to side. She really signed a lot of autographs for the crowds which had built up. Everyone was just going crazy for her. Eventually she got to the escalator and everyone was still shouting her name (not chanting...everyone was just trying to get her attention), and she turned around and was waving....went up the escalator and vanished. Seth was still around for a few minutes and then he went up too.

We decided to try and get some of the posters which had been put up, and which we’d been told could be taken once everyone had gone in for the premiere. We couldn’t get upstairs and then we saw a lift and ran for it. We went upstairs but then this woman sent us back down because we were in a section where you needed a ticket to be. Blah...we weren’t trying to get inside. So Chris Eubank was there, and he got in the lift with us. He was very nice. But then....the lift suddenly stopped and we were trapped. Everyone reacted differently. It was very strange. The alarms were ringing and it was very weird. So anyway, after about 10 minutes they came and opened the doors and we had to jump down...with the help of the two guys who came to get us out. Very surreal. It was even mentioned yesterday in a tabloid newspaper that Chris Eubank got stuck in a lift. No mention of the wonderful people he was stuck with though...

So then we weren’t sure what to do. Would they come back down? Would Sarah go to the after-party?

Cut to Geraldine’s PoV

Jo, Leigh and Sonia had to leave then so it was just Isie and her friend, Agnes and her friend and me... Then, someone gave Isie two tickets to the after-party because they had to leave early! ! ! ! But she had to leave too so she gave them to Agnes, her friend and me... We had no idea if they were gonna let us in ...but there were three of us and we only had two tickets so we started asking people if they had an extra ticket, spent some time speaking with some nice security guy who said if we had the ticket we should get inside easily. After about 10 minutes Agnes’ friend came back with two more tickets ! ! ! So we walked along the green carpet and went into the nightclub. We were very, very excited. We kept our bags and coats at first and went upstairs to get a feel of the place and then we went downstairs again to leave our coats in the cloakroom and on our way downstairs, in the quite dark staircase...we just passed Linda and Matthew and a whole group going upstairs...wow. Then, on our way up again, Tony was standing on a landing with his daughters...

The party was so great...great music, free ice-cream and mini hot-dogs, free drinks, a concert by Big Brovaz was announced onstage by Matthew. Great music. The second floor was actually a VIP space and I guess Linda, Tony, Matthew, Seth and maybe Sarah were all up there. But the Harry Potter stars were dancing right next to us and we basically saw all the people you all saw on the press pictures. We left around midnight because, let’s face it, we were exhausted...and we got to keep our tickets.

Cut to Agnes’ PoV

We have to thank Isie and her friend, Elise. We are just some lucky girls. It was fantastic to see Tony, Linda and Matthew Lillard introducing the band. I saw the girl who plays Hermionne in Harry Potter and the guy who play Malfoy was dancing near us. It was...magic. One of my best nights.

THE END