Of all the encounters I had all of them were very pleasant and the people were always polite. Never ran into one of those "jerk" types.
Ditto for me. Worked at a five-star resort in Hawaii for a few years. There were always celebrities there, including royalty at times.
Except for a couple people, most were charming. One of them even jumped in to help my co-worker and me set up chairs for an event and he could see we were running a little behind.
I've started paying more attention to movies in recent years and, while I don't follow the gossip sites, I do read reviews and interviews. The impression is steadily growing on me that 90 percent of the celebrities are generally pretty gracious, many of them extremely so. As in other fields, there is a small minority of jerks and nightmare cases that give everyone a bad name. And of course, drugs and alcohol sometimes get involved.
It's also true that the big celebrities live under a constant microscope. The paparazzi have always been there, but now everybody has a smart phone with a camera. It must be a nightmare to be photographed every time you step out onto the street, go shopping, or sit down in a restaurant. Everyone has an occasional bad day and anyone can get snappish when they're tired, upset, or have just been pestered one too many times in the last 15 minutes. But the celebs now live in an environment in which every bad moment gets captured and often goes viral.
I don't move in movie circles, don't hang out in clubs, and probably wouldn't recognize more than a dozen celebs if they were sitting right next to me. If I saw a celeb on the street, I wouldn't accost them. I've worked around politics most of my life. When I see political people out of uniform, off the clock, doing real people things in the real world, I leave them alone. They get harassed too much and it contributes to their tendency to self-isolation. They are entitled to private lives and time with their families. The same goes for movie people and other celebs.
That said, I have gone to a few local film festivals that were within range as well as a couple of "special appearance" type events involving movies in which I have an interest. There's nothing to it; just buy a ticket or two and drive out to see the film(s). My personal encounters with the tribe are therefore extremely limited. I can think of five somewhat recognizable actor/director types that I've met and a larger number of movie people who are basically unknowns. In my limited experience, all have been perfectly normal people. They were all present to work an event so they arrived in a fan service frame of mind to begin with, but they were still easy going, personable, attentive, responsive, etc., and they honestly seemed to be enjoying themselves talking about their craft. These weren't top tier, red carpet events that they had to go to because the studio demanded it; they were doing a favor for a friend and could have begged off if they wanted to. No head cases. No handlers or bodyguards. No one was watching the clock. They all stayed until they had answered every question and taken every picture, and they were among the last out of the room.
These weren't mass attendance events with a crush of crazy fans; they were small enough that one could have a short conversation in a relaxed way. And these weren't the mega A-list names whose presence would automatically generate a mob environment. All of that helped. But even many of the mega A-listers have the reputation of being very nice when encountered in a civilized environment.
I live in DC, so targets of opportunity do appear. My most recent such adventure was the Middleburg Film Festival, which was a completely lovely event that had several excellent movies that were on my list. Only one of the several venues was a theater; the rest were local buildings (community center, a church, a school) with a room big enough for an improvised screen and a jury-rigged sound system. Several of the directors (I don't recall any actors) made appearances and stayed around for discussion. It has certainly given me a whole new perspective on the industry. There are hundreds of such small, low profile festivals around the country. Check one out sometime, just to get a flavor of that strange world that we do so much complaining about. You will find out that a lot of the people aren't strange at all; they just have an unusual and pretty interesting way of making a living, and most of them seem to be grateful for the opportunity. And grateful to the audiences who ultimately make it all possible.