My Celebrity anecdotes

May 4, 1944
For me, I started my acting career backwards. Famous to begin with far too early, so you might say, as a performer, downhill ever since.
This event for me was not likely to be surpassed for the rest of my life.
It was the Royal Command Performance late on the night of

April 1, 1961
I know that Bea, being a nice person, will forgive me for this, she probably never knew.
It began in the year 1959. I had recently arrived in New York from Toronto, and insisted on renting an apartment right in the middle of the theater district, on 47th Street at the edge

1962
Jonathan was born, another saga of a story, but we decided to give it another go for his sake.
Still trying to get somewhere, and taking classes in just about everything, especially singing, I would go to Diane Courtney’s little studio up on Eighth Avenue and 55th Street, second floor walkup.
This particular session,

1963
I’m cheating here, because I never met the man, known as The Manassa Mauler. But his wife, there was a tale.
About 1963, I was one of a group of actors working for a Martin Snyder who operated a very successful theater travel group out of New York. He would put together large numbers

1964
John Dexter, the late director associated with Britain’s National Theatre, became a friend of ours when Lynn and I first married. He had directed her in Black Comedy on Broadway, and later in the first of the only two movies he directed, The Virgin Soldiers. He was also known to be a somewhat sadistic

1965
Living with Kay and the baby in a tiny walkup on Second Avenue (rent $33.35 month!) was just not working out, and so I had rented a better, and separate, apartment for them in fashionable East 66th Street (rent $56 a month!).
The monthly bills were high, though, and so a night job was

July 6, 1967
Lynn and I were married on April 2, 1967. The ceremony was conducted in Sidney Lumet’s living room on New York’s Lexington Avenue, up in the 90’s somewhere, and photographed for Life Magazine by Michael Crawford who was into photography in those days.
Back to London to live in Lynn’s newly bought