Last Man Standing: Tales from Tinseltown

by Moore, Roger

  At one point Zsa Zsa was married to George Sanders, he was husband number three of nine I think, but she was also having a great affair with Rubirosa (aka Mr Ever Ready). Porfirio Rubirosa was a Dominican diplomat whose reputation as a playboy far exceeded any political accomplishments and was only matched by stories of his sexual prowess. His larger-than-average penis actually inspired restaurant waiters to name the gigantic pepper mills ‘Rubirosas’. Many women, and some men, have assured me he was indeed built like a stallion, and his penchant for rich women saw him marry heiresses Doris Duke and Barbara Hutton among three other wives.

  George was obviously aware of something going on between his wife and the playboy and returned home one day, just before Christmas, propped a ladder up against the bedroom window and caught the duo in mid-service. The ensuing flash of a camera bulb quite put Rubirosa off his stroke, and there was a mad scramble out of the bed as George gently descended his ladder, and let himself in through the front door to wait at the foot of the stairs.

  Zsa Zsa and Rubirosa sheepishly descended.

  ‘Merry Christmas, Zsa Zsa ... and to you Rubi,’ he said in his deliciously wonderful sardonic voice, before leaving. They divorced the following April, and Rubirosa continued his womanizing ways elsewhere.

  Zsa Zsa had followed her younger sister Eva to Hollywood, and it was Eva I knew better, having worked with her in The Last Time I Saw Paris. I was having a cup of coffee with her in her trailer one day, between set-ups, and Bill Shanks the First Assistant Director appeared and said, ‘Eva, you’re in the next shot.’

  ‘Oh my goodness,’ she said, leaping up and taking off a diamond ring the size of a baseball. ‘I didn’t have this on in the last shot, Bill. Would you look after it for me?’

  ‘I’ll put it in my trouser pocket,’ Bill suggested. ‘Is it worth much?’

  ‘About $50,000,’ replied Eva.

  ‘Oh my god!’ shouted Bill. ‘Someone will cut my goddamn leg off for it!’

  ‘Don’t worry, dahlin’,’ she replied. ‘It was only two nights’ hard work.’

  That was the difference between her and her sister – Zsa Zsa would have said it was ‘only one night’s hard work’.

  Eva was very down to earth and nothing really fazed her. One day, while on the road publicizing a film, Eva was staying in a fairly grand hotel suite that had an interconnecting door with her publicist’s room. They were due to appear at a television studio, so the publicist knocked on said door at the designated hour, entered and stood patiently waiting for Eva in her sitting room. Moments later, Eva, having thought she heard something, walked into the room absolutely naked apart from multiple layers of jewels.

  Without missing a beat she spread her arms, gave a twirl and said, ‘Well, Jeffrey? How do I look?’

  Shelley Winters always had a great reputation for being good fun on set. We made a film together called That Lucky Touch in Belgium in 1975, and late one evening in the depths of winter we were preparing for a night shoot. The set-up was that I was to be filmed hanging around outside on a window ledge and then had to go off to a field somewhere – the details escape me but it was bloody cold. Consequently, my wardrobe man had procured all manner of thermal underwear for me. At one point, Shelley walked in to my dressing room to discuss something, and noticed all my long johns and vests hanging over the chair.

  ‘What are all those?’ she asked.

  ‘My warm underwear,’ I replied.

  ‘If it’s going to be cold, then I want some as well,’ she said, and picked up a selection of mine.

  In the film, Shelley was playing Diana, the brassy wife of the American General (played by Lee J. Cobb) and she certainly stole every scene she was in – along with making an indelible imprint on my memory when she alighted, in character, from the General’s car on our location wearing a lovely, warm fur coat. Just as she stepped out of the car she flashed at us – wearing nothing underneath apart from rolls of ample flesh all held in place by my white thermals.

  Shelley Winters eyes up my socks – after all, she’d already taken my long johns ... At the Garrick Club in London for a party after filming That Lucky Touch in 1975, with (front row, l to r) Shelley, Lee J. Cobb, Susannah York; (back row) Jean-Pierre Cassel, Sydne Rome and Raf Vallone.

  Shelley had a great sense of humour. One evening we were shooting in a chateau and while we were waiting for everything to be set up, Lee and half the crew – and yours truly – were playing poker. Lee was a great card enthusiast. Enter Shelley Winters, sweet-faced and innocent.

  ‘Oh! What’s this game?’ she asked, in wonderment.

  ‘Poker,’ Lee replied.

  ‘Oh, I think I played that once. May I join in?’ she asked with bashful sweetness.

  Lee beckoned her to pull up a chair, and within thirty minutes she’d cleaned us all out! We knew never to play with her again.

  A few years later, an up-and-coming young director, no doubt still wet behind the ears, was considering Shelley for a role in a film and asked her to audition. Now, you don’t ask stars of Shelley’s calibre to audition: you invite them to lunch to discuss a role, but you don’t ask them to come in and read! If anybody had suggested that to me, I’d have told them where to shove their script. But Shelley loved to work and – somewhat surprisingly to those around her – agreed to meet the director at his office and run through some lines. She duly reported, but arrived carrying an enormous bag over one shoulder.

  The director gave the usual flannel about being delighted she had come in to read, and how he’d heard nothing but great things about her. He suggested they go through a scene but as Shelley sat down, she opened her bag, rummaged around in it for a bit, pulled out an Oscar statuette and put it down on the desk. Then she rummaged around again, and pulled out a second Oscar statuette.

  ‘So,’ she asked. ‘Do I still need to audition?’

  Diana Dors was perhaps the Rank Organisation’s most glamorous blonde bombshell in the 1950s and 60s – and often regarded as the British Marilyn Monroe. She told the most hilarious story of returning to her hometown of Swindon to open a local fair, where the Mayor was due to introduce her to the gathered crowds but was conscious of not messing up his welcoming speech, in which he intended to refer to Diana by her birth name of Diana Fluck. He didn’t want to fluck it up, you see.

  The fair was about to commence and the rather nervous dignitary took to the podium. ‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ he began. ‘Today we are joined by a star of the big screen – and someone we are very proud to say was born in Swindon. You know her today as Diana Dors, but Swindon knows her better as – Diana Clunt!’

  Diana wet herself with laughter.

  Oh, and another story about Diana Dors was related to me by my old neighbour from Denham, Jess Conrad. Occasionally Jess would accompany Di to cabaret functions, as she liked to have someone to present her with a big bouquet after her act – as well as help ensure the money was paid up front. ‘Always get the money when you arrive,’ she told Jess, ‘as afterwards you’re introduced to friends, family and the champagne comes out ... and everyone forgets about the business.’

  Anyhow, this one particular evening they arrived at a club and were shown into the manager’s office and after the usual, ‘Hello ... what a thrill it is ...’ etc., the manager showed them his prized plant. Well it wasn’t so much a plant, Jess said, as a triffid-like vine, and he proudly described how rare it was, how unusual that one should survive in such a climate and so on.

  ‘Lovely,’ said Di, feigning interest. ‘But shall we do the business side of the deal, darling?’

  After paying the money over, the manager said his office was to be Di’s dressing room and that she should come and go as she liked. There was just one small snag, which Di hadn’t realized until a few minutes before she was due to go on stage: there was no en suite bathroom. Come the time that she did realize, in her full outfit, made-up and looking a million dollars, she suddenly also realized that she was desperate to gain some relief, bu
t didn’t want to have to walk through the assembled crowd to go to the loo – what would that do to her big entrance a couple of minutes later?

  Ah, dear Diana Dors, a bundle of fun and a force to be reckoned with. I look a little concerned that the moose is going to take off, while Carol Hawkins looks on, bemused.

  ‘Well, what can we do?’ asked Jess, in a panic. ‘They’re all standing outside the door waiting for you.’

  Di looked around the room and spotted the plant. I won’t go into the detail but I’m sure you know where this story is going ...

  ‘And you thought a horse could pee!’ laughed Jess to me some time later.

  After her cabaret, Di went back into the manager’s office for a glass of champagne but there was a bit of a kerfuffle as she found the manager almost in tears, leaning over his prized plant, which was no longer growing vertically but was lying, lifeless, horizontal across the floor.

  ‘Oh, we won’t stay, Jess,’ said Di matter-of-factly. ‘We’ve got a long drive home.’ And with that they made their escape – they were in hysterics all the way!

  I can’t resist a toilet story, if you’ll forgive me for dwelling in the smallest room for a moment more, and this one involves Tallulah Bankhead, a hugely successful American actress whose fame was such that, for example, she was the first choice to play Scarlett O’Hara in Gone with the Wind (only for her thirty-six years to appear a few too many when the decision was made to switch from black-and-white to glorious Technicolor, and instead the role went to Vivien Leigh, a mere decade younger ...).

  Anyhow, fame aside, Tallulah was notorious for being mean with money and the story goes that she was in a lavatory in Hollywood and discovered there was no paper. With that she knocked on the wall of the next cubicle and pushed under a $10 bill.

  ‘Can you split that for two fives?’ she asked her neighbouring occupant.

  Actually, Tallulah was deported from Britain in the early 1930s, reportedly after having worked her way through most of the boys – and many of the Masters – at Eton public school, and Scotland Yard declared her a menace.

  Incidentally, when the opening night of the London musical Gone with the Wind (which starred June Ritchie and not Miss Bankhead, but don’t let that get in the way of me telling a good story) was marred by an obnoxious young actress and a horse that relieved itself onstage, Noel Coward was in the audience and was heard to say, ‘If they’d stuffed the child’s head up the horse’s arse, they would have solved two problems at once.’ He did have such a way with words!

  As I started this chapter with a feisty – and fun – princess, I think it only right that I should end it with another one ... And you know how I like to drop the odd royal name here and there, when I can.

  I first met Princess Lilian of Sweden on a visit to Stockholm for UNICEF, my first visit to the country, in fact, and Ingvar Hjartso, my liaison and contact in Sweden, had arranged a visit to the Royal Palace. The King and Queen were away at the time, so left Princess Lilian to meet with me. I discovered that she had in fact been born in Wales and had been a model, at one point married to actor Ivan Craig. She met Prince Bertil of Sweden when she was in her twenties and they fell in love, but it was many years before they were given permission to marry. Prince Bertil’s elder brother, the future King, had died very young, when his son and heir was only one year old, meaning if the reigning monarch died before the child, Carl Gustav, came of age, Bertil would have to assume the role of Prince Regent – and him being married to a commoner, and a divorcee, was not something the constitution would allow.

  With Princess Lilian, the Duchess of Halland, a wonderful lady and a great friend.

  However, when Carl Gustav did come of age and ascended directly to the throne, he granted Bertil and Lilian permission to marry in 1976.

  Princess Lilian was greatly loved by the Swedish nation and deservedly so as she had a wonderful sense of fun, as well as duty, as I discovered when we went to lunch at a restaurant in the old town. I must admit that I sat rather stiffly for the first ten minutes, until the Princess pointed at my wine glass and said, ‘Will you hurry up and bloody well skol me as a lady can’t drink in this country until she is skoled!’

  We became firm friends, and my wife Kristina also knew Princess Lilian through her oldest friend Ewa Wretman, who was married to the great Swedish cook Tore Wretman. Ewa, Tore and the Princess spent many happy times together at their holiday homes in the South of France.

  And while I’m ‘princess name-dropping’, with Princess Anne at a Wildlife Fund Gala in 1970.

  Tore Wretman, by the way, became a great friend – and was another person with a fascinating backstory. He began his career in the kitchen at the age of sixteen as an apprentice at the Hotel Continental in Stockholm; he swiftly moved to positions at the Opera Bar in Stockholm and then Maxim’s in Paris, where he learned all about French cuisine under legendary chef Louis Barth.

  When war came Tore spent a few years in the United States where, in 1941, he signed on a Finnish cargo ship for the return trip home. However, the ship was boarded by the British fleet near Iceland and Tore was taken to the Orkney Islands then on to London until 1943, when he was finally able to return to Sweden and a job as head waiter at Operakällaren – without doubt the finest, and my favourite, restaurant in Stockholm. In 1945, aged only twenty-nine, Tore was able to buy his own restaurant and, later, went on to take over Operakällaren. He became the favoured chef of the Royal Family and, in particular, Princess Lilian.

  Whenever Kristina and I were in Stockholm we would meet the Princess for tea and would also enjoy many dinners together. Sadly, the last few years of her ninety-seven-year life were complicated by illness and she was forced to withdraw from public life. We were unable to attend Princess Lilian’s funeral in 2013, despite the Swedish press reporting we were there, but we were able to attend her memorial service in the September, where we all shared our many immensely happy and fond memories of our times with the Princess.

  With my two bodyguards on my spiritual – and literal – home turf: Pinewood Studios, where I’ve kept an office for over forty years.

  CHAPTER 2

  The Pinewood Years

  LONG BEFORE HOLLYWOOD BECKONED ME, I FOUND MYSELF auditioning for a film at London’s Pinewood Studios. Little did I realize that it would be my home three decades later for a major TV series and seven Bond films. But before I get to that, I thought it might be an idea to start where I started – and that was at the very epicentre of the British film industry: Wardour Street in London’s Soho district, though admittedly my first cartoon filler-in job was on D’Arblay Street just around the corner.

  It was such an exciting experience for a cinema buff like me to walk along seeing all the familiar logos of the major film companies, including ABPC (at Film House, 142 Wardour Street), Rank (at 127), British Lion, Paramount, Hammer (at Hammer House 113-117), Columbia, Warner-Pathé and others that were all congregated on this one magical road. Wardour Street was named after Sir Archibald Wardour, the architect of many of its buildings, though along with all the famous film interests it also had its share of, shall we say, more ‘dubious’ operators in the area and this caused the street to be known – even on the sunniest of days – as ‘shady on both sides’.

  It was to here that hopeful producers ventured with scripts firmly tucked under their arms, would-be directors wooed film chiefs over lunch, and some aspiring actors even attended auditions.

  Many of the aforementioned companies also, at one point or another, controlled the film studios where yours truly hankered to work – Rank owned Pinewood and Denham, ABPC owned Elstree, British Lion controlled Shepperton, and Hammer were out at Bray. While there were smaller concerns at Beaconsfield, Ealing and Southall, it was the larger studios that offered the most tantalizing prizes – Pinewood being the largest of all.

  In 1947 the view across the fields on the approach road to Pinewood was broken only by a cluster of tall pine trees, and then, as if from nowhere, appe
ared the mock-Tudor double-lodge entrance, and a friendly commissionaire. It was just like arriving at a stately home.

  At that time I was a rather green twenty-year-old lieutenant serving in the Combined Services Entertainment Unit and being tested for the male lead in The Blue Lagoon. It marked the beginning of my long association with the studio and now aged eighty-six I am Pinewood’s oldest (and longest-serving) resident, as I moved in to my office there during 1970, when I began work on the TV series The Persuaders! and I’ve been paying rent ever since.

  An early publicity shot from MGM.

  British film mogul J. Arthur Rank opened his Pinewood Studios in 1936 as his dream rival to Hollywood; the final syllable of which, plus the abundance of pine trees on the 100-acre site, gave him the name. When I first turned up, the studio hadn’t long reopened after being used during the war as a base for the army, RAF and Crown Film Units making documentaries. One stage was also requisitioned by the Royal Mint – some say that was the first time that Pinewood had made any money.

  Just before my arrival, great film-makers were hard at work – names such as David Lean, Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, Ronald Neame, Frank Launder and Sidney Gilliat – making some of the country’s greatest films, including Great Expectations, The Red Shoes, Oliver Twist and Black Narcissus. Even as a young studio, Pinewood had an outstanding reputation.

  With Bob Baker and Monty Berman, producers on The Saint. Flat feet, boys? A likely story!

  During the war years, my two future Saint producers, Monty Berman and Bob Baker, were both sergeants in the Army Film Unit stationed at the studio. Being the young tearaways they undoubtedly were, they’d found a way in under the wire, and used it for coming back after late-night shenanigans in the hotspots of Iver Heath. However, one night, just before breakfast, actually, they were caught midway under the wire, and were hauled up in front of the adjutant.