Your Bond location pilgrimages.

007intheAdirondacks

Thank you for the shoutout. So glad you enjoyed the book. I look forward to your contacting me and will be glad to give you a tour of the library. Cheers! F.T.

RichardTheBruce

Thanks so much for your outreach @007intheAdirondacks you're very kind and I'll watch for the opportunity and keep you posted. Happy New Year this a a great start to 2025.



Some travel for me in December last year, more film-related. But here's a book location as well.

Diamonds Are Forever, Ian Fleming, 1956.
Chapter 15 - Rue de la Pay

‘On ya right, the Flamingo,’ said Ernie Cureo as they passed a low-lying modernistic hotel with a huge tower of neon, now dead, outside it. ‘Bugsy Siegel built that back in 1946. He came over to Vegas from the coast one day and took a look round. Had a lot of hot money looking for investment. Vegas was goin’ great guns. Town wide open. Gambling. Legalised cat-shops. Nice set-up. It didn’t take long for Bugsy to catch on. He saw the possibilities.’

Bond laughed at the pregnant phrase.

‘Yes, sir,’ continued the driver, ‘Bugsy saw the possibilities and moved right in. Stayed with it until 1947 when they blew some of his head off with so many bullets the cops never got around to finding them all. Then here’s the Sands. Plenty of hot money behind that one. Don’t rightly know whose. Built a couple of years ago. Front guy’s a nice feller name of Jack Intratter. Used to be at the Copa in New York. Mebbe you heard of him?’

‘Afraid not,’ said Bond.

Driving around all day birding and seeking out filming locations (Nevada and as far north as Lower Utah), I returned to Vegas on a Saturday after sunset and pretty much at peak traffic. Planning on the fly, no reservations. So I committed to getting in the vicinity of the Flamingo Hotel and Casino, finally acquiescing to actually using their parking garage and getting a room there.

My plan was in-house, to see a show at Bugsy's Cabaret which was on site. I actually didn't have much time to put it all together but checked in, got my promotional Caesar's card, dropped off my bags, returned to the lobby area, got a double gin and tonic, and diverted to Bugsy's where I bought my ticket and entered the small venue.

The show: Wayne Up Close and Personal.

Mr. Wayne Newton is a fantastic showman, and entertained for an hour and a half singing, playing instruments (guitar, steel guitar, violin), interspersed with film clips of his career and celebrity associates telling the story across the years. He had interesting stories to share for his experiences with Elvis Presley, Bobby Darrin, The Rat Pack especially Sinatra and Martin and Sammy Davis Jr (he did a duet with Sammy), Glen Campbell, and many, many, many others. Mr. Newton was full of energy and visibly enjoying himself presenting an entertaining review of pop music history and pop culture he was directly involved in.

He also made time to share insight on his film appearances over the years, with some clips and anecdotes. Of interest were his ad lib contributions that made it into films like Vacation (he had three on that one), Ferris Bueller's Day Off, many others. I did not catch a LTK mention in the clips, maybe because they were sticking to his positive image as other than villainy.

Enjoyable on all sides, a recommended show. I'm going to try to get there a second time this year to visit the locations I didn't see, and not least for a second chance to see Wayne. I will pay for the top end ticket which allows an after show in-person meeting with Mr. Newton. Where I will respectfully pose a couple questions to him.

• What was it like to work with James Bond?
• Did you offer a song for LTK for the titles or end titles? What was it?

And so looking for second chances on this. His shows are scheduled through 2025 and after, he seemed pretty unstoppable to me.

CommanderRoss

Wow, didn't have a clue he was still working! Very cool!