PomPoms Up!

by Carol Cleveland

  Her bedroom had a window that stretched the width of the room and in front of it was a large circular bed with a low curved headboard, on which were placed four phones. I enquired as to why she had so many? She told me that, as she had friends all over the world, she had different numbers for different countries – one for Germany, one for England, one for France and one for the US.

  Helga had already told me that she had an important appointment that evening and would have to leave me alone for a few hours. Before she left she opened a bottle of champagne for me and said I should help myself to anything in the fridge. I’d just settled in to savour this life of luxury when one of the phones rang. It was the French one and I let it ring. It stopped for a minute and then rang again, so I thought I’d better answer it.

  “Bon soir cheri…. C’est Pierre.”

  “I’m sorry, but Helga isn’t here…. she’s gone out for the evening. I’m a friend of hers from England.”

  “Ah…. from England. C’est bon. And what is your name?”

  “Carol.”

  “You have a lovely voice, Carol…. very sexy. Do you look as good as you sound?”

  “Well…. err….”

  “Perhaps YOU could keep me company this evening…. yes?”

  Slowly, the penny was dropping!

  “No, I’m afraid I can’t. I’ll tell Helga you rang. Goodnight.”

  A few days later I set off on my trip and eventually arrived in California, where I stayed with various high school chums. Helga had arranged for me to spend a couple of days in Las Vegas in a top hotel at no charge. It was owned by a friend of hers. The highlight was seeing Tony Bennett on stage and then joining him for dinner afterwards. I had a gigantic suite all to myself with the biggest bed I’ve ever seen in my life! I felt a little nervous when I crawled into it each night and made sure all the locks were secure! Thankfully I need not have worried, but it was probably for the best that I never saw Helga again.

  On my return there was a message from my agent to ring urgently, as he had a casting for me in The Avengers TV series. This was the infamous episode entitled A Touch of Brimstone, starring Peter Wyngarde along with Patrick MacNee and Diana Rigg. I played Peter’s girlfriend who gets shoved aside when ‘Emma Peel’ arrives. I had what was considered quite a saucy scene with him, lying on top of a bed together, with me licking his ear while he’s on the phone. In the next shot he’s standing up on the bed, holding a whip and pushing his leather boot against my hand. It was the most watched episode of the series in England, but was deemed too kinky to be broadcast on US network TV, due to the orgiastic ritual scenes, whipping and Emma Peel’s ‘ultimate sins’ costume that she wears in ‘The Hellfire Club.’ By today’s standards it was all very tame indeed and we had a lot of fun doing it.

  I wasn’t having quite as much fun as Valentino thought I was having, however! When he and I sat at home watching it on TV, he accused me of enjoying my scene with Peter too much and thought there was more going on than just acting. I pointed out that we had filmed the scene at 8:00 in the morning, under hot lamps and surrounded by at least twenty film crew. We were also fully clothed and what’s more…. Peter was a homosexual!

  Soon after that I had a leading role in A Really Hot Jazz Piano, which was ITV’s ‘Play of the Week.’ It starred Stuart Damon – best known for General Hospital and The Champions – as my boyfriend, and Leslie ‘Hutch’ Hutchinson. Hutch was one of the world’s top cabaret artists in the twenties and thirties, but he was now sixty-five and acting in his first TV play. He did not seem to be in the best of health and struggled with his lines. We were all a bit worried when it came to the recording day, hoping that he’d get through his rather long scene that had to be done in one take. It was going well until it came to his first dialogue with Stuart. Poor Hutch was very nervous and it showed. We had to do the scene several times, but never got it right. I felt so sad that his long and illustrious career had to end like this.

  Strangely enough, the next TV production I did, Journey into the Unknown, was with another old time movie star, Joseph Cotton. One could be forgiven for wondering if HE could remember his lines? As it turned out, he was playing an aging Hollywood star who couldn’t learn his script!

  Another ‘Play of the Week’ followed, The Other Man starring Michael Caine. I only had a cameo in this, which unfortunately wasn’t with Michael, but I did get to find out what a really nice guy he was. We had met before, at the cast party after the premiere of Ian’s film, The Wild and The Willing, but only to be introduced and he hadn’t remembered that occasion. This time we’d finished the day’s rehearsals and I was sitting alone in the hotel bar when he walked in and saw me. He came over, joined me for a drink and we had a lovely little chat before retiring to our rooms. It would be twenty years before our paths would cross again, when I had another cameo in one of his films, Half Moon Street. He was now a big star and I was sure he would have forgotten our previous meeting. I was standing on the set watching him doing a scene with Sigourney Weaver and when it finished he walked straight over to me and gave me a big hug.

  “Carol darling, how lovely to see you! I’m so happy you’re with us.”

  “Michael… gosh…. I didn’t expect you to remember me.”

  “How could I forget you? I watch you all the time on Monty Python! I’m a huge fan!”

  Chapter Eleven

  “I’M YOUR BUNNY DIDI”

  After a very busy spell I suddenly found myself in a long ‘resting’ period. I had some good modelling jobs though, which took me off to various different European locations.

  A male model and I were flown to Paris for a day, where we just sat at a table in a fashionable Parisian restaurant and ate delicious food while being photographed – and getting paid for it! I never understood why they didn’t use French models, but I was glad they hadn’t.

  Another job took me, along with three other models, to Majorca, where we were photographed on beaches, boats, motor scooters and in restaurants for the Lord Brothers holiday brochure. It was a great job but there was one downside. We girls had a hotel room very near the gardens and at night the room would be filled with mosquitoes. It wasn’t that we were getting bitten a lot, as they didn’t seem to like our blood very much, thank heavens. It was the noise of their dive-bombing that was keeping us awake.

  One night, after we’d spent the evening in the hotel’s bar being treated to one-too-many of the bartender’s ‘special’ potent Sangrias, we staggered to our room and fell onto our beds in the dark. The mosquitoes sounded louder than ever and we decided we’d had enough. We grabbed our flip-flops and started swatting away. The following morning we opened our blurry eyes and stared at the ceiling in amazement – someone had got into our room during the night and somehow had managed to walk all over the ceiling!!

  I also did several Grattan catalogues, which took me to Sicily and twice to Marbella Beach in Spain. When not working, several of us models would promenade from one end of the marina to the other, wearing our newly bought bikinis, knowing that by the time we’d reached the other end we’d surely have an invitation to lunch on one of the luxurious yachts that were moored there.

  I also did several paperback book covers, one of which is particularly memorable for probably the wrong reasons. My favourite tipple is champagne – the real thing…. not Cava! – and has been since my twenty-first birthday party. I call it giggle juice because it always makes me feel happy. So it was nice to find that champagne was being served when I arrived at the opening of a new jewellers shop in Chelsea one afternoon. I knew a number of people there and was having a lovely time, until I looked at my watch and realised that I had half an hour to get to my modelling assignment in Knightsbridge. Off I went, promising to return later. I got there in good time, changed into my black cocktail dress, put the long diamanté necklace that I’d been given around my neck and positioned myself on a high stool. All I had to do now was hold the necklace up in my hands and look seductively into the camera.
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  “OK…. good…. hold that.”

  I suddenly started giggling.

  “Sorry!”

  “OK… let’s just get that look again.”

  This time I not only burst into laughter, but nearly fell off the stool.

  “Soooorry!”

  “OK… are you ready now?”

  “Yep!”

  Slowly, I started to totter sideways.

  “Carol…. go away and come back tomorrow…. sober!”

  Mind you, it wasn’t all glamorous! I also remember standing next to the Hyde Park Lido in the middle of winter, with snow coming down and me modelling a white, bunny fur bikini with matching bunny fur hat and boots. I kept being given swigs of brandy to keep me warm. When I got home I was frozen to the bone and tipsy too. While soaking in a hot bath and listening to the radio, I found myself wondering what else I might do to fill in the ‘resting’ periods. The answer came over the airwaves.

  It was announced that Hugh Hefner would soon be opening the London branch of his famous Playboy Club and applications were now being accepted from young ladies between eighteen and twenty-four to fill the various roles of a Playboy Bunny.

  Thinking about it now, I can’t imagine what possessed me – I was a fairly established actress who played mainly featured roles! But at the time I thought this sounded perfect. I’d met an American Playboy Bunny who loved her job because not only did she get time off when she needed it but she made mega bucks from the tips she got. I liked the idea of making lots of money and she also made it sound very glamorous and a bit decadent, which appealed to me. So I wasted no time in getting down to the Playboy headquarters on Park Lane and was booked in for an interview the following week. I was told to bring a bathing suit and high heels with me and not to be late.

  On the day there were at least thirty other applicants. We all had to parade in front of Victor Lownes, who would be running the club, and the ‘Bunny Mother’ who would be looking after us. It was rather like being in a Beauty Pageant, which at least I was used to, unlike some of the other girls. We each had to say a little bit about ourselves and then we were allowed to change back into our day clothes. One at a time we were then called back for an interview. At least half were told they could go home, while the rest of us had been accepted.

  Like the other actresses, models, dancers and singers, I opted to work just part time, in order that I could still go for auditions and do any jobs that came my way. Then there came several weeks of training, which to begin with involved just walking around on our stiletto heels with books on our heads…. followed by sitting, standing and turning. The next step was doing the same thing but while carrying a tray. The tray was gradually filled, starting with one empty glass and working up to capacity. The final step was doing it all with liquid in the glasses. Then came the ‘Bunny Dip.’

  The Bunny Dip was a way of serving the drinks so that the bourbon hit the table before the boobie did! Bending forward could be quite risky, as most of the bunnies had their costume stuffed with socks or tissue paper, with their own breasts resting perilously on top. So, we stood with our back to the customer, then bent one knee and swivelled from the waist while placing the drink on the table, thus avoiding any breast spillage. Once learnt – never forgotten…. which can be a bit of a give-away at dinner parties!

  Of course, it wasn’t just socks that were stuffed down the cleavage, but banknotes too. I now discovered that we weren’t, in fact, allowed to keep our tips! Instead, they went into a pool that was then shared out at the end of each month. However, not every bunny got the same amount, as there was also a ‘merit’ and ‘demerit’ system applied, which meant only those with lots of ‘merits’ got the big bonuses. We were told that any bunny that was caught keeping her tips would lose her job. I sometimes got some very big tips which I obediently, but begrudgingly, handed in…. until about two months into the job, when I discovered that half of the bunnies had more bank notes than tissue paper supporting their breasts!

  We also had to learn the ‘Bunny Stance’ and the ‘Bunny Perch,’ which was simply resting against a stool rather than sitting on it. I perched as much as possible because the heels were agony, as was the Bunny costume! The costume was basically a boned corset covered in satin which we’d be laced into as tight as we could bear it. I nearly fainted on several occasions during my first month on duty and would have to leave my post to get un-laced for a while.

  Every evening, before we were allowed to hop into the warren…. eh…. club!… we would have to report to the Bunny Mother to be checked out. But first we had to be sure that our look was perfect. It was our responsibility to make sure that our costume was in good order, with no stains, no tears in the mesh tights or scuffed shoes. Our bunny ears were not allowed to flop and, most important…. our bunny tail had to be brushed and fluffed to perfection. False eyelashes and nail polish were a must. There was already a ‘Bunny Carol’ so I used my nickname, Didi. This was on my badge, which was attached to

  the lower part of the costume. Once I put on the cuffs and collar…. I was ready to go.

  There were five floors to the club and I started in the Cabaret Room on the fourth floor. I was quite happy being there because once everybody had ordered their drinks and the cabaret had started I could perch and watch the show. One of their first performing artists was Dave Allen, who I quickly became a great fan of. I had one problem however. When the show ended everyone asked for their bill at the same time and I’d get into a terrible muddle. There were several different ways of paying, depending on if you were a member or not, and, in the rush to get the bills settled quickly, I’d find myself asking for cash from someone who only needed to sign for it and saying, “Sign here, Sir!” to those that should have paid cash!

  Sadly, I was moved two floors down to the Discotheque. I wasn’t very happy there, mainly because I loved to dance and I wasn’t allowed to. Also, I was always getting my tail tweaked by wealthy Arabs who thought they could get away with it, even though there was a strict look-but-don’t-touch policy. I didn’t get on too well with the bartender either and one night I actually smashed my tray down and stomped out.

  I was then moved down to the Cocktail Bar on the ground floor, and I probably would have stayed there had it not been for Valentino coming in one evening, grabbing hold of me and pulling me towards the exit door. Val had not been at all happy about me working at the club and we’d had a big row about it earlier on.

  The following day I was called in to have a chat with Bunny Mother…. and not for the first time. I’d had a couple of chats with her already, and each time I’d expected to be sacked, but instead I’d get a pep talk and a promotion! She’d tell me that she believed I had everything it takes to be one of their star bunnies…. if only I’d apply myself a bit more. In fact, I was even offered the chance of being a Playboy Centrefold. Val would have loved that!

  I was sure that this time I’d be asked to turn in my bunny tail and hop off! But no…. now I was being promoted to the best, and by far the easiest, job in the club. They’d like me to serve drinks in the club’s swish restaurant up in the Penthouse. I had actually planned on giving in my notice at this stage, as I’d been there for around five months and was getting a bit bored with it all, but I decided that as this new post was a rather cushy one with far less working hours I might as well stick it out a little while longer. As it turned out, I was so glad I did!

  A month later, Sammy Davis Jr. and Peter Lawford came to the club, but not as members. They came to do some casting for a feature film that they were about to start working on together called Salt and Pepper. They were at the Playboy Club to find nine actresses to play the Salt and Pepper girls, and I was to be one of them. As soon as I’d signed my contract I left the bunny warren for good!

  Chapter Twelve

  LOTS OF SALT AND PEPPER

  As a teenager, I’d always been a great fan of the ‘Rat Pack’, but never in my wildest dreams did I imagine I’d be working with any of them
. Now, here I was working with two of them and it was every bit as wild as I’d imagined it could be. The whole experience was like one big crazy party – a party I’ll never forget!

  The film Salt and Pepper is about two friends who open up a trendy London nightclub but end up being involved in a plot to overthrow the British Government. Sammy plays Charlie Salt and Peter is Chris Pepper. In the club are nine ‘Salt and Pepper Girls’ doing much the same jobs as in the Playboy Club, and I’m the hat-check girl.

  It was clear from the start that both Sammy and Peter intended having a good time making this film and they wanted us girls to join in the fun too. What astounded me was the boundless amount of energy that they both had, both on and off the set – especially Sammy who, after a night out on the town, would come dancing and singing onto the set at eight o’clock the next morning. I was a very fit twenty-five year old but he had twice my amount of energy! I was wondering how he did it.

  Sammy always had his ‘man’ with him who took care of all his needs. One morning, after we’d been out partying the night before, Sammy came into the studio looking as tired as the rest of us. He didn’t smile or even say hello, but the two of them went straight into his trailer. I was thinking that he’s human after all, when, after about twenty minutes, he literally jumped out of the trailer and came skipping and whistling onto the set.

  I said to one of the girls:

  “Wow! He must take very strong coffee!”

  She replied: