RIP Peter O’Toole
by digby
One of the all time greats:
The character of Alan Swann was evidently fairly close to his real personality. This profile from a few months back is vastly entertaining:
I followed the waiters into O’Toole’s bedroom with trepidation. The scene had changed. The bed was now empty, the bathroom door ajar. There were bubbles – lots of bubbles – lapping against the carpet, a wall of steam and an overwhelming sickly smell.
“Peter? Everything okay?” I enquired nervously. “Your breakfast has arrived.”
“I think…” Long dramatic pause. “I think… I think… Lazarus is slowly rising from the dead,” he announced mischievously, spitting out each syllable with exaggerated voice projection, volume and enunciation before appearing through the mist like an apparition.
He was naked, had an oversized powder puff the size of a Frisbee in one hand and was liberally covering himself and the room with Penhaligon’s Bluebell talcum powder.
“Autograph, boys?” he asked the trio of stunned waiters.
This Lawrence of Arabia collector’s edition 
Update: This profile by Gay Talese back when LOA was first released is also a gem.
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