Showing posts with label hmmm. Show all posts
Showing posts with label hmmm. Show all posts

Thursday, June 05, 2008

Gas Station Attendant Becomes Famous Overnight Sensation After Being Discovered

So, my weird, little--initially research-driven in order to support some stupid point, but now fodder for procrastination--obsession of the day is the tale in which a would-be star is discovered pumping gas.
So far, I've come across a story involving Toni Braxon, but that is about it.
I was sure, when I made the original point, that the story involved James Dean in some way, but then I dicovered, via a little wiki-search, that Dean was far less of an overnight sensation than his persona might suggest.
Other celebrities seem to have worked at gas stations.
Apparently, Ray Romano "worked variously as a gas station attendant, bank clerk, and truck driver" during his early career, but was not "discovered" at a gas station.
In '94, Johnny Depp confessed to Allen Ginsburg that despite his success, he still feels like the "seventeen-year-old gas station attendant in south Florida" he seemingly was before fame. 
Was he discovered there?
Even Clint Eastwood pumped gas for a living.
So, famous people have pumped gas in their pre-fame lives and I am sure that some has-beens and never-weres have pumped gas in their post-fame lives, but who was discovered pumping gas?
Just an urban legend or was someone--I mean, besides Ms. Braxon, because I am sure the archetype of the gas pumping star to-be is older and more traditionally male than her--actually discovered at a gas station and "made into" an overnight star?