Last Man Standing: Tales from Tinseltown (22 page)

Graham had never smoked in his life, but happily agreed to go along with the request. The only problem being that they didn’t load it with tobacco, but hash.

Graham dutifully puffed away on the pipe but every time he opened his mouth to speak, only gibberish came out. Edwards, Sellers and the entire crew couldn’t stop laughing. Graham, meanwhile, thought it was the best day of his comedy life as he’d never had this amazing comedic effect on anyone before. Poor Graham.

In later years, like me, Sellers lived in Gstaad and he had the most wonderful chalet there. After divorcing Miranda in 1974, he married a young actress named Lynne Frederick – she was twenty-three, he was fifty-two. Many of his friends felt that marrying the much-younger Frederick was a mistake and regarded her as an opportunist who married Sellers for his money. Just before his untimely death in 1979, Peter had made arrangements to see his lawyers to change his will and exclude Frederick, whom he was on the verge of divorcing. The night before he was due to sign the papers he suffered a massive heart attack and died, leaving Frederick, his widow, to inherit almost his entire estate, which was estimated at £4.5 million, plus all future royalties from his films.
Meanwhile, he left his children £800 each in a calculated and deliberate move to make them find their own way in life. It is thought that the feeling of rejection ultimately led to
his son Michael’s early death. Very sadly, Michael died at fifty-two, exactly twenty-six years after his father’s death.

Of course, Frederick continued to profit from the estate and even sued Blake Edwards and United Artists, the producers of
Trail of the Pink Panther
, which was made after Sellers’ death and used out-takes of the late actor. She was awarded $1.475 million in damages for ‘insulting the memory’ of her late husband.

After a very brief marriage to David Frost, she married a surgeon named Barry Unger, by whom she had a daughter, Cassie. Aged just thirty-nine, Frederick died in 1994, and her mother Iris inherited the estate until Cassie came of age. Which is how it came to pass that a person whom Sellers never knew now controls his estate and owns all of his belongings, while his own natural children remain disinherited.

As for my own experiences of Lynne Frederick? It was around 1977 or 1978 when Peter called me at my home in Tuscany, saying he was coming into the port nearby with his yacht and had Dr Christiaan Barnard (his heart surgeon, who had performed the first human heart transplant) and Lynne Frederick on board, and asking, ‘Could we meet?’

I drove down to the port and found Peter leaning against a rail on the deck of his boat while Lynne was busy massaging his member, which in turn was popping out of his swimming shorts to say hello.

‘Uh-oh!’ I thought. ‘She’s trouble!’ And I think I was right.

Gstaad and
The Pink Panther
feature heavily in a story Victor Spinetti told me. Victor was the most wonderful raconteur and larger-than-life character. I first met him when he guest-starred in
The Saint
, though of course he more famously went on to appear in several of the Beatles’ films – as he would often tell anyone who happened to be in earshot.

A year or two before I moved to the Swiss ski resort, Victor decamped there to film
The Return of the Pink Panther
, which my old friend Lord Lew Grade funded. Peter Sellers had been lured back to play Clouseau a decade after his last outing, due, no doubt, in part to him needing to re-establish his box office appeal following a few not very successful films. Victor had a few very funny scenes as a hotel worker, which left Peter in hysterics on set as it happens. A good thing, surely? No, I’m afraid not, as in the rushes screening Victor got more laughs from the crew than Peter did, and the editor was ordered to move in with his scissors.

Quite oblivious to this, Victor later accepted the invitation from Lew Grade to attend the star-studded premiere in Gstaad and to take part in the various press junkets. It was only when he arrived in Gstaad that he was told that most of his screen time had been left on the cutting-room floor. Meanwhile, all the posters in the town proclaimed welcome to the stars ‘Peter Sellers, Christopher Plummer, Catherine Schell and Victor Spinetti’ in huge four-foot-high lettering. Victor realized he could hardly back out and return to the airport, so he
agreed to do whatever they wanted.

Victor Spinetti was a fantastic raconteur. His fund of stories was legendary and he told them with great humour and warmth.

The one line Victor had left in the film was when Clouseau asked Victor’s hotel manager character, ‘Do you have a rheum?’ and Victor responded with, ‘A
rheum
?’ That was it.

Dreading that the press might ask him how he prepared for his role in the film, Victor called his old mate Richard Burton, who was then also resident in Gstaad, with his sometime wife Elizabeth Taylor, and confided in them that he was feeling rather uneasy, particularly about having to attend the big post-film party afterwards, where he was sure he would feel a bit of a sham celebrating his role. Richard, having not been invited, decided that he and Liz would support their old friend by turning up and – of course – the photographers went mad. Peter Sellers’ face dropped and Liz Taylor proceeded to wind him up even further by saying things like, ‘Why did you choose
this
place for the party?’ and ‘What’s that
awful
music the band’s playing?’ (it was ‘The Pink Panther Theme’) and so on. Then, director Blake Edwards introduced his wife, Julie Andrews, to sing, at which Burton leaned over to Victor and said,
‘Anything you can do to follow, old love? The world’s press are here and might discover you all over again.’

Victor suggested he could do his monologue of ‘When Alec Guinness was fucked by the Turks’, to which Burton enthusiastically agreed, and as soon as Julie Andrews completed her song, Richard stood to his feet and said, ‘Ladies and gentlemen, and now my great friend Victor Spinetti ...!’

Sellers leapt up and shouted ‘NO!’

Burton smiled, ‘Of course, Peter, I’m sorry. Come Victor. Come Elizabeth,’ and they swept out, only stopping
momentarily for the blinding series of camera flashes.

‘We’ll get you in the bloody papers yet, Victor!’ said Burton.

The next morning, Burton arrived at Victor’s hotel to take him back home for lunch with Elizabeth. On the way back they picked up the European newspapers and found their three faces plastered across most of the front pages.

‘Success!’ cried Richard. Only on closer inspection they discovered the captions all read, ‘At the premiere of
The Return of the Pink Panther
Richard Burton, Elizabeth Taylor and Mel Ferrer …’

That’s show business, folks!

Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis in the early days. One of the greatest-ever comedy pairings.

CHAPTER 6

The Rat Pack

F
UNNILY ENOUGH
, I
KNEW SOME OF THE
ORIGINAL
R
AT
Pack from the 1950s … David Niven was one, as were Frank Sinatra, Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, Swifty Lazar, Cary Grant and Rex Harrison among others. You see, it was a moveable feast then, ‘visiting members’ were allowed and the name was actually coined by the lovely Bacall when she gazed upon the very motley crew of revellers returning from a show in Las Vegas.

Niv told me the story that Frank Sinatra had invited a few friends to join him at the Desert Inn in Vegas, where Noel Coward was opening in a show. There were about fourteen of them, so they took the overnight train, in a private coach, of course, for the overnight trip. It was champagne and caviar all night. Next day, they partied in the day and then watched Coward’s triumphant first night, before partying some more. This went on for four days and four nights, and I remember Niv remarking that towards the end of those four nights, Frank was the only member
of this merry band who seemed able to cope with it. It was at this point that Lauren Bacall made her famous remark, ‘You lot look like a goddam Rat Pack!’

Humphrey Bogart was always hailed as the head of the Rat Pack, but Frank Sinatra was the President, and after Bogie’s death he assumed the mantle. The Rat Pack continued to have a ‘fluid’ membership until the sixties, when it was used – by the press – to refer to Frank, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr, Peter Lawford and Joey Bishop. I came to know Frank, Dean and Sammy in later years.

I first met Frank in the 1950s at a club called Moulin Rouge in Hollywood. I was then under contract to Warner Bros. and was invited, as a very minor celebrity, to attend a Thalian Society charity fundraiser that was themed around ‘Cowboys and Indians’. At the dinner, my first memory of Frank is of him having a rather public confrontation with the most famous cowboy of all, John Wayne. The unpleasantness stemmed from the fact that Jack Warner, the head of Warner Bros., bid $1,000 to have a Warner Bros. contract artist, Gordon MacRae, sing at the event … only for John Wayne to bid $2,000 for him
not
to sing.

Frank felt The Duke had insulted his friend and made a point of it. Seeing the tall-framed Duke face up to Frank – who was a lot shorter, thinner and, with his gaunt cheeks, certainly appeared less formidable – was something I’ll never forget.

But Frank stood up for his friends. He was fiercely loyal. That was just one of the qualities that endeared him to me.

There had been history between Frank and The Duke going back some years, but eventually they patched up their differences – enough that when an All-Star Tribute to the great Wayne was produced in the mid-70s, Frank agreed to host the show. It’s said that even The Duke was surprised to see Frank hosting, but the evening went well and the stars – including Maureen O’Hara, Jimmy Stewart, Lee Marvin, Angie Dickinson, Sammy, Bob Hope and the like – all shone bright. Towards the end of the show, after all the songs and tributes, John Wayne stole the show when he rose to address his guests, ‘Tonight you’ve made an old man and an actor very happy. You are happy, aren’t you, Frank?’