The Avengers Forever: Fan Tales

	Fan Tales Page 9 of 9

How Sandy Ferber Blew His Line with Emma
by Sandy Ferber

I had been an Avengers fan for around 27 years when I learned that Diana Rigg would be performing in Medea at the Longacre Theatre, here in the New York City area. (This was in the spring of 1994.) Well, I don't think I need mention how quickly I acquired tickets for this event, or how brilliant Dame Diana was in the role. It truly was one of the best nights of theatre I had ever attended (actually, to be strictly accurate, it was an afternoon matinee), and I looked forward to waiting by the stage door afterward to acquire Diana's autograph on my playbill. To my great consternation, we were told that Ms. Rigg would not be coming out after the performance, as she had another show to do that very evening and usually took a nap in her dressing room to prepare for this arduous second performance. So I had to go home that day exhilarated but with no autograph, and vowed to come back on another day, playbill in hand, to meet the woman who had been the object of my admiration for almost three decades.

Thus, around a month later, I did indeed return to the theatre. It was Mother's Day now, and I had the perfect line prepared in case I really did get to meet Diana outside the stage door. As you may know, Medea is a Greek tragedy about a woman—Jason's wife—who kills her two children to take vengeance on her husband (a classical Avenger, I guess you'd call her!). So my perfect line was to say to Ms. Rigg, "Hey, Diana, this is some show to be doing on Mother's Day!" Not bad, right? To my great surprise, there was only a handful of people by the stage door on that afternoon, and after a short wait, out came Diana Rigg! She signed some playbills and then stepped up to two matronly women standing in front of me, who presented her with B&W photos of Emma Peel to sign (the classic shot of Emma in black leather standing on the chessboard). With what I can only call a mild reproof, she said to them, in that wonderfully enunciated British accent, "You know, this was a very long time ago..." Still, she signed it with some grace and then turned to me, who was standing there with my perfect line all rehearsed and prepared. She was a lot taller than I'd imagined, and almost looked me straight in the eyes (and I'm 6'-1").

So there I was, finally face to face and inches away from the woman who had jump-started my puberty around 27 years before (and man, even at age 55, how great did she look!), and I knew just what I was going to say to her. But I guess I, uh, what you might call flummoxed. I practically pulled a Ralph Kramden and actually almost said, "Hommina hommina hommina," but what really came out, as I proffered my playbill to her, was the quite prosaic, "Diana, I've been a fan of yours for so many years...would you mind signing..." "Of course not," she said, taking my playbill and signing her name in a careless but nevertheless quite legible scrawl. And with that, she jumped into a waiting car and was whisked off, and I was left standing there stunned and grinning goofily, kicking myself mentally for blowing my line, but still aghast that I had actually been so close to my longtime favorite actress. Anyway, I have that playbill to this day, and it's not going on eBay anytime soon, I can assure you! All I can say is that I suppose I should have rehearsed that line a few dozen more times!