Coldplay’s Chris Martin is getting kudos from a fan he noticed struggling along a street on the way to his concert, and gave her a ride.
The fan, Saundra Glenn, has osteoarthritis and was laboriously making her way to see the band perform at Radio 1’s Big Weekend, an annual music festival in Luton, U.K., when she stopped to lean against a railing.
Exhausted from walking on her “dodgy right hip,” Glenn contemplated turning around, going home and watching the show from her living room.
But at that moment a black Mercedes appeared, and everything changed.
“A lady puts her head out the window on the passenger side and says, ‘Can we help you? You seem to be struggling. Can we give you a lift?’” Glenn later told BBC Audio. “I said, ‘Oh, that would be lovely.’ Then the back slides open, the side door, and I say, ‘That’s Chris Martin!’ He goes, ‘Yes.’”
“I can’t get in with you!” she told him. “He goes, ‘Come on in.’”
Her first thought was how ungainly she felt.
“I thought, ‘Oh my, how do I get in and be dignified? Because I’m — you know, my leg, I have to push it in, I thought, ‘I’m not going to look graceful.’”
But get in she did, declining his offer of help, and tweeted to tell about it.
“That moment when Chris Martin saw me struggling to walk, stopped and gave me a lift to BBC Accessible,” Glenn posted on X along with a photo of the pair. “We had a lovely chat too. Plus he likes Luton.”
That moment when Chris Martin @Coldplay saw me struggling to walk, stopped and gave me a lift to #BBC Accessible.
Xx
We had a lovely chat too. Plus he likes #Luton.I loved his #song for us.
What a booming amazing time. And what a decent bloke ❤️#BigWeekend#SeeMyLuton pic.twitter.com/BgQooFXcWe
— Saundra Glenn 💙 (@OfficialSaundra) May 26, 2024
They chatted about Luton, the approximately 220,000-population British town about 35 miles northwest of London, about her osteoarthritis, and about how at 64 she had already surpassed her late parents’ ages.
“You’re not going anywhere yet,” Martin told her.
After they pulled up to the artist area at the venue, Martin made sure a golf cart came to take her where she needed to go.
One thing Glenn didn’t worry about was the time.
“I won’t be late,” she told the singer, “Because I’m with you.”
