Kristen Bell has done it again. After she made headlines for helping fellow “Frozen” star Josh Gad’s family in Florida as Hurricane Irma approached, another of Bell’s famous friends has credited her with saving people from the storm’s approaching wrath.
Actress Jennifer Carpenter, who starred in the TV show “Dexter,” said Bell swooped in to save her aunt and 82-year-old grandmother ― in the nick of time.
On Saturday, the two women had found themselves trapped in Tampa, a city expected to be battered by Irma, with no apparent way out. In an email to HuffPost, Carpenter said her grandma and aunt had been sending pictures of themselves wearing bike helmets in their home. They had planned on hunkering down in a “closet with a blanket and a couple of pillows.”
But “picturing them in there, for what could be 12 hours or more, afraid and in danger was more than I or my family could take,” Carpenter said. “We exhausted every resource we could think of with no luck to move them east.”
That’s when Carpenter said she thought of Bell, a longtime friend.
“I knew Kristen was in Orlando because I saw what she did for Josh,” said Carpenter. “I decided to reach out … and told her what we were up against. I wanted to see if they could sleep in the lobby of her hotel. Or in the hallway. Anything!”
Bell, who had been filming the upcoming movie “Like Father” in Orlando, had not been able to evacuate from the city in time. She’s waiting out the storm at the Walt Disney World Swan and Dolphin Resort, where on Friday she managed to get a room for several of Gad’s family members after hearing they were in trouble.
Gad called her an “angel” for her kindness.
But Bell’s good work did not stop there.
Carpenter said the actress responded to her plea for help “within a matter of moments.” Some of Bell’s coworkers volunteered to “double-up in a room” so Carpenter’s aunt and grandmother “wouldn’t have to brace the storm in a closet.”
“I know that’s the reality for a lot of people right now. I also know that if Kristen could get all of them a room in a safer place, she would do it,” said Carpenter. “She’s like a battery that never loses her charge for the good fight. She deserves a lot of credit for what she does publicly and privately.”
Carpenter said she lacks the words to fully express her gratitude to Bell.
″[My aunt and grandmother] are driving forces in our very small, very close family. Kristen got them to a safer place when we couldn’t. How do you thank someone for that?” she wrote.
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