The Richard Burton Diaries

by Richard Burton

  JANUARY

  Monday 9th, Cotonou1 Last night we went to Glenville's for cocktails.2 Most of the people stood outside on the asphalt. It was warm but not oppressive. Alec was there playing the part either of a sweet saint or a great actor charming but removed from the ordinary run of common human beings.3 We arrived (deliberately) late and left after about an hour. We dined on cold ham, spring onions, radishes, cheese, bread (lovely long loaf) tomatoes.

  Gaston works like a dog. He charges around shopping answering telephones, preparing salad, filling thermoses, defleaing the dogs and watching us wherever we go, and all with the greatest good humour. He really is indispensable and, tho’ it sounds disloyal, a far better helper than Bob Wilson. There are certain things that are beneath Bob's dignity. Nothing is beneath Gaston's. [...]

  Today we're off to be officially welcomed by the President of the Republic – events which I dread.4

  E is looking gorgeous – she blooms in hot climates. It must be that Italian blood. I didn't drink a single drop yesterday and consequently had profound ‘shakes’. I must take it easy with the booze.

  Tuesday 10th Yesterday we went to the Palace to be received by the President called by all his staff ‘Mon General.’ He is very black (married though to a white wife and has seven children) about 5'8" tall, slightly bow-legged, stockily built. His clothes were ill made though his cabinet members were impeccably dressed.5 I understand that coups d'états are the thing here, as in most of the new African states, so that he may not be the boss for long. At the moment it is something of a dictatorship – when I asked him how many deputés there were in Congress he said ‘aucune.‘6 Whoops! I thought. He obviously likes women and was forever taking E by the arm. She of course was charming and very feminine. We both found the experience oddly moving. Here was this huge mosaiced palace, only completed 3 years ago, and outside the immense Salle de Reception, capable of receiving 3000 people at one time, there was washing on the line.

  He showed us with great pride the ‘chinese’ room which was so cluttered with furniture and bric a brac from, he said proudly, ‘Mon grand ami Chiang Kai Shek’ that we could barely move between the furniture.7 With equal pride he showed us his own and his family's living quarters which were poky and small. He showed us his wife's clothes closet and brought a lump to E's throat when with a flourish he opened a cupboard to show a perfectly ordinary rack for shoes.

  He asked E to step on to a mat on the way out and chuckled with delight as two wall lights automatically came on. E simulated astonishment and he was very pleased. By this time I was sweating like a bull and was glad to leave.

  The English are a cold lot. We had lunch afterwards with Guinness and Glenville and I'm sure that had we not said immediately how impressed and moved we were they were ready to send the whole thing up.

  E says that Peter Glenville [...] is a right ‘bitch.’ ‘I have yet,’ she said, ‘to catch him saying a good word about anybody.’ She's right I think.

  I am madly ‘in love’ with her at the moment, as distinct from always loving her, and want to make love to her every minute but alas it is not possible for a couple of days. She'll have trouble walking in a couple or three days.

  [...] Both of us had a hell of a time getting to sleep. The bedroom though air conditioned is the least cold room in the house and there seemed to be scores of minute mosquitoes which even if they didn't bother you made you feel itchy. [...]

  Wednesday 11th Like all films the first day seems to be the worst. We slept a little last night, perhaps 5–6 hours, and woke unrefreshed. We had Bloody Marys for breakfast. There was a mist or fog which hung around for some time. Eventually we shot the first shot at 10.30 approx. Very Hot. We did 3 takes – one of which was my fault. Then we shot 3 close-ups of the same thing. [...] Then the President arrived with his wife and entourage. I searched for E. because he quite clearly wanted to see her and not anybody else, though he might strongly deny such a terrible imputation. He was as engaging as ever and wicked. At one time, after a particularly salacious remark he kissed his wife (white) and was given a round of applause by the assembled hangers-on. His wife, who should be used to it, looked perplexed. E adores him. He looks to me like my brother Verdun after a hard day in the pits and before he's washed. He called Christian – our principal servant, one might call him a butler – ‘mon petit’. So far it seems that he is beloved. There was a beautiful negro girl, whose name I've forgotten, who never smiled, very chic, who never took her eyes off Elizabeth. There was admiration, envy, malice, hatred and love in her every reaction to my silly old girl.

  [...] Later we sat at home with the publicity man who is, so far, a bore, and Gaston and Ron and F. La Rue and after the aforesaid pub man had left started talking very seriously and equally very drunkenly of the obligation one has to one's fellow beings. Should one have a child if one has a history of insanity in the family. Should Ron take off with Vicky or stay with his wife Leah. All this laced with profound lectures from me and Elizabeth. Stupendously Smug.

  We had lunch with Ron, Claudye, Raymond St Jaques – the latter anxious to prove that he is essentially a stage actor in the Shakespearean tradition.8 Very American.

  [There are no further entries in the diary from mid-January to late March. Burton and Taylor continued filming in Cotonou until mid February. At the end of that month The Taming of the Shrew was released, having been selected for the Royal Command Performance at the Odeon in Leicester Square, attended by Princess Margaret and Lord Snowdon, and raising money for the Cinema and Television Benevolent Fund. While in London Burton and Taylor stayed at the Dorchester Hotel, along with many members of Burton's family from South Wales, and on 18 March Richard took the opportunity to see England beat Scotland at rugby union by 27 points to 14 to regain the Calcutta Cup at Twickenham. Further filming for The Comedians was carried out at studios in Paris and Nice.]

  MARCH

  Good Friday, 24th, Saint Jean Cap Ferrat9 What a huge lapse. We spent some more weeks in Dahomey getting hotter and hotter with most people getting sicker and sicker. E won the NY Critics award for VW. (I was runner-up to P. Scofield) and cabled M. Brando, who was staying in Gstaad at our house, to ask if he would pick the award up for her.10 He did and then, if you please, flew to Dahomey to deliver it personally! He apparently made a speech attacking the assembled critics for not acknowledging E before and not giving me the award now. Funny fellow.

  [...] We still retain a certain amount of nostalgia for Dahomey. The house, the lizards, the palm trees, the unit intrigues, the arrogance of the American negroes with the West Africans, the dangerous fascinating sea only a couple of sand tumps away from the house, the mad palace, the President and his dowdy provincial wife. The Palace receptions and the fetes.

  We persuaded PG not to fire an actor called George Stanford Brown – a very beautiful sluggish lethargic negro boy.11 He always wears tight jeans and sits sprawled with his legs wide open. Gives me a pain but am told to be nice to him by E. And also he's a pupil of PHB's [Philip Burton]. I hope we were right to keep him on – not that it matters, it's only a film.

  The food in the two restaurants we went to was good at first and then, through over-familiarity perhaps or boredom or something, became atrocious. We ate mostly at home afterwards. [...]

  A. Guinness walked around looking very white and pink and read a little note-book which contained his lines for the film. He looks remarkable as a negress.12 Quite deceived me at first.

  P. Ustinov gave a turn at the huge charity benefit for lepers and TB.13 He is a very good sort but his invention is running out. He is doing the same turns now as he was 10–15 years ago. They are brilliant to the uninitiated. He is very serious when alone with one but must clown with an audience of two. In some vague way, because he seems disturbed, I feel sorry for him. Jack of all trades.

  Friday 31st We have been at this house – it's a famous one called ‘La Fiorentina’ – for 21/2 weeks, and for the last 12 days have shot at night, which after the
initial adjustment I don't mind.14 It means a certain amount of sunshine during the day and a game or two of tennis. It has however been quite cold at night and the night before last in the mountains above St Michel it was bitter. We had a soup in St Michel which is well known locally as Potage au Pistou.15 I think. Very good.

  Last Monday night we had drinks at the Palace at Monaco and then went on to the Hotel de Paris to a banquet in aid of the British American Hospital, at which we were the guests of honour.16 I enjoyed but don't remember too much about it. He was tubby and smiled kindly and seemed nice. She was pretty and young looking and very short-sighted. Her eyes indeed are terribly weak and at the end of the evening were shot bright with blood.17

  Last night I worked with James Earl Jones – a retake – and then with A. Guinness.18 We finished by 02.45 – very early for us. A hot bath when I arrived home, a read in bed and asleep by 5.30.

  We were roughly 3 weeks in Paris before coming here. We stayed at the Plaza Athenée.19 So far it's the best hotel we've stayed at in Paris with a splendid restaurant. Things that stick out:

  We were both nominated for Oscars for VW – the film itself getting 13 nominations.20

  We had dinner with the Duke and Duchess of Windsor who came back afterwards to our apartment in the Plaza.21 We all got on famously.

  We went to London for the opening night of Shrew. A huge success almost totally spoiled by Frank Flanagan's sudden death on the morning of the opening night, which incidentally was E's birthday.22 He died quickly thank God of a heart attack.

  A couple of weeks later Sally Wilson died in NY of leukaemia or a sinister relation.23

  Bob (Wilson) and Agnes (Flanagan) are both with us here in the house at Saint Jean Cap Ferrat recovering from the terrible shock. Bob is strong and suffers in relative silence. Agnes, poor dab, drinks and drinks and drinks.

  With the Duke of Windsor in Paris. We went back to our apartment after dinner and the Duke and I sang the Welsh National Anthem in atrocious harmony. I referred disloyally to the Queen as ‘her dumpy majesty’ and neither the Duke or Duchess seemed to mind.

  APRIL

  Saturday 1st Went into Nice in the afternoon yesterday to buy books. There wasn't much selection but we bought a lot of thrillers. Afterwards we had cocktails at the Negresco where we ran into Bob Hall (stuntman) and John Lee. Mike (our M.) came with us. I wrote to his headmaster yesterday to try and get him reinstated at Le Rosey from which he has been expelled. Poor boy. Otherwise I'll try and get both boys into Millfield.24

  [...] Wrote to Kate and enclosed $10. She hopes Syb's baby is a boy. He will be called Colin if a boy, Amy if a girl.25 [...]

  Telegraphed Franco Z. that he can show Shrew at Cannes if he wishes but warned him that he may get royally shrewed! They're a nasty lot around here. [...]

  [There are no further entries in the diary until late May. During this period work continued on The Comedians in the south of France. On 10 April Richard, nominated for Best Actor for his performance in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, was beaten to the award by Paul Scofield for his portrayal of Sir Thomas More in A Man For All Seasons. Neither Burton nor Taylor attended the awards in California, Taylor collecting her award at a ceremony held at Grosvenor House in London. By late May they were cruising on a chartered yacht in the western Mediterranean.]

  MAY

  Sunday 21st, on Board Oddyseia Portofino26 We arrived this morning from Corsica where we have been for about a week – 2 days at Ajaccio, two at L'lle Rousse and two at Calvi.27 [...] We are going to buy this M.Y. It will cost $220,000 and we shall spend 40 or 50,000 dollars on it. It is old – 60 years – is 130 feet long, three engines, 260–80 tons. She will do 14 knots. There are 7 bedrooms two of them with large double beds and will sleep 14 passengers. There are 8 crew, though that includes a cook, maid, waiter. The boat itself needs only 4 – at the most 5 – crew to run it efficiently. I estimate it will cost $25–30000 a year to run it. Not too bad when one considers our last house (rented) cost $10,000 a month plus approx $1000 a week for food and staff etc! If we can use it as much as possible instead of hotels we could actually save money.

  Monday 22nd Stayed on board all day yesterday and sunned ourselves. Result – pink all over. Watched the port's traffic which was endless with scores of waterbuses loaded with scores of Sunday tourists from adjacent Genoa, Santa Margherita, Rapallo etc.28 Thank the lord they didn't know we were here.

  This morning however we went shopping and I bought this pen with which I write, a Jockey cap, a couple of pencils and paper while E bought out Pucci's.29 There were a lot of tourists mostly German and American – the latter being almost exclusively Jewish. They greet one with ‘Hi Elizabeth. California.’ There are only 20 million people in California. We fled for sanctuary to a splendid restaurant called ‘Pitosforo’ where we had Vodka Tom Collins, cocktail onions, cheese from Sardinia called Formaggio al Sardo, two kinds of salami and, when I asked for them, fave (spring broad beans sort of).30 Afterwards, though we'd promised to lunch on board we had steak à la maison and crepes suzette. All delicious. After lunch we went home to the boat and slept and so on.

  Must send telegrams tomorrow regarding future plans. Everybody is waiting for decisions. Must make some I suppose or should we? I wish I never had to work again but know I will and suppose we must. I must work out one day how much we have in cash property etc. Must be quite a lot. Perhaps we could stop now if we stopped spending so much.

  We think this restaurant ‘Pitosforo’ – we dined there again tonight to be among the best we know. And the ambience is splendid, the lovely little harbour at your feet.

  Wednesday 24th, Portofino Harbour The seas were high and the skies grey and the boat rocked and shivered since we are tied up slightly outside and more subject to the wind and weather. So we locked all doors and settled to read and, in my case, do crossword puzzles. I read E's script The Old Man and me and thought it good and a money maker especially with C. Grant but it may by now be unavailable.31 [...] Have read variously since coming on board. The Whole Truth a novel about foreign correspondents for a thinly disguised NY Times.32 Caen – about the battle of Caen and D-Day (I think I would have gone mad in that hell).33 Some detective stories, new original script by Tennessee Boom! which E will do as a film.34 Script of Shoes of the Fisherman – worst of Hollywood vulgarity and taste, though written by Morris West, an Australian in Rome.35

  [...] E anxious that I write about her so here goes: She is a nice fat girl who loves mosquitos and hates pustular carbuncular Welshmen, loathes boats and loves planes, has tiny blackcurrant eyes and minute breasts and has no sense of humour. She is prudish, priggish and painfully self-conscious. [...]

  Friday Night, 26th, Santa Margherita Harbour H. French arrived on Wednesday at about 7pm. [...] Showed us strange cable in which C. Grant said he would costar with E only if I directed! He must be frightened of her or something. Perhaps he's a little strange in the head.

  Hugh came back on Thursday for lunch with news of telephone calls etc. Will hear something shortly I suppose. Told us that James Mason left his agency after 17 years (?) because they [...] were getting all the plum parts for me. Well, well.

  Suspect that Rex and Rach Harrison are back because I saw a flag on their flag pole.36 I was right as I've received a note from them this afternoon.

  Weather pretty rough so shifted to above harbour as it's safer than Portofino. [...]

  Stayed on board all day and read and sunbathed. Sky hot and blue but sea a curious milky green from the storm I suppose.

  Much threat of war between Israel and U.A.R.37 Bugger it. Was put in a fury by crowds of staring idiots on Thursday in the square. [...] Fury vented on E of course.

  JUNE

  Thursday 1st, En Route St. Marg – Portofino We were in St Margherita yesterday for watering and fuelling and just as well as it gave us a chance to get away from Rex and Rachel. We had spent Sunday up at their house and, as usual it was very liquid. Rex seems to hold his booze better than
he used to but Rachel is still maniacal. We saw them again on Monday evening at La Gritta bar in the Port.38 Fortunately before Rachel became totally demented they left (not without difficulty for Rex) for home and dinner at about 9.30. By this time Tennessee Williams and his friend Bill had arrived and Joe Losey and J. Heyman and H. French.39 Tennessee, who now prefers to be called Tom, seemed sloshed and spoke in a loud voice, powerful penetrating and incoherent and somewhat embarrassing. E told him to lower his voice a few times. We were in the Pitosforo at the time, and we attract enough attention as it is. Have now decided to do Boom! with E. [...]

  On Tuesday everybody came on board. Rachel became stupendously drunk and was or became totally uncontrollable. The strangers T. Williams, Losey, Bill, French, Heyman, left in disgust. She insulted Rex sexually morally physically and in every way. She lay on the floor in the bar and barked like a dog. At one time she started to masturbate her basset hound – a lovely sloppy old dog called Omar. E lectured her, I did, Rex did. All to no avail. She bitterly harangued the memories of Carole Landis and Kay Kendall, hurled imprecations at Lilli Palmer.40 Christ.

  Yesterday, Wednesday, we left early in the a.m. for S. Marg to fuel and load up. [...] Losey came to lunch. He's intelligent but a trifle grim. I hope he has a sense of humour. I found it hard work talking to him for 2 hours. Still one doesn't necessarily have to talk all that much to directors.

  Tennessee and Bill came too. Again the former seemed to be tipsy. He is certainly not very prepossessing physically. Heyman told us he tried to kill himself a few weeks ago but was saved by Bill. There were no details. I asked Tenn if diarhyl (?) pills depressed him.