A UCLA graduate student recently sent a video request through social media site Facebook, Twitter and Youtube to actor Joseph Gordon-Levitt. She asked the movie star for a coffee date.
"After a year of living with this, I have decided to get back on the dating scene and I'd like my first date to be with you."
Lindsey Miller is battling pancreatic nueroendocrine cancer and made a connection with the movie star after watching his recent film, "50/50."
Gordon-Levitt plays a young man who is diagnosed with cancer. The story is based on the personal struggles with the disease by the movie's writer Will Reiser.
"The movie really struck a chord with me because I had gone through a lot of the things that happened in the movie," Miller, 26, said.
Diagnosed with cancer last year, she had surgery in December 2010 to remove half of her pancreas and liver, her spleen and gallbladder. She is currently on an oral chemotherapy regiment.
"I never thought it would work or that it would get any views," Miller said of the You Tube post that had more than 133-thousand views since she posted the video on Monday.
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She said she decided to put up the video because it was unlikely she would have the opportunity and courage to ask out Gordon-Levitt in person.
"I would like to know what it was like to get into the character because I think a lot of young adults. The contact that they have with cancer is that they have older family members that died from it," Miller said.
She is part of a UCLA cancer support group of 20 and 30-somethings battling various forms of the disease. Miller also began writing her physical and emotional experiences in a blog as a way to deal with the ups and downs of her situation.
"As my blog says now, 'I am a liver.’ I'm living and just trying to take each day at a time," Miller added.
Miller is grateful for the support of her friends and family. In fact it was her friend Jessica Levco, a former co-worker at Ragan Communications, a publishing company, who coaxed her into making the video. Levco flew out from her home in Chicago in part to tape the scripted video.
"At first I think she was a little hesitant about making the video but I gave her some convincing arguments," Levco said. "I think that it's been great that she's been able to expose a lot of people to her blog and the type of cancer that she has and bring more awareness about it."
"Take the focus off, you have cancer that sucks and make it more you have cancer that sucks but you are also writing about it and you're dealing with it really well," Miller added.
Still a dreamy date with the movie star would be ideal. Miller has been inspired by recent acceptances to similar requests by Justin Timberlake and Mila Kunis. But what if he says no?
"I have gotten more date requests than I ever thought in my life that I would get," she added, laughing hysterically.
KNBC and NBC LA reached out to Gordon-Levitt's representatives at Slate PR asking if he would accept the coffee date. His representatives did not immediately respond to the request.
The actor is believed to be in New York City where in the last day he has posted his own videos to Facebook of Occupy Wall Street and about the pre-sale of his new book, The Tiny Book of Tiny Stories.
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