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The Christopher Lee’s (which consisted of his wife Gitte and their young daughter Christina) had been living in Hollywood just about a year when I had my fateful meeting with “The Lord Mayor.” They had taken up residence on the eighth floor of a Westwood high rise known as the “Wilshire Holmby.” After a day or so Terry telephoned with Lee’s private number and a time I could call to properly introduce myself and perhaps join them for lunch.

My first phone conversation with Christopher Lee was a surprisingly long one filled with his serious questions about my being an artist’s representative in Hollywood (he loved the fact I was a film buff working a management job in the business as he felt most people in our business knew next to nothing of its history. “They have no idea who GARBO was?”), the pitfalls of typecasting, our mutual friends in London, a lengthy discussion on the real meaning behind the ending of Antonioni’s THE PASSENGER which had just come out, and finally what kind of a place was this Studio One where our mutual friend Terry James and I first met. When I explained that the disco was predominantly gay he paused for a moment and then said in that deep baritone I knew so well from his films “Well if I do go there, perhaps I should come alone.”

One of the things during that conversation that must have endeared me to him was when I quoted our mutual friend, the eminent fantasy writer Ray Bradbury, who described Los Angeles as “Twenty-nine oranges in search of a navel.” Christopher just roared at that, as I felt he knew in his heart of hearts that LA was not his kind of town. As we got along so well during that conversation I asked him if he would care to have lunch with me later that week. To my surprise he said yes, which left me with the responsibility of choosing the restaurant.

In those days the only place to take a celebrity in Hollywood where they could be seen and you could bask in their reflected glory was “Ma Maison,” a seemingly modest French Bistro off Melrose run to perfection by Patrick Terrail and later, with his partner Wolfgang Puck.
The place was legendary in the film industry as the most difficult restaurant to get a table, not to mention its attitude – so haughty that it had an unlisted number. The enclosed-in- plastic garden room was the main dining area, with tables always very close together so you could overhear most of whatever conversation was going on at any given time. There was a dining area back near the kitchen by the bar, but that was always reserved for Orson Welles who came in through the back of the restaurant with his little black poodle “kiki,” as Patrick allowed Orson the privilege of bringing in his pet like they tend to do for special customers in Europe.

I arrived at Ma Maison half an hour early to make sure we got our table as this was my first opportunity to impress my childhood hero in Tinsel Town. It was a good thing I did as the place was jammed for lunch as usual and I was told it might be 90 minutes before my table was ready. I decided to have a drink at the bar in hopes Christopher might do the same if we were forced to wait that long even with my reservation.
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As I walked back to the bar I could see the great Orson already at his little table dining, it seemed, by himself. He noticed me looking at him and motioned for me to come over to his table. “If you are waiting for a table you could be in this bar until dinner time the way things are looking…” I explained I was waiting for my luncheon guest, the newly arrived British actor Christopher Lee. Orson smiled at me for the longest time and said “Aren’t you that fellow Gary Graver was telling me about who is besotted about the Horror film?” I was so stunned that Gary had mentioned me, yet looking back, I had asked him to have Orson sign a photograph from CHIMES AT MIDNIGHT for me as they were always hanging out together, Gary being his cameraman and all. Orson then said to me in his best MR. ARKADIN voice, “Young sir, you march right over to that head waiter who handles the reservations and tell him you are waiting for CHRISTOPHER LEE and I guarantee you will be seated straight away, and when you are finished, please stop by my table.” Orson gave me a wink and I was off to do as he suggested. Of course it worked and I was seated a good 15 minutes before Christopher arrived.

I must say when he did make his entrance it was worth the wait. Christopher Lee is a tall man indeed, and at six foot five he pretty much towered over most of the diners that day. He made his way over and after the initial handshakes and so forth we ordered drinks to start. “I would adore a ‘Kir’ I think” said Christopher. A ‘Kir,’ for the uninitiated, is a sublime concoction of white wine and crème de cassis on the rocks. This became my favorite drink with lunch for years after that. When I mentioned that Orson Welles was dining in the back, Christopher smiled and told me that he was once directed by the great Welles in a television production of “Moby Dick” in London and was of course greatly impressed with Orson, remembering Welles saying after a take, “PRINT with ENTHUSIASM!” When it came time to leave, Christopher was simply too shy to say hello to Welles; however Orson had already left the building, so there was nothing to fear.

Our first lunch together was nothing if not a success. He was charming and funny, filled with fascinating stories about filmmaking all over the world. Within an hour or so we were finishing each others’ sentences. I was careful about discussing the Hammer years with him during that first lunch; however the subject of his long association with Peter Cushing was discussed, especially Cushing’s devotion to his late wife, Helen. Christopher was quite candid about how he felt regarding her. “She was a psychic vampire and that relationship was complex to say the least; Helen’s mental hold on her husband was absolute. Helen did not trust me for many years and actually said to me at one point “You think you are a bigger star than my husband don’t you?” At this point Christopher smiled and then told me his reply to Helen Cushing: “Well, my dear, I am taller than Peter.” Christopher reflected for a moment after that and told me that a lot of Peter’s mourning was a heavy combination of both remorse and guilt as well, for the temptations of working with some of the most beautiful women in the world sometimes proved too much for him, being a mortal man after all. However, after Helen’s death he became one of the living dead himself, unable to think or be with people. “Peter simply went into the grave with her at that point.” He was inconsolable.

“You know Peter and I went to great lengths in our separate careers not to be considered just a double act in Horror pictures, as typecasting is one of the worst pitfalls an actor can let happen in a career.” However it was the great man himself, Boris Karloff, who felt just the opposite and would be the first to tell you that if it had not been for his being cast as the Frankenstein monster in 1931 he might well be forgotten today and not revered as an icon. “An honor Boris most richly deserves by the way. My career was much like his, really, for I too became known after I played the creature for Hammer in CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN, and then a year later, well, you know the rest don’t you?”

I would wind up doing at least three print interviews with him during his eight years in town. I don’t think he ever adjusted to being so far from Europe. His only real outlet was golf and sometimes he would play five days a week between films. His wife Gitte, a stunning former model from Denmark, was always traveling abroad, as LA was not her cup of tea either. Christopher was funny about that, too. “My wife stays with the richest families on the continent and yet she calls me collect!” I could hear Terry James laughing at that remark…. Looking back at that afternoon in 1979 lunching with Count Dracula, receiving advice on securing a table from “Citizen Kane” It simply does not get better than this…even dining in that hopelessly pretentious Bistro known as “Ma Maison” remains cast in my memory with a golden hue of a paradise lost.

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