Throughout my long life, I have come across so many celebrities, you just name them, including kings and queens, presidents and premiers, ministers and ambassadors, renowned astronauts and world-class scientists, movie and theater megastars. But I keep the photo of only one of them on the wall of my study at home, and that is the perennially shining and truly incomparable Audrey Hepburn.
That memorable encounter with her took place several decades ago in Atlanta, Georgia, USA. As fate would have it, I worked for several years at one of the local television stations there, in the capacity of a TV reporter. That’s exactly when I won the well-known Regional Emmy Award and was nominated for the national one—a fact that truly surprised all of Georgia at the time.
Imagine: just another Georgian young man, who grew up under a stark communist regime and couldn’t exactly boast of any extraordinary personal qualities, suddenly found himself in America and appeared full-size on American television, to be seen on screen by millions. It was a real miracle—no more, no less!
It’s understandable that others didn’t quite believe what was happening, but I myself could hardly accept it as true. When the Soviet Union broke up, the United States and Georgia exchanged television journalists. Don’t be overly surprised: this was the time when the Soviet state security had loosened its ideological grip, and traveling abroad had become easier, and so an American TV journalist came to Georgia, and his Georgian counterpart went to America. The mission was to tell the respective Georgian and American audiences stories about each other’s countries through the eyes of those two journalists. The project was so interesting and timely that it even aimed for the Nobel Peace Prize. Jokes absolutely aside!
It was truly difficult to imagine a regular Soviet ‘animal,’ dressed in the skin of a journalist, unabashedly opening his mouth to talk to Americans about anything that came to mind. Eventually, all went well. The Americans absolutely loved my journalistic work. I returned home peacefully. The local Georgian television broadcast all my American stories and turned me into a real celebrity overnight.
Fans were so eager to talk to me in the street and take pictures with me that I even began avoiding my usual outdoor activities. Yes, I was the lucky one chosen by the Party Central Committee and the KGB to fulfill this great mission. And they surely had their reasons—I knew English better than most, and I had some experience in journalism to cope with this strange new opportunity.
So, that lucky morning, when I arrived at the TV station in Atlanta, the head producer told me to get ready for a very interesting assignment. Soon, I learned that an interview with a famous Hollywood megastar was in store for me. I was going to meet the great Audrey Hepburn herself!
I thought I would die of excitement before reaching the destination. And, finally, the cherished moment arrived. There she was, wasted away and fragile, wrinkles covering her beautiful face, but her faded eyes still carrying that killer spark. I thought I was in the 1953 Roman Holiday.
Gregory Peck, move over—I thought—my time has come.
And then, having returned to reality, we did the job we were supposed to do. The interview went very humanely, professionally, and attractively. We spent a couple of hours together. At that time, Audrey Hepburn was serving as UNICEF’s Goodwill Ambassador-at-Large.
She felt the blight and desperation of children throughout the world as deeply as she had once embraced the subtle nuances of the roles she had played during her extremely meaningful life.
The interview came out light and business-like. None of us said anything particularly profound or world-changing that would attract the attention of all humankind, but every word she spoke, both on and off camera, was full of love and kindness. Our entire conversation was marked by her genuine desire to serve mankind in her new capacity as a goodwill ambassador of the United Nations.
I thought I shouldn’t torture her with the pronunciation of my full Georgian name, so I told her to call me Nug. I said that’s what everybody called me. And she repeated it. I was so happy and proud! Then, I softly touched her fragile hand, thinking her fingers might break in my palm, but I was spared.
At that time, there were no cell phones with cameras, and one of my good acquaintances, an American photographer (the press was, of course, present at the interview), took our picture. He asked us to stand together, and we, for just a brief instant, leaned gently toward each other, posing for the snap. Then, just another twinkle of an eye, and we said farewell.
“I will never see her again,” I thought.
Some time passed, and my photo-artist friend brought me that now-famous photo of ours. With a slight grudge, he told me: “Nug, you don’t even know what this means.” Indeed!
Blog by Nugzar B. Ruhadze
