And that’s all she got, my regards, since we roamed the Monte Carlo casino before it was open for gambling.
The Beaux Arts cathedral of high stakes betting was featured in Ian Fleming’s first James Bond novel, “Casino Royale.” It wasn’t in the eponymous movie, but it turned up in another Bond film, “Never Say Never Again.”
Ian Fleming loved a card showdown in his novels. More hands are dealt Bond in the books than ever take up time on the screen. If Bond had a spiritual home, we were standing in it.
A monument to lavish Belle Epoque spending, the Beaux Arts space gave me more of a Roaring Twenties doomed romance feel than a Cold War cards-close-to-the-chest spy drama. With the fluffy romantic murals bending the ceiling corners, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s French Riviera novel “Tender is the Night” seemed more present than “Casino Royale.”
I was less likely to run into a secret agent (Bond) bluffing at blackjack than witness a troubled soul (Zelda Fitzgerald) at the roulette table having nervous breakdown.
Not a troubled soul, but a talented jazz singer (Dee Dee) I met years ago in New York was scheduled at the wealthy nightclub area of the casino.
For Americans Monaco is a Cinderella story starring a midwestern gal named Grace Kelly who married a prince. Prince Rainier III was a big promoter of the Monaco Grand Prix, the Formula One car race that is almost a hundred years old. Downhill from the casino by the harbor there is a museum of his car collection.
Of course these were expensive cars conspicuously consumed, but what struck me was the size and solidity of these vehicles manufactured in the Twenties and Thirties, not to mention how comfortable they looked.
I could just imagine Dick Diver in “Tender is the Night” taking a spin in one of these babies.
Bond, an Aston Martin man, would have had a more early Fifties style to his Formula I.
Outside by the road used in the Monaco Grand Prix, we were back in Bond World where yachts from around the world docked in the harbor.
And though I was readily willing to sit down and sip an espresso while I dreamed of zipping along the coastline in a fat-tired roller derby-sized speedster, I followed Ella toiling up steep stone steps to the top of another promontory where the old part of Monaco overlooked the casino by the harbor.
A changing of the guard was taking place.
At the cathedral, any quiet sanctity was disturbed by work going on behind the altar. It sounded like they were installing a hot tub in the vestry.
And the old town was ready for tourists.
