Celeb appearance helps raise $10K for cause
Source: UIndy News
Saturday’s semi-surprise appearance by actor and singer-songwriter Drake Bell helped a student-organized fundraiser collect more than $10,000 for the cause.
Bell, who has appeared in many films and became a tween-pop heartthrob as co-star of Nickelodeon’s “Drake & Josh,” delighted an all-ages crowd in the university’s 500-seat Ruth Lilly Performance Hall. Thanks to audience donations, merchandise sales and an anonymous matching donor, the event generated more than $10,000 for the Thirst Project, a California-based not-for-profit organization that supports water and sanitation improvements in developing nations.
The concert was organized by UIndy senior Ryan Brock in conjunction with Thirst Project founder and CEO Seth Maxwell, a Franklin Central High School graduate now based in Los Angeles.
Brock spent months organizing the concert and arranging performances by local bands. When some of the entertainment fell through on short notice, Bell – an official spokesperson for the Thirst Project – agreed to fly out and perform for no fee. His UIndy appearance was not widely publicized, but through word of mouth and Facebook postings, the news trickled out to local fans, who lined up early outside the university’s Christel DeHaan Fine Arts Center.
Bell was generous with his time before and after the concert, Brock said.
“He was so good with the kids,” Brock said. “He took the time to make sure everybody got an autograph or a picture or whatever they wanted.”
Clips from Bell’s performance are already showing up on YouTube. Click below for some clips of the concert preparations and Bell signing autographs and providing interviews with Brock and Maxwell.
Posted Tue, Feb 23, 2010 @ 11:54am
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Nickelodeon star Drake Bell packs Chevy Court with young fans
Girlish shrieks and a packed infield greeted Drake Bell's performance Monday in the Chevy Court at the State Fair.
Bell, 23, an actor and musician, is very popular with the audience of "Drake & Josh," a Nickelodeon program about polar opposite stepbrothers and their little sister who delights in getting them into trouble.
As shrieks echoed through the court, Brigette McLean's fingers were busily texting friends on her red cell phone about seeing Drake "live."
It was exciting, the 13-year-old Syracuse girl said, because the family didn't know that he would be performing at the fair.
"You see him on TV. You don't get to see famous people in front of you," McLean said. Even though many children were watching the performance from the top of their fathers' shoulders, McLean's spot well off to the side offered an unobstructed view of Bell.
A reporter unfamiliar with Bell, asked what channel is he on? " Channel 34 at 7," piped up her nine-year-old sister Eryn McLean.
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Posted Tue, Sep 8, 2009 @ 2:08pm
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Nine-Year-Old Won Pantagraph Contest Ahead of Bell's Local Show
By Dan Craft, The Pantagraph, Bloomington, Ill.
May 4--Meet Madeline Kleist, age 9, of Bloomington. She wants the entertainment editor's job. So we're giving it to her, naturally. At least for the week at hand.
And you know something? She's good at it. Very, very good. So very good, in fact, that the entertainment editor has every reason to be nervous about next week.
Especially with the rumor going around that he devised the contest as a way of getting around doing the job himself.
Thanks to her way around a savvy question, Madeline, the daughter of Steve Kleist and Stacey Kleist, was the grand-prize winner in GO!'s recent "Interview Drake Bell" contest.
Bell is the big weekend attraction at the U.S. Cellular Coliseum.
He's also an industry veteran at the ripe age of 22, having started in the business around age 5, racking up credits he can barely remember, from "Home Improvement" to a memorable scene in "Jerry Maguire."
Mainly, though, Bell is the much-idolized star of Nickelodeon's top-rated series, "Drake & Josh," for which he wrote and performed a lot of the music.
Among Bell's biggest fans is Madeline Kleist, who, we suspect, knows every episode by heart.
So the Epiphany School fourth-grader arrived at The Pantagraph one day last week armed with a list of queries that inquiring minds of Bell fans want to know.
The first day, Madeline had to tough it out through an all-too-familiar journalistic crisis: the celebrity interview gone kaput due to circumstances beyond everyone's control.
Bell was in the middle, so to speak, of "Fish Tank," a pilot for a new CBS series he's filming. You don't just walk off the set in the middle of filming to do an interview.
Madeline toughed it out as the wait hit the two-hour marker, followed by apologies from Bell's management and a request for a rescheduling.
"Sure!" said Madeline with perfect aplomb.
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The following day Madeline returned and, right on cue, the Bell rang for her. Here are the results, with occasional intrusions by the entertainment editor:
DB: Hi Madeline! How are you?
MK: I'm fine.
ED: OK, Drake, here comes her first question. Madeline, fire away!
MK: Do you enjoy acting or making music more?
DB: Um ... hmmmm ... I like 'em both: music is a passion of mine, and so is film and television. It's kind of a toss-up.
MK: I heard you were inspired by the Beatles when making music. Do any actors inspire you for film?"
DB: Yeah, I mean I love Johnny Depp, and Jerry Lewis --
ED: Jerry Lewis?? Aren't you a little young for Jerry Lewis?
DB: Well, all my favorite actors are people like Harold Lloyd, Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin ... I grew up on classic film and television. I love old TV like "The Dick van Dyke Show" and "The Honeymooners" and shows like that. I just grew up on old stuff, so that's kind of what I love.
ED: Who got you hooked on the old stuff?
DB: Probably my dad.
MK: I heard you had a car accident ...
DB: Yeah, I was just sitting at an intersection, stopped at a red light, and somebody fell asleep at the wheel and crossed the wrong side of the road, went through the red light and hit me. I was completely aware and coherent -- I didn't pass out or anything like that. I saw the car coming and it was just over so fast (ED note: In the New Year's Eve 2005 head-on crash, he suffered a broken jaw and fractured neck, lost six teeth and received a six-inch gash on his chin.)
MK: How did it change or affect your career?
DB: We had to go on hiatus for a few months on "Drake & Josh," but it didn't really affect it as much as I thought it would. I healed pretty well and got right back into it, so ... it kind of just put the career on hold for a minute, but not too long.
MK: What is an average day for you?
DB: (Laughs) An average day for me? Uh, I wake up ... let's see ... I don't know ... I get dressed, go to work, come home ... I don't know, like everyone else? I'm pretty much an early riser, up at 6:30 or 7 every day.
MK: Who is your favorite person to film with?
DB: Hmmm ... um ... (long pause) ... I mean I worked with so many people I've always wanted to work with. There's a lot, but I guess my favorite one is I got to do "The Nutty Professor" cartoon with Jerry Lewis. I was his grandson.
ED: Looking back to the very beginning, do you remember your first celebrity encounter?
DB: I'm trying to think back ... I guess "Home Improvement" was one of the big ones cuz I remember watching that show when I was younger. Going on the show and meeting everyone, that was my first, like, WOW ... seeing the set and the cast and everything else."
MK: What is your favorite song that you've written?
DB: Uh, I like "Makes Me Happy" a lot ... Madeline, what's your favorite song?
MK: "Makes Me Happy"!
DB: Ah, cool! Cuz it makes you happy?
MK: (Giggles) Yeah!
And on that uplifting note, we now happily bid Madeline and Drake a fond adieu -- until, that is, when they meet each other face-to-face at Sunday's concert as the rest of our winner's grand prize goodies kick in.
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The big star
Name: Jared Drake Bell, aka Drake Bell
Age: 22, going on 23 (as of June 27)
Origins: "Next door to Disneyland" (Orange County, Calif.)
Claim to fame, kids: The slender half of "Drake & Josh"
Claim to fame, adults: Told Tom Cruise to "(bleep) off" in "Jerry Maguire"
The big fan
Name: Madeline Kleist
Age: 9
Hometown: Bloomington
School: Epiphany, Normal (fourth grade)
Biggest fans: Mom (Stacey) and Dad (Steve)
Posted Fri, May 8, 2009 @ 3:44pm
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CBS hooks Bell for 'Fish Tank'
Nickelodeon alum Drake Bell ("Drake and Josh") has been tapped to star in the CBS pilot "Fish Tank."
The addition of Bell lifts the cast contingency on the laffer, which will now head into production.
Josh Goldsmith and Cathy Yuspa are the exec producers on "Fish Tank," which comes from Sony Pictures TV. Laffer follows a teen who winds up getting the family house to himself during the week when his parents start commuting.
Bell's credits include "College," "Yours, Mine and Ours" and the Eye's "That's Life."
Meanwhile, "Reaper" cast member Tyler Labine has signed on to star in the Fox comedy pilot "Sons of Tucson."
Labine will play a thirtysomething man who's hired by a group of boys to portray their father while their real dad is in jail. Twentieth Century Fox TV and J2TV are behind the pilot.
Beyond "Reaper," Labine's credits include "Invasion" and the upcoming feature "A Good Old Fashioned Orgy."
Also, Eion Bailey ("ER") is in talks to play one of the leads in CBS' drama pilot "House Rules."
Bailey is expected to play the Wall Street hotshot Alan Levi, who enters politics. ABC Studios and the Mark Gordon Co. are behind the drama.
Bailey's credits include "Band of Brothers," "Almost Famous" and "Fight Club," as well as upcoming indie "The Canyon."
Then there's Natalie Dormer ("Flawless"), who has joined the cast of Fox's Paul Scheuring pilot "Masterwork."
Twentieth Century Fox TV is behind the hourlong. Dormer's credits include "The Tudors."
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Posted Thu, Mar 12, 2009 @ 8:11am
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