You may not know it, but Wilmington, NC isn’t just ‘famous’ for being the Matchmaker Logistics headquarters; a few well-known celebrities make their home here. You see, once upon a time, this town was known for filming all kinds of movies and TV shows – Ironman 3, One Tree Hill, Under the Dome and Dawson’s Creek, just to name a few. Wilmington was nicknamed ‘Hollywood South’ and ‘Wilmywood’ for its appeal to producers, directors and actors too.
While the film and television industry in Wilmington has died down somewhat, a handful of famous actors fell in love with our beach town and decided to stick around. And so it came to pass that on the way home from New York City, I found my youngest daughter, Chloe, hobnobbing with a star at our airport’s baggage claim.
I was in the back of the plane with my oldest daughter, Emily, while my wife sat up front with Chloe. When Emily and I joined them at the baggage claim carousel, we noticed Chloe chitchatting with a gentleman from the plane. He looked kind of familiar to me, and he was clearly enjoying my very entertaining daughter. Knowing Chloe, she was probably already on her eighth movie deal…
Chloe’s Airplane Friend – A Super Actor and “Local” Superhero
When we were on our way to the parking lot with our bags in hand, my wife, Amy, gave me a nudge. “Bob, that guy was a celebrity! What’s his name? Orlando…something, I think.”
Orlando Bloom
“Bloom?” We wondered? Admittedly, we could only think of one celebrity named Orlando at that moment. When we got home, I did some Googling.
It was pretty clear that the guy talking to Chloe looked nothing like Orlando Bloom. In fact, Orlando Jones seems to get that a lot. The home page of his website says: “Not the little boy from Everybody Hates Chris. Not Solange Knowles. Not Orlando Bloom. Not Jeff Goldblum in blackface. Not Mos Def.”
Orlando Jones
I knew the actor who makes his home in our historic downtown area as the hilarious spokesman from the 7-Up commercials; others might know him from Sleepy Hollow (another production filmed in Wilmington), MADtv, Evolution or Bedazzled.
I should have gotten Chloe to make a commercial deal for me while she was talking to Orlando. Some of us in the transportation industry make pretty great 7-Up spokesmen, too…
Be on the lookout for familiar faces this weekend,
~Bob
