Carolina Film and Video Festival

Carolina Film and Video Festival - February 21, 2004

I didn't find out about the appearance of Donovan Patton and Dave Palmer at the historic Carolina Theater in Greensboro, NC until noon on Friday, the day before. By the time I convinced my husband to take my son and me, discovered I had tickets (thanks to a friend) and got arrangements made, it was very late. We left very early in the morning because it's about a 3 1/2 hour drive from here to there and planned on arriving at the theater about 10 minutes before 10 am which was when the program was scheduled to start. Unfortunately, our drive took quite a bit longer than we expected and we didn't get to the theater until almost a quarter past 11.

As the three of us approached the theater on foot, we started passing groups of people; groups of parents and children, we soon realized. That's when we noticed most of the children had Blue's Clues memorabilia. They were wearing orange and blue "Joe" outfits and other assorted Blue's Clues t-shirts, and clutching postcards, handy-dandy notebooks and stuffed Blues of every imaginable size.

We decided to go in anyway and since the show was over, no one stopped us. There was a crowd still milling around and lines still forming along the length of the stage so we started scanning the crowd as soon as our eyes adjusted to the indoor dimness.

I spotted Dave Palmer first. I had never met him; never knew what he looked like but it was clearly him: the man standing behind the podium drawing pictures of Blue and her friends. His drawings were being projected onto the theater's big screen via an overhead camera and it only took me one look at the screen; one good look at the drawing style and the hands doing the drawing and I knew it was him.

Then my husband spotted Donovan. For a moment I felt like my husband and I were playing a game of Blue's Clues with Donovan taking the place of the clue.
"There he is."
"Where?"
"There. On the corner of the stage."
"Where? I don't see..."
"Right THERE!"

He apparently had been sitting down on a corner of the stage, obscured from my view by the crowd, and when he stood up was when I could see him. Donovan looked like was about to go backstage - just enough to make my husband mutter, "Uh-oh," then he came back out with a wooden chair. We joined the line and my husband put our son up on his shoulders so he could see. Once my son spotted "Joe," he started bobbing up and down on his shoulders and yelled, "It's Joe! HI, JOE!" He was so excited!

At this point, I managed to get a few pictures of Donovan while he was signing autographs. He looked very nice dressed down in a dark red sweater with his shirttail hanging out and stonewashed jeans and sneakers. It was nice hearing him talk in his real voice which is just a bit lower than his "Joe" voice.

At a few points while we were waiting in line, Donovan got several of us to laugh with his jokes with the kids; he seemed like he was really having a blast signing autographs and interacting with the children. He was like Santa Claus to them; they either ran up to him right away or they just stood and stared at him in awe until he coaxed them over. The kids just loved him and he did so well with them!

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There was one adorable little girl there who looked to be about 18 to 24 months old who took two steps and just stopped and stared at "Joe." She was too scared to move, I think, so Donovan got out of the chair and sat down on his knees on the floor. That didn't work, so the girl's father sat in the chair and coaxed her onto his lap while Donovan stepped away and stood in the center of the stage with his back to them

The funniest part was when he realized he was blocking the center of the screen that Dave's drawings were being projected upon and started to goof off. Dave either noticed or someone pointed it out to him because he turned around and they bantered a bit. I couldn't hear what they said but Donovan was laughing when he came back to the father and daughter. She got her picture after all! One little boy, about five or so, who came up to Donovan was wearing a complete "Joe" outfit. As Donovan lifted the boy onto his lap for his picture, he suddenly spotted the embroidered Blue on his cargo pocket and exclaimed, "They make pants? I didn't know that! They make the pants too!" He commented on that a few times more later on, proclaiming, "That's so cool!"

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Another child approached Donovan with a little stuffed "Joe" doll for him to autograph. As he was signing it, he giggled a little, shook his head, and said something like, "These things crack me up."

Several times during our wait, Donovan paused long enough to thank everyone for coming and that he appreciated everyone being so patient. I think that thanks should go the other way as well, to Donovan for being so patient with us, to sit and take pictures and sign autographs for so long. He was very polite and friendly and never once stopped smiling and laughing.

Finally, it was our turn! I made sure my husband still had the camera, handed him my purse and took out the fabric swatch I brought along to hopefully ask Donovan to sign. My hands were shaking and I was worried they'd be sweaty. Honesty, you'd think I was more nervous than some of the children! What would my son do when he saw "Joe" up close and face to face? Would he chicken out? Heck, would I chicken out? I have so much

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respect and admiration for Donovan, for stepping into that role and taking over the hosting duties of such a wonderful and groundbreaking show, of having to replace such a beloved character as Steve and creating a beloved character of his own.

Donovan looked at my son and I gave him just a tiny nudge. He turned around and said to me in all seriousness, "Mom, I won't get scared." He turned around and went straight to "Joe" with no hesitation. He told him his name and my husband snapped a picture. They talked for a bit before "Joe" autographed a postcard for him and I knew that if I were to approach him, it had to be right then. There were still a few children in line behind us and I didn't want to take up any time that could be used by them. So, I approached Donovan while I was retrieving my son and sending him to his dad and introduced myself by telling him that I run the website The Ways of the Blue Dog. He immediately gave me a big smile and said, "Yeah? Really?" as if he was familiar with it! I crouched down beside him so we could talk face to face and handed him my fabric swatch. Well, half handed it to him and half laid it on his leg would be a better way of describing it I think. In fact, I almost started to smooth the fabric, out of nervous habit, and then stopped myself when I realized how that would definitely give a wrong impression! I asked him if he would mind signing it and told him that it was a leftover swatch from the bear I made him and

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I hoped he'd gotten it. He thought a second and said, "Oh yeah! The bear!" He mentioned the cording around its neck and said, "I got that! It's in my office!" As he was signing it, he said that he had gotten my address and had planned on writing me a thank you note, but that he was just so bad with correspondence. He also said that someone had emailed him to tell him I was coming so he was glad I made it! He told me that he doesn't get on-line very much but that his dad posts on Connie's site. He mentioned her by name and brought up the subject on his own!

I was just awestruck that he not only recognized the name of my website and my online name, but he also received my bear and keeps it in his office and talked about Connie's website! I told him that we'd love it if he wanted to post with us too, and then told him that he was welcome to come post at the Blue Dog as well. He's very easy to talk to and I wish we could've had more time or could've gotten together later to talk more but things just didn't work out that way.

When he handed me my swatch back, I knew I couldn't take any more of his time; he was there for the kids, not the grownups after all. So, I asked if I could have a quick picture with him for the website and he said, "Sure!" so I scootched up close and put my arm around his back. As I was standing up to leave, he shook my hand, smiled at me, and said that he was very glad to have met me! I'll admit that he took me a little off guard with that. I was already flustered and that was just an incredible compliment. I stammered something about it having been very nice to have met him too and we left so he could have his time with the few children who were behind us. All in all, we couldn't have been talking for more than 3 or 4 minutes, but I'm so happy to have gotten that.

I never made it over to Dave though because we would have been at the end of his line and we knew there was no way we could have gotten back up to the stage before the staff shooed everyone out of the theater. That was disappointing because part of my fascination with Blue's Clues is the animation itself and I really wanted to see him draw a character, perhaps Green Puppy, my favorite.

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All in all, we had a wonderful time, as short as it was, but still wonderful. My son and I both will have great memories of that day.

~Thunder

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