Meeting Beau van Erven Dorens
Sometimes meeting famous television personalities can be underwhelming. Many take their TV egos, personalities and sometimes, arrogance with them into the real life. After all many of them think their fictional persona have to be maintained for whatever reasons. In The Netherlands Africa Web TV has met some B or C list TV personalities before and sometimes one felt like, what’s the point?!
Beau van Erven Dorens is as big as any TV personality in The Netherlands. He has fronted some of the biggest Dutch television programs past and present. He is to say the least a household name. Meeting Beau while he was filming an episode for his Dutch TV program; Het is hier Fantastisch” (a holiday program) was a refreshing experience.
The setting was The Gambia in the last week of January. Africa Web TV was in the country for some other stories when we got to hear that Beau was coming to town. We immediately thought it would be nice to have a couple of shots of him while at work to use for a larger video we might make about holidaying in The Gambia. It was a long shot based on our previous experience with a couple of Dutch TV personalities. However, sometimes the past counts for nothing. You just have to focus on here and now. When we got to where we knew he was going to be, he was already at work surrounded by his crew. We managed to ask one of the crew members if we could take some pictures of him. No problem.
During the break, we went over to make pictures and Beau was ever so friendly. There were so many others wanting to take pictures of and/or with him. To all he was open, friendly and all smiles while he engaged the people in all kinds of small talk. There was no trace of arrogance. Beau has a street reputation of being this upper class, spoilt and smooth talking guy. Well if he was, he either left those coats at home in Holland or he is really a very good actor too! From what we were able to see and observe, he is just your average Joe who happens to be good in what he does.
At Africa Web TV, we are not carpetbaggers. We are polite and friendly. So we decided to ask one of his crew members if Beau would be willing to have a word with Africa Web TV. “NO!” came the response. He is really very busy and would not like to be bothered. We explained that we were not asking for an hour long interview. We were just intending to ask one simple question about The Gambia. The guy relented and told us we could approach him. Once Beau’s break was over, we approached him and explained what we wanted. He was all smiles and was willing to appear on camera. He waited patiently while we set up our camera and microphone.
We could do it in Dutch or in English, we explained to him. He said it was okay to do it in English. He held the Africa Web TV microphone up and was ready to go! He introduced himself and we asked what his first impressions of The Gambia were. He gave his answers in his typical and recognisable way, beaming and breaming with a hidden smile across his face. We managed one more question and he was clearly ready to answer more questions if we wanted. But we know how to keep our promises and not to abuse our chances. So we said that was all and express our gratitude. He wanted to know more about Africa Web TV which we gladly obliged. We also told him one of our goals this year was to do some broadcast in the Dutch language. Before we knew it, he was offering to do the whole interview again in Dutch! Yes we set up the camera again and he gave a Dutch version of the earlier answer! We were really happy at this!
We wished him a nice stay in The Gambia and released him to get back to filming his own program. The Africa Web TV year is clearly beginning 2015 on a positive note and we could use a bit of Beau to brighten up our day! He is such a nice guy. It was a chance encounter and we are glad he is part of the Africa Web TV footprints now.
