The RUSH premiere in London yesterday was never going to be the usual red carpet parade of a normal film debut, but it went from good to fantastic when two proper McLaren F1 cars arrived.
Yes, that's a 1970s McLaren M23 (looks like Emerson Fittipaldi's 1974 car to me) and a championship-winning 2008 MP4-23. Jenson Button was behind the wheel of the Cosworth V8 classic and Checo Perez drove the ear-splitting Mercedes-powered youngtimer.
How ear splitting? You can see visible pain written on these spectators faces in this clip. That's F1 for you.
Given that Woking, where McLaren is headquartered, is only about 30 miles from central London, it shouldn't be a huge surprise that these cars showed up. That doesn't make it any less cool.
Sadly, McLaren forgot to bring Jenson a chair.
All the stars were at the event, including Olivia Wilde, who forgot to wear a shirt.
Ron Howard was there with his wife, Tamara Ecclestone arrived and was very Tamara Ecclestone-ey, F1 reporter Natalie Pinkham came dressed as Mr. B Natural, and McLaren head honcho Ron Dennis looked as cheerful as he ever does.
If you ask me, it was the members of the F1 circus that were the best to see outside of their usual environment.
From right to left is David "Cheesegrater Chin" Coulthard, Niki Lauda and his wife, former Senna rival Gerhard Berger, and the inimitable Jackie Stewart.
Mr. Muppet looked happy as always.
Oh, and this period Ferrari was hanging out at the after party, too. I thought it was worth including.
Basically, now I can't wait to see RUSH's American debut at the Jalopnik Film Festival on the 19th. If anyone out there has a spare F1 car they want to ship out to Brooklyn, give us a call.
Photo Credits: Getty Images