I watched the DVD the other day and saw you right where you said you would be. The hair, headband, and the white gloves. Must've been great to be there. How old were you then? Could you give us a desciption of how the night was?

I'm buying this edition just for Black as soon as I can find it.

can someone post the picture?

I felt great when I finally spotted you. I had to rewind before I got it!

I've heard the story before but I want to hear it again - it's a doozy...

joyinrepetition said:

Thanx joy but uh, what's up with all the spaces in my name? (smile) And the capital letters? Dig, run it all together like your name; And in all small letters, just like yours. blackguitaristz It was great to be there. I was 15. I've never told the whole shebang on here...don't know if I ever will cuz I just don't want folks on here "shooting at it" as Priest in SuperFly would say. I wrote about "some" of what happened over on dezdickerson.com about 3 years ago. The thread is "84 Purple Rain Premire". It should still be up over there. I had some incredible things happen to me in a 2 day period.

cassingle said:

You felt "great" huh? (smile) ....cool. I'm leaving out some things basically cuz I don't want some folks on here to trip. Cuz they will and it's not worth it. Basically a friend of mine (who's standing next to me in the footage) went down to Mann's Chinese in Hollywood on a Tuesday night (school was out) and spent the night camped out in front of the theatre. When we got there, no one was in line. So we asked the girl in the ticket booth when were they going to start selling tickets for the premire. I saw an ad in the L.A. Times just a few days before and I couldn't believe it. That they were actually selling tickets to the public. So folks could sit in the theatre right along with Prince and the Revolution, The Time, and EVERYBODY else that was there. Lionel Richie, Eddie Murphy, Stevie Nicks, Sheila E., Devo, David Lee Roth, Adam Ant, and so many others. Everybody who was HOT in the early 80's untill then was there.

But back to us at the ticket booth that Tuesday night. The girl in the booth said that they wouldn't start selling tickets for awhile yet so my friend and myself thought we should go kill some time. So we just walked around Hollywood Blvd going in all of the shops just looking around. Then all of a sudden, something hit me like a brick in the head, a feeling, telling me that we needed to get back to the theatre. Like right now. So we headed back and there were two girls already camped out. I was like "Damn... We should have been the first in line!" Anyway, slowly but surely, folks started showing up, getting in line. In about an hour, the line was heading down the block of Hollywood Blvd. People were bringing their boom boxes and of course everyone was blasting Prince's music. It was a trip. hearing "Uptown", "Let's Pretend We're Married", and "I Wanna Be Your Lover" playing all at the same time. Anyway the line just grew and grew untill it hit the corner and you couldn't see it anymore. And it was a LONG block. By in the morning, it was a complete madhouse. There were literally hundreds of people all jammed up facing that ticket booth. Thre was no more "one" line. It was just people everywhere. At this stage, maybe around 7 or so Wednesday morning, a local news station came by to see what was up. This news reporter came straight to me and asked me "So I take it you're a Prince fan?" And I said "Yes" Then he asked me "Why did you want to spend all night here when you could have just as easily seen it Friday?" I said something like "Because I didn't want to wait untill Friday..Not when I could see it a day early." While I was still there at the theatre, my mom saw me on the news a little later on the news, along with some kids I went to school with. People were calling me at home and shit that evening, telling me that they saw me on the news.

Anyway, probaly around 1 in the afternoon, it was sooooo many people out in front of Mann's Chinese. All you could see was people. Everywhere you looked. I couldn't even see the sidewalk or the cars on the street. They finally opened the ticket booth and I got my Silver ticket. My friend and myself had actually got seperated much earlier from each other just from the surge of the crowd. It was bedlam. I couldn't believe P had this MANY fans. I think it was a lot of curiosity for many folks. Sure, there was some that I could tell a mile away they were o.g. Prince fans like myself. We were easy to spot. We just had a "look". Not just the clothes, but it was an attitude we had to. You have to undersatnd, Prince had still been like a cult artist. Up untill he released When Doves Cry and then all hell broke loose. EVERYBODY all of a sudden was a Prince fan. Oh well...I was happy as a lark for Prince. I had seen it all. All of P's transformations. From year after year. I had seen him grow from the cat with the afro to now this music superstar that's sitting on a motorcycle and that's about to release a film that at that stage, nobody knew how well it was going to do. Or what it was even about. After I got my ticket, I went and stood on the sidewalk. I was looking for my friend in the crowd and didn't see him anywhere. I was shocked to see, now in the afternoon sun, just how many people were there. The line had looped TWO times around this HUGE block. And people were STILL showing up to buy tickets. While I was standing on the sidewalk, I actually saw a few other people that I had met before back at the Controversy show. Small world. They were just getting there. There was no way they were getting tickets. Not to this.

So finally I spotted my friend in the crowd. He got his ticket and then I went and called my mother to come pick us up. The next day, Thursday, was the night of the premire. I was HYPED. I mean HYPED. I thought about all day what I was going to wear. I couldn't decide. Should I wear one of my trenchcoats with the studs? I had a hat that was very similar to the one P wore in Automatic that one of my girl cousins had gave me. Nah,..I had worn all of that to see P in concert on the 1999 tours. How in the world I came up with what I ended up wearing was just....what I call cosmic. Especially the white gloves...Which belonged to my mother. Anyway, my mother dropped us off and all of Hollywood Blvd was blocked off. Thousands of people filled the streets. Fans and on lookers were everywhere. My friend and myself had to walk almost two blocks to the front of the theatre because everything was blocked off. The people who had the tickets to get in were to stand behind these "purple ropes" which was sectioned off from all of the other folks who were just there to see everybody show up. We walked up and this security cat asked to see our tickets and we showed them. They were these big silver envelope looking things. Very shiny and very "Old Hollywood" looking. I still have mine. This is what Dez would later sign for me. Anyway, it was an open empty spot right up front behind the ropes. Nothing blocking our view. We were right were all of the celebs were filling out of the limos. They had to walk right past us to get in the theatre. It was a perfect spot to be standing.

I have this DVD...
going to check this out PRONTO!

We were told by security that everybody who had the silver tickets were to go in after all of the stars had went in. Me, growing up in Hollywood from when I was 5 years old because of my dad being a music artist, I had, through him, met many famous people. Other music artists, who had known my father. So I was definately never "star struck". And by then, I myself had been playing rock guitar, patterning myself, musically and visually after Hendrix, Dez and of course Prince. But it was so many celebs at this place. All came to see P and his film. Everybody would file out of their limos. The Time, Morris in his own limo. Appolonia 6 with Apples showing up in her own limo. Same with Sheila E, who of couse wasn't in the film. The Revolution was split up in their limos, being the last set to show up. In one limo, it was Bobby, Matt and Mark. Then in another limo, it was Alan Leeds with Lisa and Wendy. And then of course this purple limo pulled up and it was the loudest screaming I had ever heard. Big Chick got out and then Prince got out. I thought people were going to tear down shit at first. Girls were going BUCK WILD. P was cool as hell. But in this enviroment, it really showed just how small P is. Not just the cat is short but...little. I'm only 5'9 and I wasn't that height when I was 15 but P looked like a wind up toy doll that walked! He strolled in kinda looking like he was scared to death but was cool at the same time. His eyes were HUGE.

may i post what i think it is of you or will it ruin the thread
[Edited 7/23/08 0:01am]

So after everybody who were geting in got in, the theatre lights were on. You could see so many celebs sitting with other folks who had tickets. There were m ushers everwhere, helping people find their seats. Inside the ticket, it showed your assigned seat. What row, what aisle, etc. So since my friend and I had been spit up while we were in line to get tickets, we had totally different seating locations. So as I was walking down the aisle, I spotted Dez sitting in his seat. Like I mentioned earlier, I was never "star struck"...but when I saw Dez I was like "Oh shit...I gotta go meet Dez!" So I just darted over there, stepping on people's feet and shit. It was just like that Bugs Bunny cartoon. "Oh pardon me....Excuse me...pardon me." I made my way over to Dez and didn't realize at first that the members of the Revolution was in the row right behind Dez. To his right. Dez saw me and smiled. I think I said "Hi Dez...could I get you autograph?" I had never asked anybody for their autograph and had never wanted to untill then. I swear to God, Dez was super cool. He was sitting next to his wife. He signed my silver ticket. He asked me if I played guitar. I said that I did. He said that I looked like it. It was ironic that Dez and myself were the only two people in the entire place who was wearing white headbands. Our jackets were even similar looking. I just happened to glance up and that's when I noticed Bobby Z checking me out talking to Dez. He was probably wondering who I was since Dez was spending some time talking to me. Dez and I probably only talked for a good 5 minutes. Which seemed like forever. But Dez was so gracious, asking me if I played in a band, what type of music did I play, etc. I told him that I always studied him while he was on stage. That I thought he was cool. He probably thought that was obvious from the headband I was wearing. He told me good luck and we shook hands and I walked off, trying not to step on any more feet.

I know mofos in here are strung out on sarcasm but if this shit is true then....

PHOTO PLEASE!

I wanna see my big brother

Now this is my kind of thread!! I thought it was really cool when I first saw him at the premier, I thought WOW, he was REALLY there, that must have been such an amazing experience! I also thought, you should always wear something that makes you stand out from the crowd! You can't see how gorgeous he really is there though, he's got a cute face and beautiful eyes!!

After that, I went and asked this usher where my seat was. He showed me. I sat in Aisle 2, Row 6, Seat 1. Directly across the aisle from me was Weird Al Yankovic. The cat that had the hit "Eat It" with the parody of Micheal's "Beat It" video. I was pretty close to the screen. Anyway, right before the house lights went off, I got up to go get a soda in the lobby. I had this long walk up the aisle in the theatre. I felt all of these eyes on me as I was walking out but I didn't really care cuz I knew I looked cool! When I got in the lobby, (This is where I promised myself to stop this part of the story!).....During the film, people were constantly turning around to see Prince, who was actually sitting two rows back behind The Revolution. He walked in after everyone else was seated of course, to make his grand entrance. But all through the film, girls in the audience were screaming at every single thing Prince did on screen. In the first scene where P spoke his first line, some girl in the audience sreamed out "Oh my God, he really talks!" Everybody just started laughing. Girls were talking to the screen. Whenever a close up was on Prince, girls were starting screaming "Oh Prince is sooooo FINE!" "I Looooove You Prince!" After each musical number, people were cheering and clapping at. Like they were REALLY at a concert. Nothing was worse than when P actually kissed Appolonia. Girls in the audience went beserk. And the LOVE scene?...Forget about it. It was so loud in the theatre with girls screaming and shit. It was too much for them to take watching P have a love scene AND knowing Prince is actually sitting in there watching it with you. You couldn't hear any of the music during that scene. They screamed through the entire scene. It was surreal to see and to hear that. Girls were flipping out. God only knows what Prince was thinking. Right before the scene where his father was going to shoot himself, I heard all of this screaming again. I looked back behind me and I saw Big Chick, two other security cats and Prince walking out of the theatre. He left and didn't return.

After the film was over and everybody pilled out of there, I found my friend and he had heard that Prince was playing nearby at The Palace on Vine. Although I knew we didn't have tickets to this show at The Palace, and I knew there was an age limit to get in, (You had to be 18), which neither one of us were, I STILL felt that somehow, someway, we would be able to get in. We walked all the way from Mann's to The Palace. Which on foot, was no hop, skip and a jump. When we got there, there were security at the door. We were like "Fuck it. Let's go for it." We walked right up and this brutha was like " You on the list?" I was like "Yeah...Chris CoShea." And then my friend said "And Paul Reitz"...The cat looked at his clipboard and then looked at us. I swear for a second I thought the cat was going to let us pass through, then he flashed over and was like "I don't see your names....You've got I.D.'s?" That was the killer right there. "Umm, no...we didn't think since we were on the .." "Nah man...can't do it." We turned around and walked off. That was it. I called my mom and she came and picked us up. All of of this is the honest to God's truth. Like I mentioned earlier, I wrote a thread on Dez's site describing a much shorter version of this. On that, I mainly focused on meeting Dez. That was around 3 years ago when I posted that on Dez's site. There are a very few people on this site that I have told this too. I told them I never wanted to run it on here. Part of me thought it would be cool to share but...after I would see how a few people would react to other people's thing, then I was like "Nah.." But since joy ran a thread about seeing me and so forth, I thought I'll go ahead and tell some of it. It was a very cool experience for me, personally.

Harlepolis said:

You KNOW what u gotta do!

tangerine7 said:

Nah, of course not. Post what u want. Besides, it can't ruin the thread.

Very cool story, I'm jealous as hell

Great story! Like many others, I went back to the video to check you out.

While watching the Premier Party, 2 trailers for the movie played. I noticed they both had scenes that did not make the cut. I am particularly curious about the scene during which Prince went into Apollonia 6's rehearsal and had a fight with Jellybean.

Anybody know what happened in that scene and why it was cut? Is the actual footage anywhere? Where is a "deleted scenes" option on a DVD when you need one?

mynameisnotsusan said:

Thanx for digging it..Cool name you have too. Very cool. One of the coolest names I've seen on here.

okay. this isn't a good quality screencap but is this you? right behind apollonia?

tangerine7 said:

Yes ma'am.

Blackguitaristz, thank U so much for this, I really enjoyed it.
Too bad I wasn't born some years earlier...

Brutha B THANK YOU for that amazing story. It's probably one of the best stories I've read on here all year. You were at the right place at the right time. That's great that you got to rap to Dez. I don't know why anyone would hate on you for that story.

I remember being on vacation with my family and watching the premeire from the hotel room that night thinking it must have been incredible to be there. The "Palace" story was funny (lol).

Thanks dude, your posts were a good read as always!

Wow that is nothing short of amazing right there blackguitaristz. Thank you for sharing your story and all of your stories with us. They are always a treat to read and with this one, I felt like I was right there with you man.

Wow!!! Amazing story! I hardly ever post, but this is sooo beautifully told that I had to go wow!!! Lucky guy!

Ahh man! You got to do all that! You are one lucky guy! I wish I was alive and able to see that! =[

I think I am the youngest Prince Fan here...