Reminder: Always double-check the "To:" field before sending.
Michael Keaton learned this lesson the hard way after an accidental (but hilarious) correspondence with Bradley Cooper.
On the Aug. 25 episode of Late Night With Seth Meyers, Keaton explained that he has a home in Montana, where he regularly rides horses. One day, he decided to treat himself to a custom, handmade saddle and contacted a saddlemaker named Cash Cooper. After a shop visit, the two began emailing to go over details.
"It gets into the minutiae," Keaton explained. "It gets pretty esoteric, you know, unless you know what you're talking about."
The Birdman alum sent messages about everything from the stirrups to the saddle horn. But it wasn't long before he noticed there was something amiss with their exchange.
"He'd respond and then there'd be these gaps and I wouldn't hear from him," Keaton continued. "And I'd go, 'Hey, how ya doing? Just checking in. You know, we were talking about the engraving down at the bottom. Keep it simple.'"
The response? "'Yeah. OK. Ha! Ha!'"
Initially, Keaton shrugged off the replies. But there were more red flags as time went on, including when the Oscar nominee emailed an idea and the saddlemaker seemed disinterested.
"He'd go, 'Sure.' Something like, 'OK, whatever,'" Keaton continued. "'I'd go, 'Whatever?'"
After a while, Keaton realized his error. "He emails me back, 'Who is this?' I go, 'Who is this? What are you talking about who is this?'" he recalled. "I had been mistakenly emailing Bradley Cooper the whole time. And he's on the other end going, 'What the f--k is he even talking about? I don't even know what this means.'"
Luckily, both actors laughed off the whole thing. "I thought it was hysterical," Keaton said. "And I email him back and I go, 'Oh man, that is so funny…' And he goes, 'Yeah, I was kind of rolling along with it, but I didn't know what I was supposed to say.' And he said, 'I thought it was really a great gag, but I kind of ran out, you know, because you were getting really specific with that stuff.'"
Watch the video to hear Keaton tell the whole story.
(E! and NBC are both part of the NBCUniversal family).