The Guardian profiles Tony Curtis, who would like you to know he’s still very much alive, and he’s still had more sex than you could even dream about. Now 82, Curtis enjoys his golden years from a gated community outside Las Vegas. “His house, situated on the corner of a quiet street, seems surprisingly small,” writes John Patterson. “Once you're inside, though, it opens up hugely, and the living-room window is a majestic Cinemascope production, looking on to a small pool that in turn overlooks a golf course that stretches away into the desert distance. It rises to a low ridge that niftily obscures all the crappier suburbs of Vegas, leaving visible only the thicket of garishly coloured casino-hotels downtown. At night, this must truly be a million-dollar view.”
Curtis doesn’t get around as well as he used to, so his days of carousing the strip Rat Pack-style are probably behind him. Patterson finds the actor in a wheelchair (“He doesn't really need it any more, he says”), hard of hearing and just getting over a long bout with pneumonia. But by gum, he’s still got his memories. “Well, there was a lot of pussy - always a lot. I don't mean to be disrespectful, but that was my aim in life - the girls. And I took a personal pleasure in it, obviously, because it had nothing to do with me, I was just a nice-looking guy. Listen, that was one of the best gifts I had. What am I gonna do, put it down?”
Along those lines, Curtis recounts an anecdote we’ve heard before, one that’s almost too perfect to be true although we really hope it is. The last time we heard it was right after Walter Matthau died, and at the time, we could think of no better tribute. Just picture his trademark hangdog expression when the punchline arrives.
“I was in my early movie days, and they flew me back to New York from being in this one movie, tiny part. And I got in the limousine to go back to the hotel. And I told them to drive by the old theatre where the acting school was - the President Theater - and Walter was standing under the awning, looking just miserable, a terrible rainy day. And I told the driver, 'See that guy standing over there, pull over so I can talk to him.' And here's Walter, still at the acting school, hasn't worked as an actor properly yet, and he was so dishevelled and sad and wet, and I'll never forget the look on his face, like, 'Who the fuck is comin' to the school in a car like that?' And before he could get a word out, I rolled down the window, stuck my head out and said very loud: 'I fucked Yvonne De Carlo!' And then I told the driver, 'Get outta here!' I left poor old Walter standing there holding his newspaper over his head in the rain.”
We’re sure Matthau laughed about it eventually.