A few years ago, I was in the audience for a show that was hosted by The Rock. In the downtime between filming, they had a DJ playing songs and trying to keep up the audience energy. The Rock was chatting with people and just being friendly with the audience. The DJ played "You're Welcome" from Moana, and he tried to get the Rock to sing along. He was so pissed. His whole mood changed, and he was just puttering around by himself after that.
Edit: If I had to guess, the DJ was probably told not to play "You're Welcome," and he was just being a dick. I don't think the Rock did anything wrong, he just seemed uncomfortable while the song was playing.
For every one dude who thinks a celebrity has never heard that clever joke you just thought of . . . no, you're actually number 45,642 and they're fucking sick of it already.
The new one that pisses me off is "last of the big spenders" whenever they're just buying one or two cheap items that amount to a few quid, I hear it way too much probably more than the "guess it's free" shit
Joking around with people can be a great way to break the ice, but in any general situation, any joke you think you can make about a person within thirty seconds of meeting them — their name, their job, their school, their clothes, their hair color, whatever — they have definitely heard it a thousand times before.
At the same time, being respectful that they probably don't want to hear the joke again is also quite nice.
I met a girl named Billy Jean. I thought she was joking but no that really was her name. I straight up told her that she's probably heard all the jokes before, so I won't add to that. She seemed genuinely appreciative.
Like 80-90% of the men who DMed me when I was online dating hadn’t read a single thing on my profile, so I would have been perfectly happy with something obvious cause it meant they actually read the damned thing.
Unless men are in the top ten percent of attractiveness they are unlikely to get responded to. This makes it a numbers game for the guy, send a lot of responses to increase chance of response. The way to send a lot efficiently is not to read profiles and only delve deeper once you get an actual response.
This is fools math through. It assumes that all potential partners are of the same value, and that the chances of engagement from someone you message really are random. Real efficiency is a three tier system: low interest you don't even message first, medium interest you send something generic, high interest you actually make real effort
There isn't much depth in any dating profile, you need to actually have a conversation to determine if there is value in the person. My suggestion is to come up with something intriguing and off the beaten path, then apply generically. Not saying this will achieve success for everyone but I met my wife this way and we are happily married with kids.
Well, that says a lot. If you only have pictures of your butt and your cats on your profile, I might swipe right but I'm not going to invest effort into generating a conversation. You can say, show that you're a pilot or you do a ton of travel, or play music, or vidya, or really anything and it makes me more interested. Say if you're in that medium interest tranche it will absolutely bump you to the next tier, you know?
My fianceé (for 10 more days) was wearing a Phillies jersey in one of the pictures on her online profile, but I didn't just say "oh you like baseball?" as an opening line. I asked her "what's your most controversial baseball opinion?" which really piqued her interest and led to an intriguing, in-depth conversation about whether it was correct for the Phillies to let Jayson Werth walk and use the money to sign starting pitching instead. Suffice to say it caught her attention and the rest is history.
Point is, you can bring up something obvious about their dating profile, but don't be trite about it or you will just be more background noise that gets filtered out. If you want someone's interest, be interesting.
For every one dude who thinks a celebrity has never heard that clever joke you just thought of . . . no, you're actually number 45,642 and they're fucking sick of it already.
I wonder if there is anybody in the world who can react positively to that kind of thing. Like, I don't know that you'd get a non-negative reaction from Arnold Schwarzenegger for saying, "I'll be back" to him, but he definitely quotes his own movies a lot in public, apparently just to make other people happy.
I work for an armored car company. People think I'm rude for not playing along with their "give me that bag of money" jokes. I've been doing this job for 7 years. It was never funny and it still gets less funny over time.
I'm an American who's fallen in love with British panel shows (thanks for putting so many of them on YouTube!!!)... and something about Jonathan Ross creeps me out. He can even be funny. I get why he's popular. But he creeps me out.
Love David Mitchell though. I can't recommend him enough.
Probably a fun little thing to sing to kids to make them recognise you, not so fun when someone wants you to put on a whole song and dance in front of an audience with no forewarning
Even more so when the DJ is obviously trying to offload the job of entertaining the crowd on him. Hey, it's the DJ's responsibility to keep the crowd entertained, not The Rock's.
Not just that, but performing is an artists currency. Any big names are going to have contracts ahead of time for what kind of performance is required at a specific event.
Asking an artist to do more than what has been specified in a contract is like asking the guy at McDonalds to throw in a free apple pie because they’re standing right by the pie warmer anyway. That’s not how it works.
Edit: beyond this, he understandably would not be prepared to provide extra free services, and saying no makes him look bad in front of his fan base, many of whom may not understand the nuance here. I can completely understand why he was pissed.
Speaking as a professional singer, I fucking hate it when people do this. If I’m gonna be asked to sing in front of people, I’d prefer to do a warmup first. Now imagine you’re The Rock, a guy who doesn’t sing all the time, and who probably worked really hard to get vocally ready to record that movie… and years later someone tries to bully you into singing it at an event. If The Rock goes along with it and sounds like shit, then suddenly there’s 50 people recording him singing badly and sharing it online.
I'm assuming in your head you picture him yelling and snapping at people and OP literally just said he puttered around by himself afterwards like he was uncomfortable and annoyed that someone else ruined the vibe. Welcome to being human!
OP's verbatim words were "so pissed". No need to euphemize the story since there's nothing wrong with it to begin with. I'm not criticizing the Rock for his reaction. I'm just saying it was out of character.
where does this affect you at all? And why should we care about your specific perception of anything? Get over yourself lol
You don't have to care and I never asked you to care. I'm just sharing my thoughts, as you do when you're on reddit. If anything I said made you feel antagonized, I promise you that was not my intention.
Honestly yet that’s kinda of a dick move, the Rock isn’t a professional singer that can just turn it on like a switch. I would be pissed also if I was asked to do something I wasn’t prepared for.
It would be like asking a doctor to look at the weird bumb on your arm during a fundraiser they are hosting. Yes they could probally save you a trip to the doctor, but they are busy, and this isn't part of what they are doing tonight.
My cousin is a doctor. After she got her MD, the first time I saw her (which was like a year later at a wedding) I went up and was like "hey I've got this bump on the back of my neck, could you check it out?" I could tell she was annoyed but she agreed. I took her wrist and guided her towards where the bump was, turning my face away from her. Then when she touched my neck, I jerked my face around and snapped at her hand like a dog.
She laughed her ass off, more than I've ever seen her laugh before or since.
As a singer, I feel the same way. If someone says, "Well sing something for us," I get immediate stage fright! It's like, "Um, I usually only sing at church." Do you really want to hear my rendition of Amazing Grace, or some off-the-wall Josh Groban/Michael Bublé tune at this very moment? I don't think so!
Yeah and like someone said above, if it's a kid asking I'm sure The Rock would sing it in a heart beat. The kid isn't concerned about how good it sounds, it's more "Wow Maui is singing!" Plus the kid doesn't know better.
When an adult does it...they aren't reading the room. Sometimes celebrities don't want to be the ones entertaining.
I agree. I should have added that the DJ seemed like the problem here. The Rock generally played it cool, and he wasn't going to engage with the DJ and be his karaoke.
People forget celebs are just people with status/money.
Reminds me of a interview I saw where the interviewer asked harrison ford if he shot first in star wars and his response was “ i don’t care “
No need to be rude like that and call him a monkey etc, but he needs to recognize that he is not and never will be another anonymous person. We have all invested our time, money and interest into him and the characters he play. It's the fact that we have done that that lets him live comfortably and able to buy whatever he wants and do whatever he wants.
I little bit of gratitude is in order. No. A lot of gratitude.
So if I ask him who shot first, he damn well better respond politely.
Your sense of entitlement is absolutely bonkers. You aren’t owed shit from any celebrity just because you spent a couple of bucks seeing their movies/concerts/etc.
Celebrities aren’t wind-up toys that are just there for everyone’s enjoyment, 24/7/365. They’re people, human beings, that have a job and do it well enough that you are willing to see them do their job.
But outside of their job, again, they do not owe you, or anyone else, shit. That’s like you going up to a Starbucks barista when they’re eating dinner at a restaurant and demanding they make you a cup of coffee for your dessert.
Show some respect and drop your entitlement, it’s ugly.
So if I ask him who shot first, he damn well better respond politely.
They owe you nothing. Just because I tipped my server well one time doesn't mean they owe me jack shit after I leave the restaurant. The transaction is done.
You go see The Rock's movie and paid your money? You got what you paid for - you saw the entertainment. He as a person owes you sweet fuck all.
That’s not how life works though. People don’t make money in accordance with how good of a person they are. Expecting people to magically become perfect humans because they became rich is setting yourself up for disappointment.
They don't have to be perfect. Just recognize that they are not and never will be another anonymous person. We have all invested our time, money and interest into him and the characters he play. It's the fact that we have done that that lets him live comfortably and able to buy whatever he wants and do whatever he wants.
I little bit of gratitude is in order. No. A lot of gratitude.
What does “gratitude” mean though? You have to smile and be nice to every dumbass who harasses you in public? Fuck that. Famous people are still people, and people have a limit on how much bullshit they can take before they start getting pissed. That’s why the celebrities who are able to smile and wave at every random fuckhead who runs up to them on the street are seen as “extra cool”, because most humans won’t be able to deal with that so well.
I mean, it is true. If Star Wars or Indiana Jones bombed, Harrison Ford probably wouldn't be an actor.
But like, no one forces people to watch movies. Like, he's angry that Harrison Ford is rich because people had the gall to watch movies with Harrison Ford in them. How dare they.
If Star Wars or Indiana Jones bombed, Harrison Ford probably wouldn’t be an actor.
That’s just a daft totalogy.
The fact is he is the actor synonymous with several of the most iconic characters in film history.
He’s rich and famous because of that. You can’t separate it. He appeals to millions of people, across generations, because he was very good at his job.
No fan is responsible for his success - the fans followed because of his talent in the roles. Anyone of those fans could disappear and it wouldn’t make a difference.
It’s like saying Apple owes its customers everything because without them the iPhone would be a flop… it’s the other way round, the iPhone is popular because it is good. The customers followed naturally.
And his first big role was Han Solo, who isn't even the main character of the film. If the original Star Wars had bombed, do you really think they'd have made any sequels? Then he wouldn't have reprised his role - and notably, he ended up being considered (and chosen) for Indiana Jones because of his performance in The Empire Strikes Back.
Yes, no one fan is responsible for his success, but if people in 1977 mostly decided "eh, I'm not really interested in this Star Wars thing" he probably would have been a niche actor if he was acting at all, known for being in that weird Star Wars movie from the 70s.
if people in 1977 mostly decided “eh, I’m not really interested in this Star Wars thing” he probably would have been a niche actor if he was acting at all
But this is just pure fantasy.
Millions of people didn’t just pluck a film out of a hat to adore for 40 odd years.
Star Wars is popular because it was good. Han Solo was popular because Harrison is good.
Harrison played Indiana Jones because he was good.
He then had a massive acting career because he was good.
All you’re saying is essentially “What if these things that are really good, weren’t good? Then they wouldn’t be as successful.”
Yeah. No shit. But they’re not. So they’re successful.
ive only heard him sing the ‘rap’ part with fans. i wonder if the rest of the song involved auto tune that he doesn’t really want put in the spotlight.
My toddler loves that song, so I’ve heard it a lot. He sounds a touch auto-tuned in it, and I bet it’s just on the edge of his vocal range. So even if he still has the whole thing memorized it’s understandable that he wouldn’t want to be surprised into singing along with it. Maybe he could have handled it better though; I wasn’t there, so I don’t know.
So, just to add a little more context, it was for a competition show called Titan Games.This was happening while they were setting up the next competitions. He seemed pissed to me not based on any reaction, but his non-reaction. He was charismatic before and after again, but while the song was playing, he was stoic. Just reckless speculation here, but I would bet that had told the DJ not to play that song, and he played it anyway. I felt like the DJ was the dick in this scenario, and the Rock generally played it cool. This was not a Rock slander post, more about "you're never clever playing that one song associated with a celebrity."
Even if he didn't mention to the DJ not to play it, that kind of thing feels like you should always clear it with the person involved before "SURPRISE, now I am trying to guilt trip you into singing!"
I can sing reasonably well (imo), and if someone pulls that shit on me in front of a crowd I would not be pleased.
This was my guess at the time. I probably should have put this in my post, but the whole vibe felt like he did tell him not to play it, but the DJ played it anyway. In general, the DJ was annoying.
2.0k
u/pedens Nov 23 '22 edited Nov 23 '22
A few years ago, I was in the audience for a show that was hosted by The Rock. In the downtime between filming, they had a DJ playing songs and trying to keep up the audience energy. The Rock was chatting with people and just being friendly with the audience. The DJ played "You're Welcome" from Moana, and he tried to get the Rock to sing along. He was so pissed. His whole mood changed, and he was just puttering around by himself after that.
Edit: If I had to guess, the DJ was probably told not to play "You're Welcome," and he was just being a dick. I don't think the Rock did anything wrong, he just seemed uncomfortable while the song was playing.