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Thursday, March 28
The Indiana Daily Student

arts iu auditorium

Meryl Streep tickets gone in hours

All 3,100 available tickets for Meryl Streep’s April 16 lecture at IU were distributed in just a few hours Monday. 

An orderly line filled the IU Auditorium’s lobby as 522 students and community members filed through, waiting between 45 minutes to almost an hour and a half before stepping up to the ticket windows.

“I’ve always loved Meryl,” senior Madeline Dinges said while waiting in line. “I think she’s the epitome of classy Hollywood.”

Katie Williams left her home in Indianapolis at 7 a.m. Monday morning in order to pick up fellow IU-Purdue University Indianapolis senior Kevin Boling in Terre Haute.
They arrived in Bloomington to get their tickets at 11 a.m.

“I would walk through a pile of broken glass to see Meryl Streep,” Boling said, laughing.

Williams and Boling said they both saw Streep when she spoke on campus with Jane Pauley in 2010.

“At the end when they were wrapping up, there was this moment of awkward silence, and I screamed, ‘I love you!’” Boling said. “And then she looked at me, and she blew me a kiss.”

Streep will visit campus to speak as part of the Jorgensen Guest Filmmaker Lecture Series and to accept an honorary doctoral degree from the University.

“Given the number of calls we received about the event, we were prepared to handle a large crowd, and I believe the distribution process went very smoothly,” Maria Talbert, associate director of the IU Auditorium, said.

Despite the quick distribution Monday, those interested in going will have one more opportunity to possibly attend: a standby line will be recognized starting at 1 p.m. the day of the lecture.

Tickets for the event were free, but the public must be in their seats by 2:50 p.m. Any returned or unused tickets will be given to people in the standby line on a first come, first served basis, Talbert said.

IU Cinema will also show several films starring Streep in her honor, including her most recent work, “August: Osage County,” throughout April and May. 

“It makes me so happy to know that she’s getting that honorary doctorate,” Williams said. “We’re IU students too, so it feels nice to have something in common with Meryl Streep.”

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