A Cincinnati photographer and a couple whose engagement session she was shooting got a bit of a celebrity surprise Sunday night at Yellow Springs Brewery when comedian Dave Chappelle photobombed them.
Jaycee Brammer of Jaycee Marie Photo had been shooting photos for couple Tommy Saunders and Emily Eldridge at a nearby nature preserve when they decided they wanted some more urban shots so they headed into Yellow Springs to visit the town's brewery.
The brewery was packed so the trio decided to go out back with some beers and continue the shoot, when Chappelle walked in.
"As they're waiting in line to order, my husband, who comes to my shoots with me, was like, 'Hey. Dave Chappelle just walked in.' And I was like, 'What the heck? What's going on?' Clearly, I want a picture of him for my Instagram — this is so cool; nobody famous is ever in Ohio. And he's like, 'No. Don't be weird. Stay calm.' And I was like fine," Brammer says.
Chappelle, who has a home outside of Yellow Springs, makes frequent appearances in town.
"So we go outside and I'm taking some shots of them and (Chappelle) walks outside and is smoking and like drinking his beer wearing that huge coat in the photos and he's like 15 feet away from us and there's nobody else out there, just us and him, and I'm kind of looking at the couple and they were looking at me kind of like, 'What's the move here? How do we go about this?' I said you could ask him, just be polite, like you have to ask — you can't not."
Tommy, a big fan of Chappelle's, walked over and asked him if he would be in an engagement photo with them.
"He was like, 'I really appreciate it. That's so nice you're fans, but I don't take photos with people — it's just not something I do.' And we're like, 'OK, that's fine.' We understood; it's his hometown — he doesn't want people being like if we go here, we'll see him, so we were understanding, and he was just so nice," Brammer says.
The three continued their shoot as Chappelle stood outside and then seemed to change his mind.
"He stood around for a couple more minutes and then he looks at me and he's like, 'Maybe I'll just photobomb one,' and he kind of laughed," Brammer says. "I was like OK — I'm sure my eyes were so wide. So I snapped the photos and he kind of laughs and steps back away from us again and then we finish our shoot and a couple minutes later we're looking through (the photos) and he's kind of looking over like, 'I wonder how they turned out,' and I walked over and I showed him and it was just so weird because he was so normal. He was like, 'Oh man. Those are so sweet, we're gonna go viral.'"
"I just laughed," Brammer says.
But Chappelle seems to have been right — Brammer has already been contacted by multiple media outlets, including the UK's BBC News.
*A previous version of this story had Chappelle's name spelled incorrectly
