The Richard Burton Diaries

by Richard Burton

  Eventually, I made it up with them both. But ‘taint good enough.

  Friday 27th, Kupari We spent yesterday in the bay of Kotor which Princess Margaret was so enthusiastic about.94 [...] We entered through the straits of Verige – my little book tells me – so named because the locals would block the entrance in the middle ages with a chain and ‘verige’ is apparently the local word for chain.95 The Turks appear to be the most persistent marauders and I wouldn't have thought that chains would have proved a very formidable obstacle to so tough a people. Anyway it appears that nobody over the centuries ever succeeded in penetrating into the city of Kotor. According to my little book Bernard Shaw thought it the most beautiful place on earth.96 [...]

  Wolf Mankowitz has arrived and has already re-written my part and simplified it. Good and hard-working man. But I think all to no avail. [...]

  Sunday 29th, Fiord of Kotor [...] I said, at one point yesterday, that I thought the ‘bungalow’ arrangements were fine for an actor on location but that I found it surprising accommodation for the President of the country. Ah, they said, so do we, but it is to impress the people that he is still one of us. I said I thought it didn't work as far as I could see as the people are more impressed by our, E and me, display of enormous wealth – as they thought – and would be far less interested by a Ford, an arrival by Air Italia and a simple cotton frock than they are by a gleaming white yacht, a private jet and a giant Rolls-Royce. Of the scores of newspapers and magazines they bring to me occasionally which generally contain lots of pictures of me as Tito, E and me, E and me and Tito etc. there is invariably a very glam shot of the Kalizma and the Phantom 6 with a description of its inside, its TV etc. [...]

  We steamed from Cavtat last evening as soon as I'd had time to arrive home from Sutjeska take my make-up off and shower and shampoo and get to the yacht. Liza left for England with wet eyes and much kissing from Mum and daughter, so Mum tells me, and weeping servants and all. We miss her already, rather more than usual as she has become more of a companion than hitherto and now, God be praised, has started to become our favourite thing – a book worm. The Gabrielle Hounds by Mary Stewart and Rosemary's Baby by Ira Levin which is a considerable advance over no books at all for thirteen years.97 [...]

  There is a big house opposite us that seems to be at least pre-war and has an air of neglect. Our Chekhovian imaginations run riot.98 It could be very handsome if done up.

  Monday 30th, Sutjeska There is no such definite locale as Sutjeska – the latter is the name of a river over which the Germans and the partisans fought so bitterly. Also here were the Italians but they are very much neglected both in history and in our script so I presume their contribution to the German slaughter of the partisans was probably as negligible as it was in every other theatre of the last war. Nearby – a short walk from this ‘villa’ which we are living in – is a very impressive monument to the Sutjeska dead, some 25,000 or 20–40,000 depending on which authority you listen to last, which is to be unveiled by Marshal Tito this week.99 [...] There are many soldiers about who sing a lot around fires – a bit like my old Welsh lot. They seem very contented, or at least as contented as one can expect conscripted soldiers to be. [...]

  Kathy Green, the giant daughter of Johnny Green – for many years head of the Music Dept of MGM – appeared on the set today with a man called Richard Chase.100 I think the latter is a musician. However, while we were all waiting for the helicopter to arrive with E and Maria and Claudye aboard, she, Kathy, found a half-blind kitten, minute, in a hedge and kept it and gave it to E as she arrived. So now we have another member of the family, it seems [...]. It is already the centre of everybody's attention and is being fed with sugared water and milk and is being house-trained. It is a tom we think but no name has yet been chosen. I want to call it Jack. I've always like the name Jack. Dunno why really but possibly because it sounds honest and strong and masculine. Jack Stevens the Fruiterer who always thought the English language inadequate and added ‘strengthening syllables’ like collossical, majestical and monumentical etc. And Jack Jones Edwards, a rogue, smalltown politician in Cwmavon, and innumerably over-masculine Jack Joneses and Jack Jameses four square and brutally forward and overbearing affronters of pomposity and weak arguments. It looks however as if it might be called ‘Sutjeska’. [...]

  Tuesday 31st, Tjentiste I finally told Elizabeth this morning how ill her mother has been for the last nine days. I couldn't even confide my worry to this diary as E dips into it sporadically. Anyway her mother was operated on two days ago and the telegram we received yesterday said the five days following the operation are critical so now it's three days. [...] The latest telegram mentioned above was signed by some people called Karl and Mary Frances Voldeng, and of course Valerie who has been the signee for the past week and a bit.101 [...] E has taken it all badly as she has a quite unjustified guilt complex re her mother. Nothing that can be reasoned out so I don't try. Also, I feel that I genuinely do not have the capacity for suffering that other people have and in particular Elizabeth. I am as dispassionate as it is possible for a human being to be and not be a machine, and what compassion I do have I find almost impossible to express. God knows what will be my feelings if anything happens to someone I greatly love but I generally console myself that I will have gone to my long home long before they. I am prepared for Ivor, even for Cis. But not for the children and above all E. If anything happens to E I am fairly positive that I won't be long after since I cannot believe that life will be worth living without her and indeed cannot believe that I ever did. I mean live without her. It was such a dreary plain with only an occasional high peak of excitement. [...]

  SEPTEMBER

  Wednesday 1st, Tjentiste [...] Yesterday was brilliant sunshine until lunch-time when a huge wind sprang up and by the time I finished work – about 4.30 – it began to rain and has continued to do so ever since with very few let-ups. It is pouring in torrents now at this moment and has been all night [...] I wonder if they can shoot in this monsoon weather. [...] I'd like to work because (a) I feel guilty when I don't as I cost so much money and (b) because I like these Yugoslavs so very much. I do not suffer any guilt pangs at all when working for a big studio though then I simply feel frustration at not getting the damned film finished as soon as possible. The thought of bad weather or bad luck causing a Zanuck a Warner or a Wasserman to cry into his Scotch gives me infinite pleasure.102

  And still it rains and there are all our soldiers under canvas. Shades of Alun Lewis.103 Unlightable fires and damp matches. Blue-cupped hands. Give us a light mate. [...]

  It is now eight at night and still it rains and confuse it not with a drizzle. It is an unremitting Dickensian God-despairing world-ending Noachian deluge promising the end of the world by dawn. [...]

  Thursday 2nd [...] The rain is coming down comme une vache qui pisse, a charming simile I learned yesterday from Claudye, and is not raining so much cats and dogs but mastodons and megathings and other prehistoric reptiles. [...]

  Yesterday, while E stayed sensibly in bed and wrapped up, I went with Claudye, Gianni, Brook and E'en So to view the ‘villa’ up on the mountain called Bare. The situation is breathtaking. The house, very alpine looking on the very edge of a lovely little lake about 150 yards by 100. The road was unpaved and occasionally very dangerous, avalanche-prone, and interminable, hairpin after hairpin and in this torrential weather a real monster. We took no chances in the Phantom 6 and crept up. This meant a journey in pouring rain, of course, of just over an hour. Nevertheless I would have settled for the extra hour or so a day getting to work were it not for the fact that the interior of the house was a complete shambles. No heating except for a huge fireplace which could be jolly enough. No hot water, wood-burning kitchen stove, no electricity and no prospect of getting any as far as I could gather. Filthy, rusty bath and a blocked shower with a fin de siècle wood-burning stove to heat the water presumably. One of the ladies spoke a little French and was totally flabbergasted at the p
rospect of anybody staying there. But, we said, tout le monde dit que le President reste ici quelque fois. ‘Jamais,’ she said, ‘he once came here and killed a bear, of whom the forest is full. But he has never stayed here.‘104 So thereby is killed another lie or, to be charitable, another bit of misinformation. [...]

  Thursday 2nd, Kupari [...] Better and better news of Sara and hopes are now that it will not be necessary for either of us to fly to Arizona. We had more or less decided that E and Claudye would fly tomorrow. Temporarily, at least, that possibility is now in abeyance. [...]

  Friday 3rd The Hitler War started 32 years ago today. A fine day like this I remember and a Sunday morning I think. I was excited, like all the other boys – I was 13 years old – and pleased enough that there was a real war, never dreaming that it would last long enough for me to be in the RAF toward the end of it.105 The only disappointment was that I was quickly assured that the war meant I'd lost my chance for a schoolboy rugby ‘cap’ for Wales. I was an obvious certainty having been there or thereabouts the season before and was massive for my age – 12 stone and 5ft 8 or 9. I've hardly grown since. I might have got one as a grown-up largely through personality rather than genuine first class ability. I was a natural Captain wherever I played and might have sneaked a cap or two when one of the standard boys was crooked or something. I regret it a lot less than I used to do when I saw so many of my contemporaries getting caps while I was playing Shakespeare. Too late cock, too late. [...]

  James Wishart expected any minute from London for me to sign some papers anent Harlech TV. It goes public shortly. I could make a fortune and pull out now but I suppose I shouldn't. Wait and see what James has to say. I wish he were a younger man and I wish he hadn't been so ill. Always affects people's judgements one way or the other.

  Since writing the above we have been in to Dubrovnik again. [...] Bought books – not much choice but took everything unread. [...]

  A letter from Liza [Todd]. How sophisticated her fist has become. Also one from Lil Williams who says that notices for Milk Wood are ‘fabulous’ and that one has to queue up to see Villain everywhere. Now if, as I expect, XYZ hits the jackpot too we shall have had a very good year. Even the joke film Raid on Rommel is surprising everybody. There's life in these old dogs yet.

  Wishart's plane three hours late so shall see him tomorrow sometime. Going back up to Tjentiste tomorrow [...] to see Tito. Apparently he wants to see us before he sees all the other odds and sods. [...] And so, Samuel Pepys, to bed.106

  Saturday 4th, Kupari James Wishart came with me [to Tjentiste] to tell me all the tales of Harlech TV. He seemed in good form and rubicund and jolly like an animated doll's head. He told me that the Harlech shares which we paid 2/6d a share for are likely to open on the market at a quid.107 We could if we wished sell half the shares and pick up a half a million or so and still be rich holders – at the moment we are the principal shareholders by a considerable amount. I am accustomed to earning vast monies but they were earned. Picking up millions from an investment which was, I think, about £100,000 is fairy tale stuff. So after the horror of the first four days of this week everything is turning out golden again. Sara is going to be alright, God Willing, Milk Wood has had magnificent notices not only in London and Italy but now too in NY, Villain is packing them in in Britain and Raid on Rommel is doing likewise in Paris, Rome and Milan. And, most importantly of all E has come back to life again after being moribund for these horrific last few days.

  In the car on the way up Wishart told me that he had guessed from various snippets of stock-exchange gossip that Stan Baker is having some financial difficulties.108 I can't believe that hard-headed old Stan hasn't salted some nice sums away somewhere. He must have got himself into trouble with the tax people. He'll whistle his way out I'm sure.

  We arrived at Tjentiste about 20 minutes early for Tito [...]. Then at eleven on the dot it seems we were summoned to the presence. For the first half hour or so it was just Tito and Madame and Popovi and Deli and of course Tito's interpreter. We – Deli , Popovi and I – all told Tito how good everything was. I said how efficient Popovi was and he said how professional I was and I said what a splendid director Deli was and Deli said what a magnificent actor I was etc. Tito was in a very jolly mood putting what seemed like the fear of God or a firing-squad into the other two blokes when he said that he expected me to be in his old uniform tomorrow for the ceremony. They took him quite seriously until I said ‘Come on, the President is pulling your leg!’ Which of course he was. Afterwards all the other actors were presented to us and a dozen or so old comrades and I presume local big-wigs. From then on it was hard work for Tito, looking across the valley and at the mountains where he and his lads had fought so desperately 28 years ago, naturally began to reminisce and was so far gone in memories that he rarely gave his interpreter a chance to speak. This meant long periods of listening to stories in a completely alien tongue, only some of which were translated.

  Sunday 5th Here we are again ready to set off for the dreaded Tjentiste by helicopter we hope this time. Today has all the hall-marks of being dreadful. Many thousands of people. Speeches. National Anthem. The Internationale.109 And on top of it all they want me to work! Just so that Tito can see a bit of action. After all that they want us to fly to a place called Niš (pron Neesh) to the annual beano of the Yugoslav theatrical profession.110 We are expected to stay the night and come back tomorrow morning for work again. Strange behaviour. The film sometimes seems to be very much in second place to all kinds of social activities. [...]

  Later Today:

  Well, as prognosticated by Dr and Mrs Burton, it was a dreadful day though not as boring as I thought it might be. [...] First of all, we arrived in plenty of time to see Tito at eleven o'clock only to find out that His Excellency didn't expect to see us at all. It was the ineffable Popovi who had insisted that we were there so early because of the danger of being delayed en route. [...] However we hung around the unfinished hotel and I drank coffee while E had a drink or two. Then suddenly there was a flurry of Generals and we were hastily put into cars and driven across fields where we were presented to the Marshal and Wife. Some bloke made a speech introducing the Tito I presume, whereupon the old man tore off up some steps to the podium, batteried with mikes and let us all have it for about 30 minutes. The crowd was huge. I guessed 50,000 trying vaguely to fit them into Cardiff Arms Park in my mind's eye.111 ‘Many more than that,’ said the Generalissimo in English and quite sharply. In fact Tito seemed much less friendly today than he was yesterday. E remarked on it feeling a trifle miffed I suppose. I can only assume that his attitude changes subtly but definitely from public to private. There was none of the hugging and kissing of Brioni. Fact is that I was pretty well pissed off with the man-o-the-people because he didn't make more fuss of Elizabeth. He and Madame Broz did at least ask about her mother and at the end of the day when we had done a very actionful shot for their Majesties, Madame sent E her love and Tito said something which was I suppose ‘hear hear’ or something. And at the final handshake he said in English ‘Hope to see you again.’ You'll be lucky, mate. I swear to God there is more nonsensical protocol than with English royalty. [...]

  After the speech which was apparently full of platitudes [...] about the heroism of the mighty dead and that the world and even their ‘allies’ – meaning Russia apparently – still did not believe the extent of the Jugoslavian sacrifice – we went back to the hotel not knowing whether we were invited to lunch with Tito or not. Not quite sure whether we wanted to be or not we put three tables together and ordered lunch at the hotel-restaurant. Five minutes later there was yet another panic and they came [...] in a sweat to say that we were expected to have lunch with Tito and the surviving partisans of the battle of Sutjeska. Furious [...] we got into the ever-present Mercedes and drove about 10 miles to the place. It was an open restaurant, obviously just shoved up for the day. We stood there, E and I and Maria and Vessna the new interpreter for 45 minutes signing
endless autographs waiting for Tito to arrive. After all that we found we were not sitting with him but stuck with the scintillating Popovi and Hardy Krüger. The latter obviously has a very nasty attack of jealousy and resentment of the red carpet treatment I get everywhere. He too is a bore and I hear from the other lads who live around the hotel with him that, typical Teuton, he bullies defenceless people like waiters etc. He works without cease on Wolf to write in flashbacks of Tito and himself enlarging his part and enabling him to get to grips with R. Burton etc. and Wolf refuses and Krüger persists with Wolf saying: I wasn't paid to re-write the plot mate. I was hired to put the translation into palatable English. The insults began according to Ron and Brook. One sample: Krüger: ‘You are a stupid man.’ Wolf: ‘And you're the Nazi Tab Hunter.‘112