Costa Rica – Joan Rivers is many things: Funny lady. Jewelry mogul. Red carpet mercenary. But a terrorist?
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Rivers, 76, was deemed a danger to national security and booted from a Newark-bound flight in Costa Rica on Sunday by a jittery Continental Airlines gate agent who found the two names on her passport fishy.
Her passport reads: Joan Rosenberg AKA Joan Rivers. Rosenberg was her late husband’s last name.
The “nasty and cruel” Continental gate agent bumped Rivers from the last flight out and the comedian found herself alone (her daughter, Melissa, flew out to Los Angeles earlier in the day) and with no ATM card and just $100 cash, she said.
Rivers’ tale of woe put a famous face on travel’s new reality – one that leaves many feeling like common criminals.
“If I were going to make up an alias, I wouldn’t pick Rosenberg. I’d pick Jolie or Pitt,” said Rivers, back home in New York with her sense of humor intact. “Do terrorists wear Manolo Blahniks? I can tell you Donna Karan does not make anything that hides a bomb,” she said.
“I tried the tears; they didn’t work. I tried reasoning. I couldn’t bribe because I didn’t have any money,” she said. “I said ‘I’m going to have a heart attack over this,’ so the woman called the paramedics.”
She said a porter, Eldon Ramos, took pity and found a friend to drive her 6-1/2 hours to the main airport in Costa Rica’s capital of San Jose for another flight leaving in the morning.
New York-area travelers were also reporting their own horror stories. “It was just one security checkpoint after the other,” said Carmella Rodriguez, 65, of Brooklyn, after barely making it through customs at Newark with her nephew after arriving from Panama. “I told my nephew I felt like I was a delinquent person.”
Now THAT’S funny!
With all of her face lifts, who could recognize her?
THIs is why i no longer travel by air for pleasure.
As Jackie Mason says: if you ring at security because of a pair if keys- they give you a full rub down, if you ring because of a bomb, they’ll let you right on the plane.
america is clueles on how to do security checks
Reminds me of the story when a salesperson at 47th Street Photo supposedly called the cops when Whoopi Goldberg tried to use a credit card there. He said a “shvartza” with a credit card Goldberg, must be a stolen card.
she will have lots of new material to make jokes about.
dont worry, she will turn this around to her benefit
u gotta take precautions!
I can think of worse places to be stuck in than Costa Rica, like Newark or LaGuardia.
It’s not funny, it’s serious. They are picking on the wrong people who are absolutely harmless and giving them a hard time, while the real terrorists get away with murder (almost). Everyone knows who Joan Rivers is, even, I who doesn’t have a TV. Is this an anti-semitic thing or what?
maybe if she just kept her Jewish last name Rosenberg, then she wouldn’t be in this mess in the first place..(being sarcastic)
Security was probably confused how someone born in 1934 can look like she is 30 years old.
It’s nice to know that it’s safer to fly out of Costa Rica than to fly out of Amsterdam.
If this picture of Mrs. Rivers is recent she has discovered the fountain of youth !!!
so big deal. i was once detained at ben gurion for four hours after arriving at midnight on a flight from europe. and i’m jewish and not a terrorist. these things happen all the time. better to err on the side of caution. i wouldn’t want to be the gate agent who accidentally let the wrong person through and i certainly wouldn’t want to be on the plane when it happens.