Dublin Dossier Pat Keenan on happenings in and around the capital
When Dublin became Cold War Berlin
Smithfield, Dublin becomes a Berlin checkpoint for the Spy Who Came In From The Cold
John le Carré, photo: Krimidoedel
Was a time, growing up, when there seemed to be only two posh hotels in Dublin, The Gresham on O’Connell Street and The Shelbourne on St.Stephen’s Green. This curiously came back to me with the announcement in December that John le Carré had died. I recalled that the former British secret service agent and author of those Cold War espionage novels booked into the Shelbourne when he came to Dublin for the filming of The Spy Who Came In From the Cold perhaps his best novel. Also in town for that film, Richard Burton and his new wife Liz Taylor opted for the Gresham.
Richard Burton and Michael Horden in Dublin Zoo for the filming of The Spy Who Came In From the Cold
Burton played the novel's anti-hero Alec Leamas, a British spy in Cold War Germany. During one scene Burton was required to fall off the Berlin Wall which, by all accounts, was a difficult scene requiring him to perform lots of falling 'takes'. Liz wanted to have a look but when she arrived on the cobbles in her Rolls Royce everything came to a halt as onlooking Dubliners surged over the film set cordons to see her.
Their Gresham suites occupied an entire floor of the hotel. At the time their first marriage was less than a year old. On arrival they were none too impressed by the Gresham's luxurious double bed. Simply, it was not wide enough. A much wider bed was hurriedly made to fit their requirements. They stayed for 10 weeks as the film progressed at the newly opened Ardmore Studios in Bray and at various Dublin locations masquerading as post war Berlin.
During their stay Elizabeth Taylor’s Rolls Royce was again in the news, this time more seriously for an awful accident. With chauffeur Gaston Sanz at the wheel and Liz sitting in the back seat the Rolls struck and killed 78 year old Alice Maud Bryan while she was out for a walk on the Stillorgan Road. No duel carriageway then - just a narrow and windy road. Liz Taylor, Richard Burton and the chauffeur offered the Bryan family a message of 'sincere and profound sympathy'. Two years later in1967 the couple would return to the Gresham for just one more time when Liz gave evidence at the inquest into the death of Mrs Bryan. No criminal proceedings were ever issued but Liz Taylor left Dublin, never to return.
Grey cobble stoned Smithfield Square was turned into a major film set. Money was poured into building a section of the Berlin Wall, complete with watchtowers and Checkpoint Charlie with large signs 'You are now leaving the American Sector' in English, German, French and Russian.
Just before he died John le Carré, appalled by the Brexit vote, told his friend and fellow writer John Banville that he was applying for an Irish passport. He told him ‘I am a European and I would like the passport of a European,’ He talked on the late Marian Finucane's Radio 1 radio
The Burtons arrived in Dún Laoghaire on the mailboat and were whisked into the city in Liz's Rolls Royce, driven by her French Basque-béreted chauffeur and bodyguard Gaston Sanz.
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