NOT AS GOOD AS Benson’s Brasserie,” commented Lansdown, “but pretty good food nonetheless.”
The large marquee served as a restaurant for the “upper crust,” as Lansdown humorously referred to it. The director, the assistant director, the director of cinematography, the communications manager, an accountant, the electrical supervisor, and a handful of others were in there at lunchtime, and Lansdown had a word or a wave for all of them.
Lobster salad, giant shrimp in a garlicky sauce, fresh bread, and a bowl with a bewildering variety of fresh fruit made a delightful meal, and we had a couple of bottles of Castilian wine, the wine of the region. “Miles and miles of open plains around here,” Lansdown commented. “You wouldn’t believe they could grow grapes that yield wines this good. None of them travel well, so nobody gets to know about them. Vinos verdes, they call them.” This one was a blend of grapes from Treixadura and Torrontes, and it was sharp and biting yet fruity at the same time.
During the meal, Lansdown told us of his fascination with the character he was playing. “Poor old Richard Plantagenet has been getting a raw deal from historians for a lot of years. A hundred years ago, they had him pegged as ‘the worst king ever to sit on the English throne.’ Said he was ‘a bad son, a bad husband, a selfish ruler, and a vicious man’. Then, on top of that, they said he was a homosexual, though it seems that may be more a reflection on our times than on Richard’s.”
“The view is different today?” I asked.
“They seem to be getting nearer to the truth now. Both Richard’s parents were French, did you know that?”
“No. We think of him as so essentially English.”
“He was brought up in France and spent more than three-quarters of his life there. More than any other king of England, though, he belongs to the world of romance and legend rather than the world of history. It’s understandable—the bravest warrior of the age, leading a great crusade to the Holy Land, captured while returning to England, imprisoned in a castle, finally returning home to wrest back the throne from his rascally brother, John.”
“Which viewpoint did your screenwriters use?” I asked.
“They’ve had to bring in as much of the romantic element as needed for a movie. Generally, though, they show him the way historians today see him—as a military genius, a very capable ruler, and a brilliant political strategist.”
Interested in everything, Lansdown was clearly ready to go on about Richard, but across the restaurant marquee, Francesca had seen a stunt man she knew from a couple of Roman epics. He had made the transition from chariots to one of Saladin’s commanders, so she went with him to talk about old times while Lansdown and I went to his trailer, a massive Winnebago that he jokingly called his 747.
It was luxuriously furnished, and we sank into plush armchairs while Oriental carpets spread on the floor and oil paintings on the walls made it hard to remember where we were. A silent air conditioner kept the temperature and humidity at comfort level, and Lansdown stretched out his legs and said, “Right. Now’s the crunch. What about these three chefs?”
I didn’t take out my notes. I wanted to give them to him verbally before I did that.
“I’ll give you a thumbnail sketch of each before we get into details. Let’s begin with Giacomo Ferrero, chef and owner of the Capodimonte. He’s a huge, bearded character, looks like Pavarotti, extroverted, boisterous, noisy, opinionated. Been in kitchens all his life, stays fully involved in all aspects. He’s a fine organizer and a stickler for precision. His aim is to offer nothing less than perfect food and flawless service. He believes in thorough professionalism and is a hard worker.”
“First out of the gate.” Lansdown grinned. “Off and running, may be hard to beat.”
“The food is excellent, service too. From an extracurricular point of view, he owns part of a vegetable distributor and has stock in a trucking outfit that handles mostly foodstuffs. One final point.”
Lansdown leaned forward attentively.
“He is about to lose one of his three stars, according to gossip.”
“Gossip!” he said contemptuously.
“Well, you’re in the entertainment business, which is lubricated by gossip. I know you’re in the restaurant business too, so you know that it’s taken more seriously there.”
He looked unconvinced. He shrugged, though, and asked, “Any basis to the gossip?”
“Not as far as I know.”
“Married?”
“Yes.” I decided not to enlarge on the sultry charms of Anita so I just added, “She is not active in his business.”
“All right. Next?”
“Ottavio Battista, chef-owner of the Palazzo Astoria—”
“Heard he’s a bit of a prima donna.” commented Lansdown.
“You can say that again. But he’s imaginative and more than that, he can see the possibilities of food combinations that nine out often chefs would miss. He’s unusual for that brilliant a chef, too, in that he always seems to have an eye on costs. He’s not a penny-pincher but he has more awareness of economy than most chefs. He can get away with clever touches—he leaves the pink coral on grancevola, spider crabs. He can make simple dishes into special dishes. Do you know strangolopreti?”
“Don’t think so. What is it?” He was all attention at the chance of learning something new.
“It’s gnocchi filled with spinach. Seasoning the spinach with chives or marjoram is as far as most chefs go—even the better ones. Ottavio adds garlic and caraway, a real daring idea. A lot of chefs try challenging things like that and many fail. With Ottavio, he seems to have an instinctive flair for knowing, just knowing that they will work.”
“And on the negative side?” Lansdown asked.
“The man’s a mess, personally. Looks like a reject from a rehab clinic. He’s a tyrant in the kitchen too. All he needs is a whip—though his tongue is just as effective. He treats his crew as if they were galley slaves.”
“And how do they react?”
“I won’t say they love it, but many of them have become chefs elsewhere and several have gained stars.”
“He’s a woman-chaser as I recall from the earlier survey when we still had a lot of candidates.”
“They swoon over him as if he were, well, a movie star,” I said straight-faced.
Lansdown grinned. “Surely women don’t do that?”
“There are rumors.”
“Okay.” Lansdown nodded. “And the third, that’ll have to be Bernardo Mantegna. Bit of an odd duck from all accounts.”
“He is a genius with flowers and plants. From a culinary point of view, probably one of the best-informed people in Europe. Yet he doesn’t let them dominate. He likes to make use of them as much as he can, but he is superbly talented with conventional dishes.”
“Sort of a Zen character, isn’t he?”
“Different, yes, but not eccentric. He admits to being totally immersed in his approach to cooking as being also an approach to nature. There’s one difficulty that has to be faced— his wife hates London.”
“Impossible,” said Lansdown promptly.
I smiled, expecting him to say that. As a barrow-boy on the North End Road in Fulham who had progressed to one of Britain’s most visible exports, he was a fervent Londoner at heart and not likely to understand how anyone could dislike the city.
“She even faked an affair with another of the chefs because she wanted to help him get the job, thereby making sure that Bernardo didn’t.”
“Is she involved in his business?”
“Deeply. She does the books, handles the money.”
“H’m.” Lansdown sighed and rose, going over to an elaborate bar. “Get you anything while we judge the finalists?”
I had a glass of palo cortado, a style of sherry slightly less rich than the oloroso and from the famed Valdespino bodega, the oldest family in the sherry trade. Lansdown opened a bottle of Spanish beer, San Miguel. “Can’t beat Young’s or Fuller’s,” he said, keeping up his loyalty to English beer, “but this is not bad.”
He returned to his seat and put the beer in front of him. “Now let’s see your notes and get down to some nitty-gritty.”
We spent the rest of the afternoon discussing, reviewing, arguing. The time was punctuated by another sherry and another beer and then another. We covered every aspect in the decision-making process and we were nearing the selection of a name when a knock came at the door.
“Mr. Stewart asks if you could come and look at these dailies, Mr. Lansdown,” called a voice.
“I still call them rushes,” Lansdown said. “Shows how long I’ve been in the business, I suppose.” He called out an agreement. “I’m co-producer on this picture,” he said to me, “so Bob likes to keep me involved.”
“You and I are close to making a choice.”
“Yes. Might be a good idea to sleep on it, though. When are you planning on flying back?”
“I have a flight to London at one o’clock tomorrow afternoon, and Francesca leaves for Rome and Bologna an hour later.”
“Why don’t you do this then?” Lansdown said. “We keep a few rooms booked at the Parador de Salamanca. Stay there tonight and we’ll finalize this in the morning. Bob and I have a meeting tonight with the fellows responsible for the Spanish army.” He chuckled, “I don’t mean the generals—these are from their War Department. We’re going to use two thousand soldiers in the scenes coming up and we don’t want to have to keep them a day longer than necessary. Neither do the Spanish—they might have a war sneak up on them.”
So it was agreed, and I went in search of Francesca, wondering if the movie bug had bitten her again and if she was right at this moment signing up for the next epic.