L-Word.com News Stories

By B&TF

My journey

My journey to Birmingham had begun one ordinary Wednesday morning and it would have remained just ordinary if my travel plans hadn’t changed. I was supposed to fly to Chicago first but due to some bad weather issues, my flight was delayed for almost three hours. If I had waited, I would have missed my connections and Delta representative was trying to rearrange my flights to accommodate me.

I’m grateful for all their help but they really don’t particularly care about geography. Instead of any other East coast city that Delta flies to, I was sent to Portland just to turn around and fly all the way East to Amsterdam and then to turn around and fly back West to England. So obviously, my journey was pretty long but I had a great view outside the window and watched many free movies.

One of them was “Alice in Wonderland”. I remember that Miki Turner, a good friend of Laurel Holloman, told me on twitter to save my money and buy ice cream instead when I asked her opinion about that movie. After I had watched it, I agree whole-heartedly. I’m really glad the movie was free… Well, sort of considering the price of the plane ticket but at least I did get an ice cream with that.

After arriving at Birmingham Hilton Hotel, I had to wait in the lobby for over three hours to get my room ready. As I sat there, drinking latte primo and feeling really tired, I realized that I’ve been up and traveling for more than 24 hours and badly needed a shower and a bed. I think I’m getting too old for this.

We knew beforehand that three guests had cancelled their appearance due to work commitments. Sean had tried to find replacements but wasn’t able to get anyone on such a short notice. Luckily, Clementine Ford and Janina Gavankar are now going to attend L8 Convention along with Jennifer Beals, Kate French and Erin Daniels.

I arrived in Birmingham on Thursday and learned that Kate Moennig and Leisha Hailey were already in England, and later there were a few Kate photos posted on Twitter. They were having fun in London before getting to Birmingham. Sean also posted that they had asked him if they should do a tap dance for the absent guests. My first thought was a lap dance…oh well; I guess I should get my mind out of the gutter and get back to my report.

Opening Ceremony

The opening ceremony was over pretty quick. Mei Melançon came to greet us first and she appeared pretty shy and maybe a little bit nervous, which is understandable since it was her first convention and she didn’t really know what to expect. Kate and Leisha have been through this already twice and they were more comfortable on stage.

Kate expressed her surprise at the fact that there were still so many loyal fans even after the show has been over. Leisha said that she was excited to be at L7 and that they just go here from London where they spent the week.

You can watch the compilation of the Opening Ceremony here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BcKef9Efauc as posted by Starfury.

Meet&Greet

As it happened at all the previous conventions, the Gold Ticket holders attended the Meet&Greet where they had an opportunity to chat with all the guests in smaller, more intimate circles. There were over 200 fans with Gold tickets and so the guests didn’t stay long at each table because they needed to give everyone a chance to talk to them in a short time.

Mei Melançon was the first guest at our table and she was less nervous than during the Opening ceremony. She said that she was really surprised by the warm reception considering that the show is over and her character was on it for only a short time. None of the cast liked the ending of Season 6 or the season itself because it didn’t make sense to them. Since she was a newcomer, Mei didn’t feel like she could say anything but the rest of them let Ilene know what they had thought. The cast wanted their characters to grow but Season 6 didn’t show any of that. Mei also showed us the tattoos on her arms. They were saying in Japanese “Love me” and “Hate me”, which means to give other the choice. Mei explained more about those tattoos later in her Q&A’s and I will post it in my Day 2 report.

Leisha Hailey was next but she didn’t stay at our table too long. She talked about her new album coming out possibly in February and that they have been touring a little bit. The album will be released in the US and the UK.

Kate Moennig was really cool. She shook everyone’s hand and let them introduce themselves. She actually remembered a few people from previous conventions and let them know that. Kate said that she was excited to be there and surprised that there were so many attendees and that people are still devoted to the show. We had some questions about “Three Rivers” and Kate said that the remaining episodes are being aired right now. One of our questions was about Kuol and if he finally got his heart. Kate said that they filmed so long ago but she thinks he did. She remembered filming a scene with him at the end and then she said, “the f***ker should have got a heart.”

Day 2 report is coming next.

This entry was posted on Sunday, July 4th, 2010 at 3:04 pm and is filed under Conventions, Lesbians, The L Word. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.