My "Welcome to Hollywood" experience says it all...
I was freshly moved to town and my first steady gig was a popular steak house in Beverly Hills that was heavily patronized by Hollywood's leading VIPs, so seeing people of interest was kind of normal. The night that killed me however, was about three weeks after I'd started working there and they hosted a special event; a tribute to a Big Band guy named Horace Heidt, who seems to have been the guy responsible for launching numerous careers in Hollywood given that the "low end" celebrities present were Pat Bucktrum (Mr. Heany from Green Acres), the Van Patten and King Family's with people like Bob Hope, Carey Grant and Lucille Ball representing the top of the heap...
To put it kindly, I was shaking in my shoes for most of the night in that I was doing table magic. Donna King however, took a liking to me and started dragging me all over the club introducing me to folks and having me perform... it was nuts!
What did I do?
Sponge Balls, Cups & Balls, Matrix... classics all the way around and every single one of them loved it. Carey Grant (who happened to be on the Board of Directors for the Magic Castle) patted me on the back and said that he appreciated those that weren't trying to do all the show-off stuff and simply presented solid, simple and elegant magic.
I rarely get star struck but that particular night was very overwhelming for a kid from the Midwest that only dealt with major celebrities one on one a few times a year, not being in the middle of a herd of them and feeling very, very insignificant...