|
For Him's resident food psychologist analyses the contents of another celebrity stomach. This week's special: Tony Slattery.
FHM Dec/Jan 1990
Now, I like to think of myself as an open minded chapess... I'm prepared to find out that not all blondes with faces for which an entire Noah's Ark of animals has died and mammaries like weather balloons have the IQ of a poached egg... I'm willing to believe that there are some regular heterosexuals in showbiz... I'm even open to persuasion that Ben Elton hasn't really sold out.
But I knew I wouldn't find Tony Slattery interesting.
I knew I didn't want to spend a lunch gazing across the ice melting in my Evian at a medialand yuppie who, to me, had always appeared to have the manner of the concerned young house surgeon in an amateur dramatic production.
And oh - to paraphrase the Avon man - how things did conspire to feed my prejudice... The charmingly chummy Kate had played a sort of journalistic Cilla to our coupling, setting me up with Tony ("really great... very friendly") for a lunch at the Braganza ("really great... very friendly"). My bonhomie evaporated like an audience from Metropolis when, having opined thoughtfully that Tony 'isn't as young as you'd think', she revealed, in tones that begged the rejoinder 'poor old thing', that he must be at least... twenty nine.
I considered forewarning the Braganza that we would be taking our lunch through straws, but thought better of it.
I did, however, resolve to wear my camouflage specs and sit with my back to the light.
The final nail in the coffin of positivity was hammered home by the esteemed editor of this ouevre who phoned to inform me, in his chirpy cockney way, that it would be 'old Justin', the fastest shutter in the west on the old visuals for this one and added, as a parting shot 'bit of a clothes horse, old Tone, inee?'.
I further resolve to wear shoulder pads and something intimidating in the way of accessories.
And so I sit again in the downstairs bar of the Braganza, trying not to put my elbows in the sticky patches... story of my life, really. I am not an incandescently happy little Copstick. The bar has had to send out for tomato juice, my eyes are already smarting from a reckless and unaccustomed application of Outdoor Girl's Ultralash, and neither the normally well-informed Justin, nor the classy anorexic on the welcome mat appears to have heard of my British brat pack blind date. By the time I have to spell his name... always a bad sign... my hackles are in an erectly state such as would do justice to Errol Flynn. It is as my index finger is greedily foraging around in the glass for my piece of lemon that the door opens and in lopes the thinking usherette's crumpet.
My immediate thought is that if only Hollywood could have made his biopic in time, he would have had to be played by the young Nigel Stock.
He looks not so much cuddly as cuddled. Vaguely rumpled, even. And smaller than I thought he'd be. But perhaps that's the effect of the rumpling.
He wears a school uniform blue suit, fashionably loose, and a lavatory green and white striped shirt, not so fashionably open at the neck.
Somehow he contrives to make the ensemble - self evidently fashionably expensive - look like a pair of pyjamas.
His eyes are the brown of a champion conker. When he smiles, he somehow seems to smile with his whole body. The overall effect is of a eager Eurosize schoolboy with the handshake of a games master.
I ask if he would like a drink or whether he'd prefer to lunch immediately. He tells me he is putty in my hands. I decide I like this person. I take him straight upstairs. Plus ça change...
My little pink eyes - the Max Factor Kohl Eyeliner Pencil in Soft Black was a definite mistake - take on a gimlet quality as Tony announces that he never eats lunch.
Justin - equipment in one hand, menu in the other - asks if everyone is starters and orders the lettuce and mushroom soup.
Tony flings usage to the winds and joins Justin in the soup - figuratively speaking.
And speaking of figures, Tone is a recent returnee from a health farm. Two weeks to turn the fatter Slattery into the noble specimen who sits but a Puffatoon of Smoked Salmon away (I only ordered it to see what a Puffatoon was... it is, as Tony concisely puts it, 'a profiterole without the chocolate sauce'... only chewier).
You see, he has a bit of a thing about his weight, does our cover boy. He refers to himself as a fatso... describes himself as 'waddling'... it's not true.
Physically, I would say Tony Slattery represents an anatomical median 'twixt Emo Phillips and Robbie Coltrane. I cannot help but notice a rosebud blush peeping through the manly chestal foliage exposed by the decolletage as Tony leans forward to warn Justin that he will become 'greasy' ere long. I mention it.
Tony confesses that he is very nervous.
I am incredulous. But it would explain the blush... and the act that he has just ingested a midget Hovis with such speed that the bread virtually liquefied as it hurtled though the air from plate to mouth.
He says he doesn't do interviews. He says he doesn't like them.
But he wanted to do this one.
I am flattered. I feel a warm glow. I think it is probably due to the fruity New Zealander chosen with a savoire faire (his, not mine) born of recent membership of the Wine Club. Tony's tastebuds have been getting to grips with the Germans, and he spiritedly (ah, the appeal of a good pun...ect ect) defends the honor of the much maligned Leibfraumilch. He tells me the Leibfrau has created much good milch. My palate is racked with memories of vaguely viscous liquids poured from bottles adorned with pictures of what appeared to be little Jimmy Osmond in Lederhosen, but I bow to his superior knowledge. And the Chenin Blanc he has chosen is delicious. A tad tepid, we agree, but delicious. Even the second bottle is delicious.
And I decide that Kate was absolutely right... Tony Slattery is very interesting.
He's Irish. I didn't know that. He certainly doesn't sound Irish, tho' he says Mother and Father Slattery do, and neither do the sibling Slatterys - four in number, three of whom are triplets, and none of whom led the way for the littlest Slattery into showbiz. He attributes his well modulated timbre to an education begun at a 'Catholic grammar school with Jesuit overtones' and continued at Cambridge - a choice made on aesthetic rather than academic grounds.
Three years he was there, immersed in history and mediaeval languages and dabbling in the Footlights - or rather, as it turned out, vice versa. He thinks an Oxbridge education gives one a certain 'classlessness'... mmmm... tell that one to the Diplomatic Corps, Tony. He hasn't been back to Ireland since he went up... or down... or whichever way it is one goes to Cambridge.
But there is a gentleness about him that is very Irish... and he does love his potatoes.
Now this last remark could easily be seen as a racist slur on the dietary pecadillos of the Emerald Islanders, born of sterotyping and ignorance. I prefer to think of it as a neat link back to or continuing gourmandising. And he does love potatoes.
But he's talking about Fatso again so I dive into the verbal maelstrom with a brilliant 'are you a good cook?'. Sue Lawley, eat your heart out!
He claims to have a 'battery' of dishes with which he impresses.
A double 'A' size battery, I venture to suggest... Boeuf Stroganoff, Boeuf Stroganoff without the cream sauce (or in other words, Boeuf) and ham and cheese toasted sandwiches. He admits to having a toasted sandwich maker but says it is deeply encrusted with the detritus of toasties past, and presently developing blue bits.
Over Swordfish with Lemon Butter sauce - which didn't, incidentally, taste lemony or buttery but was delicious - discourse ranges from French cinema to Tales By The Riverbank via Batman the Movie and Twizzel. And Thirtysomething. Justin claims never to have seen it. Tony claims only to have seen one episode. I claim never to have seen a whole episode. Yet somehow we contrive to spend quite a mirthful while discussing Elliot (who works in advertising and cries a lot) and Michael (who works in advertising and cries a lot, but not as much as Elliot) and endless middle American yuppie babies (who seem to be the only members of the Thirtysomething cast who don't cry a lot). And we talk about the 'New Man'. Justin claims he's a feminist. Tony admits to tears and periods of broodiness.
I suddenly feel somehow to the macho side of Sly Stallone.
We ponder the lemminglike rush to pair-bonding and procreation that seems to overtake chaps as they get to be thirtysomething.
Tony reckons it is the urge to stake a claim, to put your flag on the top of your mountain. He's probably right. But Edmund Hilary didn't have to change Everest's nappies.
I'm telling the tale of a good friend of mine who has recently swapped what appeared to be an almost permanent erection for an overdraft and a 'Snuggly' (which is one of those harness things which allows the New Father to carry his New Infant slung close to his manly - but caring chest.)
Thoughts of little Slatterettes first begirt Tony at University, but were simply part of the 'experimenting with ideas' that goes on in the average undergraduate mind. Although the Squirrel Nutkinesque eyes mist over as he describes a day recently spent filming a corporate video which co-starred a new born baby. He mutters into his Pommes Lyonnaise about having 'ridiculous feelings'.
He had a wonderful childhood himself, you see. He says he got total and unconditional love from his parents and still is very close to them now. I think it probably shows. Lucky Tony. And lucky Mother and Father Slattery.
Their youngest son is just about the most genuinely modest person I have ever met. Which is incredible. He actually has very little to be modest about.
We touch lightly on the subject of the new series of Saturday Night at the Movies, I say I was disappointed that it offered more or less animated listings. He says he didn't feel qualified to be opinionated... he says he didn't feel he had the background... he says he thought 'who gives a fuck what I think, except my mum and dad?'... see what I mean about modesty?
Apparently the only thing he has ever pushed himself forward for (he hustled, he says) is Whose Line Is It Anyway? Which he continues to enjoy. And which he thinks is possibly improved by John Sessions limiting himself to appearing in only half the series. Apparently he's been getting a little tetchy, has the intellectual colossus of alternative comedy. A little impatient at times says Tony in the same sort of way that Mother Superior enquired 'How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria?' Tony thinks the problem is that John doesn't really like to share a stage with anyone. Nobody's fool, our Tone.
Over dessert - which I, in an unguarded moment, refer to as pudding - of Chocolate Mogador for the boy who never eats lunch, and little parcels of fresh mango sitting on a sauce that looked exactly like the previous one (again tasting of neither lemon nor butter but again delicious) for me, the butterfly of our conversation flits from minimalism as excellence in screen acting - we agree on Gregory Peck and Dirk Bogarde but part company on Meryl Streep - to minimalism of excellence in 'Aspects of Love' - to a production which has Tony returning to the medieval Spanish word for derogative. The best known showbiz hyphen's latest triumph is, according to Tony, a 'cabron' (come on chaps, let's hear those rrr's roll). Which is to say... well, it does lose pith in the translating, it is an argumentative of the word for goat. Savvy?
I discover the boy can tap dance. He learned in a fortnight to play the upper class tap dancing twit Gerald in Me and My Girl. It was during his stint in this, he explains over a pot of Earl Grey to wash down the Chocolate Mogador, that he decided never to eat lunch.
At this juncture I am more than a little impressed as the twinkle toed Tony springs from his chair to demonstrate a choreographic salute to Dougie Squires, dancemaster extraordinaire and sometime Second Generation supremo.
Back at the pot of Earl Grey we talk about beauty born, bred and bought. We talk media pressure and the lure of the Holy Grail, silicone implants and the importance of mastering one's Max Factor.
Tony is avowedly of the 'handsome is as handsome does' school of thought. And he says he never quite got to grips with the greasepaint. Those years as a student Slattery, in the glare of the Footlights, were spent in an ugliness of Othello coloured pancake that stopped short at the chin, pink dots in the eyes and - a new one on me - touches of blusher on the earlobes. This last 'trompe de maquillage' is intended to impart to the thespian a fresh and youthful glow, but resulted, in Tony's case, in an overall effect of excruciating embarrassment.
The young Stephen Fry apparently started something of a trend in the application of white stripes down the middle of the nose, to correct any crookedness. A generation of Footlighters took to the stage looking, in Tony's own bucolic simile, like badgers.
By the time four o'clock comes and we are all late for something, I know things like he wanted to be an astronomer when he was at school, and people keep telling him he looks like Robert Mitchum and Ben Elton hasn't sold out.
And on our way to Leicester Square - Tony to a meeting, me to the Northern Line - he worries that we haven't talked much about food and tells me his cravings for Kebabs... the full, unexpurgated, Dunlopillo sized kebabs with onions and chili and all those other things that lose you friends and then he bounds off through the traffic.
Now I like to pride myself on a pithy ending. A few well chosen words to linger in the mind and excite the intellectual tastebuds. But Tony Slattery, three courses and four hours later the words that spring to mind are...
What a bloody nice bloke! Cos he is.
|
