On the streets of New York, a visitor from Paris saw a man removing a half-eaten hamburger from a garbage can. She offered him some assistance, not understanding it was Richard Gere.
The distraught woman thoughtfully brought the billionaire beggar some fresh food, saying, “It’s unimaginable that something like this could happen.”
Find out why the star of Pretty Woman mistook him for a homeless man by reading on!
Richard Gere, together with Kyra Sedgwick and Steve Buscemi, starred in the drama film Time Out of Mind, which was being filmed in New York in 2014.
In the film, Gere, who is currently 74 years old, portrays George, a mentally ill man who is expelled from his flat and left on the streets.
The celebrity was requested to “be” homeless for a scene by the director, Oren Moverman, on the first day of filming. Clothed in rags, Gere was dropped among regular folks on the busy city streets.
When Gere pretended to be destitute and wandered the streets of New York City with an empty coffee cup begging for coins, not many people seemed to notice that he was filming in a major city.
“No one made eye contact with me during the first forty minutes or so that I was out there,” Gere remarked. “I was acting like myself,” he remarked. One of the busiest areas in New York was where I was. I wouldn’t have survived for thirty seconds if I had been Richard Gere.
However, he clarified that Gere was neither disguised or makeup-free.
“People’s assumptions based on my body language and my location on the street filled in these gaps with an incorrect narrative because I wasn’t the movie star,” says Gere.
Moverman goes on to explain, saying, “No one gave him a cent.” He wasn’t even acknowledged by anyone. And that demonstrated the main point: although we don’t see them, there are homeless people everywhere.
homeless people in disguise
Sadly, someone took a picture of him, and after posting it to social media, rumors circulated that the An Officer and a Gentleman star was going undercover to raise awareness of the homelessness issue. He even said he was giving $100 to every homeless person he spotted in the then-viral post, which attracted the attention of over two million people.
Gere, who lacks a social media presence of his own, utilized actor Jenna Malone’s Facebook page to address the inaccuracies and unsupported statements.
Richard Gere is here. Hello. To my utter surprise, I discovered last week that a picture of me as a homeless guy on the streets of New York had been placed on a Facebook fan page.
He goes on to say that the message that was linked to the post is “fictional” and that he was not conducting an experiment; rather, he was filming a movie. He says that he has never given out $100 bills.
Pizza that is cold
Even though there was no change left in his cup, one woman did notice.
Karine Gombeau, her husband Bruno, and their teenage son were leaving a nearby pizza establishment when the Runaway Bride star dug through a trash can near Grand Central Station and took up a half-eaten burger.
When the family from Paris arrived, they saw the elderly “hobo” with the destroyed burger in his hand, dressed in a light jacket, baggy slacks, and a tuque.
Who was below the soiled garments was a mystery to her.
Sickened by what she saw, 42-year-old Gombeau went up to him and handed him some of the remnants from the “enormous” pizza she, her husband, and their 15-year-old son had bought from an Italian restaurant, she told The New York Post.
After accepting the item, Gere enquired, “What’s in the bag?”
“I attempted to communicate with him in English, but it was partially in French,” she begins. I apologized, saying, ‘Je suis désolée, but the pizza is cold.’
“Thank you so much,” the millionaire remarked as he accepted the present. God be with you.
Subsequently, the tourism industry worker from Paris expressed her sadness at the large number of homeless individuals in the city.
“Knowing that they have nothing and we waste food makes me very sad.” I’m moved by it.
Unexpectedly!
Two days later Gombeau received a copy of the local paper from a staff member at the hotel where she was staying.
She says that when she opened the pages and saw a picture of herself with the hottie, she was taken aback.
“It was enchanting…This story is ridiculous. She exclaimed, “It’s unbelievable that something like this could occur.”
Even for his age, I believe he’s really attractive. She continues, criticizing, saying, “I really loved Chicago, but Pretty Woman wasn’t my favorite movie.”
In an interview with the journal, the woman clarifies that the family, who was spending four days in the city, was unaware that they had stumbled into a film set.
