Bruce Springsteen turned down our fine dining restaurant
How the Boss Became My Favourite Celebrity Guest
It’s Springsteen Day in New Jersey!
I’m not in New Jersey, mind you, so the state and the superstar will have to party without me. Happy birthday from up here in Canada, Bruce Springsteen! This post is for you.
One of the perks of working in upmarket hotels is crossing paths with people from every walk of life and from every corner of the planet. Good people, bad people, rich people, poor people, leaders, followers, celebrities, sporting greats, and everything above, below, and in between.
When she was in her teens, I always told our daughter that there are two ways you can meet celebrities. You can stand in the rain in the crowd outside their hotel and hope to catch a glimpse of them, or you can get a job inside the hotel and they will come to you.
Regular readers may wonder why I’m writing about a rockstar celebrity. In an earlier post, I told about the time a journalist asked me why Michael Jackson wasn’t staying in our hotel, to which I responded: “We prefer real VIPs”.
The answer is simple. Not all rockstars are created equal.
Some of my more unfortunate experiences include reading a tear-jerking interview with an aging music legend who told how he’d kicked his drug habit and was living a clean and righteous life. I read the article while a team of specialist housekeepers in hazmat suits were in the popstar’s suite removing a mountain of used and bloody syringes from under his bed.
We once did a series of live TV shows from the lobby of a hotel every Saturday night. A famous local pop star refused to follow the no-smoking in the lobby regulation as he prepared for his set and then, as the director counted down to his live performance, he loudly cleared his throat and, just before the red light on the camera was illuminated, he sent a snot-filled spit projectile flying out into the audience.
Then there were the pages and pages of riders that could only have been written by people who knew they were demanding the next-to-impossible. I’m not sure how a hotel would respond if I sent a request that said I would only stay there if hand-picked pink roses from my mom’s garden were placed in my room and replaced with fresh ones three times a day and that a glass of my favourite root beer that can only be purchased in my home town be placed beside the roses and refilled three times daily.
The day the Boss and the E-Street Band came to town, I was the duty manager in the hotel. I can’t remember what their rider said, but I do remember that we were instructed to tell the groupies outside the hotel that they would all get autographs on departure day on one condition: No one could disturb the band members inside the hotel during their stay.
It was the last week of a gruelling global concert tour so a number of band members had brought their families to towns.
The organizers had booked a table in our top-floor fine dining restaurant for Bruce Springsteen and his young family. The Food and Beverage Manager and I escorted Bruce and his tour manager to the venue high above the city with picturesque, panoramic views. When he entered, the “Dancing in the Dark” star went straight to the windows and gazed out over the town.
“Wow, this looks lovely, but I’ll have to ask you to cancel the reservation for us.”
The Food and Beverage Manager gave me a look that was somewhere between frustration, fear and disbelief. This very upmarket, design-perfect venue had been praised by food critic columnists and national celebrities, yet it wasn’t good enough for Bruce Springsteen? What was his problem?
Springsteen didn’t look at us, he spoke directly to his tour manager.
“People pay a lot of money to come up here. They’ll be bringing their wives or girlfriends up here for something special. We have young kids. Just send some burgers up to the suite. Let’s let people enjoy their romantic evening here without us distracting them.”
Of all the famous people I’ve met, I don’t think anyone else came close to showing the empathy and consideration for others that Bruce Springsteen did that day. Especially when you consider that his gesture would never be known to those who benefitted from it.
He kept his promise to his fans, too.
On departure day, the families and other band members were taken down to a back entrance where vans were waiting to take them to the airport for their long flight home.
The “Boss” exited the hotel through the main entrance into the throngs of waiting fans. Young teenagers, and people their parents’ and even grandparents’ ages were waiting with pictures, vinyl albums, t-shirts, and other merchandise they held up hoping for autographs. In the pre-iPhone, pre-selfie age, cameras were passed back and forth and pictures were taken of the idol and his idolizers.
Springsteen was as patient as he was cordial and made sure everyone who had waited so patiently for this once-in-their-lifetime moment would go home happy.
It took time.
It took a long time.
It took so long that their flight was in peril of missing its slot time.
The vans were brought around to the front of the hotel and the van with Springsteen’s family pulled up under the porte cochere. Young voices called out from inside the van,
“DAD! Come on Dad! We’re going to be late. DA-AAD!”
Bruce Springsteen may have been an almost god-like figure to his autograph and picture-seeking fans, but to the kids in the van, he was simply Dad.
To me, he was someone who understood he was a role model. He modelled different roles for different folks and from my limited perspective, he modelled them very well indeed.
In 2009, our daughter gave my wife and me tickets to Bruce Springsteen’s concert in London’s Hyde Park. The band, with its nigh on 60 year-old leader had headlined the famous Glastonbury festival with an epic performance the night before.
It didn’t show.
They played their hearts out. Springsteen was drenched in sweat early on, but nothing slowed them down.
There was a sound curfew in London and Springsteen breached it both nights he played there.
“We’re not done yet!”, he yelled to the ecstatic crowd, “We paid the fine for yesterday, we’ll pay the fine again!”
Happy Birthday, Bruce Springsteen!
P.S.: Here’s another great story, told by Springsteen himself, about how much this man cares for his fans.