What a pro Queen Elizabeth is and a good sport, too. Danny Boyle said that she quickly got her role in the James Bond spoof during the opening ceremony of the Olympics and it only took a couple of hours to shoot the whole scene.
“Just marvelous, darling.” as Fernando Lamas used to say. She is a great example of debunking the fact that the British are too ‘stiff upper-lipped’. As a matter of fact, I thought the whole opening was entertaining and quite a feat to execute. Bravo to the Brits!
Again all this talk about London takes me back ( okay, over-fifty’s sometimes live in the past) to a visit I had there several years ago.
As an actress I always enjoy those impromptu moments, you know, when I have to listen to my fellow actors and then react by my gut or fly by the seat of my pants emotionally and verbally. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t, but it is fun.
Unfortunately though, once off the stage, I admit my skills in real life are not that great. Hasn’t this happened to you? I always think of what I should have or could have said long after the encounter has happened. I create this ‘after-play’ in my head that is just great.
Well, the first day of a trip to London I headed for Bond Street, with its very picturesque road winding along and creating a narrow pathway for some of the most magnificent shops in London. It is among one of my favorite streets in the world, but you must walk almost touching shoulders with other shoppers along the narrow way. As I walked from our flat at Wimpole Street, all the while savoring visions swirling in my head of the wonderful credit card opportunities that lay ahead of me, I tried to ignore the man who had popped from an art gallery and insisted walking at my pace and getting into my ‘personal space’.
Annoyed at his arrogance, I kept my eyes straight ahead and didn’t even glance his way. “What a creep”, I though to myself as I finally decided to give him a less than friendly stare as I quickly crossed the street to get rid of him. Our eyes met.
Well, if there had been a manhole available, I would have dived right in. Tall, tan and gorgeous, there he was receiving my ‘ugly American’ scowl-the actor and self-styled celebrity, George Hamilton!
I was so embarrassed that I almost humiliated myself more by tripping as I ran across the small street to escape from my stupidity. I couldn’t get away from George and Bond Street fast enough.
A few days later, forgiving myself for being such an idiot and my humiliating experience slowly fading, my desire to shop and satisfy my credit card addiction on Bond Street won. I returned to the scene of my crime.
After visiting several stores, I stopped by the Maud Frizon window to look at the shoe display.
Suddenly I was aware of a presence behind me checking to see what was capturing my attention. My heart almost stopped. I couldn’t believe the reflection I saw in the window. Lightening had struck twice! The reflection had a familiar name attached to it. It belonged to the one and only George Hamilton.
“We have to stop meeting like this”, he said with his white perfect teeth glistening within his perfectly tanned smile.
“Husband?”
My mind went blank, and the following events are a little hazy in my memory, but I think I do remember turning toward him and giving a slight idiotic embarrassed giggle with my ‘should I lie, but I can’t’ honest…. “Yes.”
Then what seemed an eternity (was probably no more than a few mille-seconds), “Too bad,” he replied with a wink that crinkled the skin around his perfect eyes.
And he was off to continue his journey down Bond Street and I was left to think of what I should have, could have said, or wanted to say to George Hamilton.
As Mark Twain said, “The difference between the
almost-right word and the right word is really a large
matter-it’s the difference between lightning and the
lightening.”
©Sandra Hart 2012
Sandra's Hart My Over 60 Lifestyle Journey 