actress anita ekberg – la dolce vita

orson welles – still from the film touch of evil

when picking a mate, just keep in mind… well, the mind. the rest will soon be gone. a couple of specimens demonstrate my point.

swedish actress/pin-up anita ekberg was much like bardot in her days. the story goes that when ekberg met howard hughes, who at the time was producing films, hughes wanted her to change her nose, teeth and name. hughes felt “ekberg” was too difficult to pronounce. she refused to change her name, saying that if she became famous, people would learn to pronounce it, and if she didn’t become famous, it would not matter…. hmmm. promising point but what about the nose and the teeth? regardless, in her later days one does hope that she turned out to be an interesting person one could still love.

orson sure didn’t age much better than anita, but he was indeed more than an interesting man. he had it all, if only he wasn’t the gourmand that he was. a recollection from writer jim harrison’s dinner with orson goes something like this…“orson began by clearing his palate with a half dozen bull shots in quick succession. as we were hungry, the first course was a half-pound of fresh caviar with an iced bottle of stolichnaya. the next course was a wonderful ragu of sweetbreads in pastry covered by a half-quart of black truffle sauce, accompanied by a rare old burgundy. then without a moment’s rest arrived a whole poached atlantic salmon in a sorrel sauce and a white bordeaux…” and that was just 1 out of 3 meals that lead him to where he went. by dd