JSFC / ZSociety Fan Club Party --Shameless Candy Thieves
| It was a perfect, sun-drenched Southern California day. They came from Nevada and New York, Florida and Texas, California and Wisconsin and many places in between. The gazebo was surrounded by lush green foliage, riotous flowers of every imaginable color and music spilled over from the adjoining pool area. It was like a private sanctuary on the "Quartermaine" estate, except we were actually at the Sportsmen's Lodge in Studio City, California. |
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The first gathering of the Julian Stone Fan Club in conjunction with the first gathering of Jackie Zeman's fan club, the "ZSociety," was held on July 24, 1999. It was an event that had been much anticipated since the formation of both clubs last year. Appropriately, the theme was "Shameless Candy Thieves" and the proceeds of our silent auction were donated to a charity called The Gabriel Project. |
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| Briefly, The Gabriel Project is a charity that Mark Melamed, a 6th grade teacher in Vineland, New Jersey started over 10 years ago. Each year he involves his 6th grade students who raise money in various ways in order to bring children with serious heart diseases to the US from Tanzania, Africa. When they get here, The Deborah Heart and Lung Center donates the life saving heart surgery the children need. In the past 10 years his students have saved the lives of 5 children. |
| The students raise the money in order to pay for the child and his/her parent/guardian to fly here and have room and board while here until the patient is well enough to go back to his/her home in Africa. Mark and two of his former students, Brad and Angel came to the event. They were helpful and truly appreciative of the money we raised through the silent auction. |
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Several memorable props, such as "Jerry's" how-to-talk-about-sex books, the shirt from "Jerry's" stay in the PC jail and a copy of the "PC Herald" from the "House of Jacks Crumbles" era were auctioned off to lucky fans. Autographed scripts, Nurse's Ball T-shirts and magazines along with Studio tours given by Julian and Jackie were also auctioned with great success. The tours with Julian and Jackie prompted a "bidding war" and later, one large bid was matched for another tour with Julian. This brought the JSFC/ZSociety contribution to The Gabriel Project to over $3500! |
| A thirty-question trivia contest was underway when Julian and Jackie arrived... everyone was scribbling furiously, but club member Alicia (Semiangel) was the winner! She won an 8 x 12 portrait of Julian and Jackie from an unreleased studio photo-shoot. After some opening remarks in front of the shade-dappled gazebo, Julian and Jackie fielded questions from the 85+ guests at the event. |
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| Julian and Jackie also graciously signed autographs, posed for pictures and even performed another auction item called "Take One" with two talented and brave fans. The scene was an actual GH scene from early June, when "Jerry" was squabbling with "Lucy" and "Katherine" at the PC Grille, and "Bobbie" settled the argument with the flip of a coin. |
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Andrea and Susan were wonderful as "Lucy" and "Katherine" and needless to say that Julian and Jackie were terrific too! This marked Julian's General Hospital directing debut as well, and he deserves a hand for the effort he went through to make the "summer theater" debut of the two fans so successful. We think Lynn Herring and Mary Beth Evans would have been quite proud! |
| Speaking of making fans comfortable, earlier that day, the JSFC held a Meet-and-Greet with Julian just for club members. Without any introduction, a tall man with a box snuck into the garden area. Everyone looked up in surprise to realize that although he was expected, it was Julian himself! Kathy, the JSFC co-president, had managed to get Julian to the gazebo not only on time; but she had put him to work, carrying a box of things needed for the event later on in the day! |
| The Meet-and-Greet was an excellent opportunity for members of the JSFC to get to know Julian and for him to get to know them as well. He went from person to person, shook each hand and spoke with each member individually. |
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| From the moment he arrived, Julian was energetic, enthusiastic and willing to be pretty candid when he answered the myriad questions posed by his most ardent fans. Questions such as: Do you think "Jerry" really knows about "Bobbie's" past? (Answered affirmatively); and, Is A. Martinez going to play a character who will take "Bobbie" away from "Jerry"? (Answered with a shrug and a look of total innocence... Julian nor Jackie seem to have an answer to that question.) How do you and Ingo like working together? (Julian enjoys working with Ingo, and the actors who play "Jerry's" parents.) |
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Do you think GH should keep the Jacks parents on the show? (Julian would like to explore more about "Jerry's" background/past and his relationship with his parents.)Would you like to see "Bobbie" and "Jerry" get married? (He responded that he would like that relationship to develop slowly as "Jerry" is commitment shy.) The fan-club-member only Meet-and-Greet was a huge success thanks to the interesting questions from the members and the humorous and honest answers from Julian. |
| Luckily, there were several reporters and photographers from the various daytime television magazines, so hopefully you will be seeing more coverage of this event in SID, SOU, SOW, and SOD... and even more importantly we hope each of you will be able to join us at next year's event. |
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