Roger Ebert: Farewell to my London home
Legendary film critic Roger Ebert reminisces about the eccentric hotel on Jermyn Street that for 25 years was his sanctuary – but now faces demolition
Oh, no. No. No. This cannot be. They're tearing down 22 Jermyn Street in London. Much of the block is going. Bates hat shop, Trumper the barber, Sergios cafe, all vanishing. Jermyn Street was my street in London. My neighbourhood.
There, on a corner near the Lower Regent Street end, I found a time capsule within which the eccentricity and charm of an earlier time was still preserved. It was called the Eyrie Mansion. When I stayed there, I considered myself to be living there. I always wanted to live in London, and this was the closest I ever got.
Many years ago I was in London and unhappily staying in a hotel room so small, they had to store my empty luggage elsewhere on the premises. I could sit on the bed and rest my forehead against the wall opposite. Fed up, I walked out one fine Sunday morning to find a better hotel, but not an expensive one. I recalled that Suzanne Craig, a Chicago friend of mine, had once informed me: "If you like London so much, you should stay at the Eyrie Mansion in Jermyn Street."
"A haunted house?"
"No, stupid. Spelled like an eagle's nest. And Jermyn isn't spelled like the country, either."
I took the tube from Russell Square to Piccadilly, and surfaced to find backpackers sprawled on the steps of Eros, still asleep after their Saturday night revels. One block down Regent and right on Jermyn and I found a small sign over the sidewalk above a doorway. It opened upon a marble corridor pointing me to a man who regarded me from eyes in a scarred face. The gatekeeper of the Eyrie. He disappeared and, when I drew abreast, he was behind a wooden counter protecting an old-fashioned switchboard, a thick registration ledger and a wall of pigeonholes.
"How may I help you, sir?"
"Is this . . . a hotel?"
"Since 1685, I believe. You require a room?" He had a Spanish accent.
"I'd . . . how much are your rates?"
He consulted a card tacked to the wall.
"For you, sir, £35. That includes full English breakfast, parlour and bedroom, own gas fire and maid. Bath en suite."
The rate was a third of what I was paying. I asked to be shown these quarters. He locked the street door. Then we ascended in an open ironwork elevator to an upper floor and I was let into 3A. A living room had tall old windows overlooking Jermyn Street. Dark antique furniture: a sideboard, a desk, a chest of drawers, a sofa facing the fireplace, two low easy chairs, tall mirrors above the fire and the sideboard. He used a wooden match to light the gas under artificial logs.
A hall led to a bedroom in which space had been found for two single beds, a bedside table between them, an armoire, a chest, a small vanity table and another gas fireplace. In the bathroom was enthroned the largest bathtub I had ever seen, even in the movies. The fixtures were not modern; the toilet had an overhead tank with a pull-chain.
"This is larger than I expected," I said. "How many rooms do you have in all?"
"Sixteen."
Of course I took it. When I'd moved my luggage in, it was still only 10 o'clock and I rang down for the full English breakfast. The Spaniard said he would prepare it himself as soon as possible, "because Bob is indisposed". He appeared with two fried eggs, a rasher of bacon, orange juice, four slices of toast in an upright warmer, butter, strawberry jam and a pot of tea. I sat at my table, regarded my fire, poured my tea, turned on Radio 3 and read my Sunday Telegraph.
For 25 years I was to come to Jermyn Street time and again. Now I can never return. Some obscene architectural extrusion will rise upon the sacred land, some eyesore of retail and condos and trendy dining. Piece by piece, this is how a city dies. How many cities can spare a hotel built in 1685, the year James II took the crown? I will barely be able to bring myself to return to Jermyn Street, which is, shop for shop, the finest street in London.
That first morning I walked down Regent Street to St James's Park, strolled around the ponds, came up by Prince Charles's residence, climbed St James's Street and returned the full length of Jermyn. I ordered tea. It consisted of tomato, cucumber and butter sandwiches, which the English are unreasonably fond of; ham and butter sandwiches, which I am unreasonably fond of with Colman's English mustard; and cookies – or, excuse me, biscuits.
I had just settled in my easy chair when a key turned in the lock and a nattily dressed man in his 60s let himself in. He held a bottle of Teacher's scotch under his arm. He walked to the sideboard, took a glass, poured a shot, and while filling it with soda from the siphon, asked me, "Fancy a spot?"
"I'm afraid I don't drink," I said.
"Oh, my."
This man sat on my sofa, lit a cigarette, and said: "I'm Henry."
"Am I . . . in your room?"
"Oh, no, no, old boy! I'm only the owner. I dropped in to say hello."
This was Henry Togna Sr. He appears in a Dickens novel I haven't yet read. I'm sure of it. He appeared in my room almost every afternoon when I stayed at the Eyrie Mansion. It was not difficult to learn his story.
Henry and his wife Doddy lived in the top-floor flat. He may have been the only man to live all of his life within a block of Piccadilly Circus. The Mansion was originally purchased in 1915 by his parents, who came from Italy, and Doddy's parents, who were English. The two children grew up together, married, and fathered Henry Jr, "who keeps his irons in a lot of fires". He asked me how I learned of the Eyrie Mansion. "Oh, yes! Suzanne. A lovely girl."
I was usually in London three times a year: in midwinter, in May after Cannes, and in summer. Henry was naturally confiding, and cheerfully indiscreet. That first day he lamented that his assistant, Bob, had gone missing when I wanted my breakfast. "Bob is a great trouble to me," he said. "He gets drunk every eighth day. I have implored him to make out a seven-day schedule and stick to it, but no. He will not be content unless he is throwing us off."
"I was well taken care of by the man who checked me in," I said.
"Poor fellow. He was a famous jockey in Spain. His face was burned in a stable fire while he tried to help his horses. He was one of those handsome Spanish boys. He was in a movie once by Buñuel. A film critic like yourself must have heard of him."
"Oh, I have," I said. "I wonder which film?"
"You'll never get that out of him," Henry said. "Nor will he tell you his real name. He says he's hiding out here, working overnights. He doesn't want anyone in Spain to learn where he's gone."
I thought of Jermyn Street as Ampersand Street. On Jermyn Street you will find Turnbull & Asser, where Saul Bellow bought his shirts and Gene Siskel bought his boxer shorts. You will find Paxton & Whitfield, with its window stacked high with cheeses, and Fortnum & Mason, where you can lunch at the soda fountain or plunge into the food hall. Down the street a bit are Sims, Reed & Fogg, the antiquarian booksellers. And, of course, Hilditch & Key, Harvie & Hudson, Crockett & Jones, New & Lingwood – all shirt-sellers. The street is synonymous with shirts.
Next door to the hotel, there is Bates the hatters, with a big top hat hanging over the sidewalk. This was one place where you knew for sure you could find a bowler, a deerstalker or a collapsible opera topper. They have had the same cat for 50 years (although it has been stuffed and with a cigar in its mouth for most of that time). Next to Bates, Trumper the men's hairdressers. I make it a practice to get my hair cut in every city where possible. Near the Eyrie I went first to Georgio's, a one-chair Greek barber shop in a mews off Duke Street. One day I followed the Archbishop of Canterbury into his chair. In the basement of Simpsons, I had my hair cut next to the former prime minister Edward Heath. Jermyn is that kind of street. Finally I graduated to Trumper, a magnificent shop of brass and leather, wood and mirrors, and the aroma of hair tonics with exotic spices.
Sometimes in walking about the area, I would happen upon Henry, always dressed to befit Jermyn Street, who knew everyone of any interest, from the maitre d' at Wiltons to the man with the Evening Standard stand behind St James's Piccadilly. I never saw Henry in a pub, however, and despite the bottle of Teacher's under his arm, I never saw him tipsy.
One day he invited me to lunch. We walked over to a cozy, chic French restaurant in a byway near Leicester Square. Customers waiting in line were ignored as we were seated immediately. We were shown to our banquette by a handsome French woman of a certain age, whose hand, I observed, lingered longer on his shoulder than one might have expected. Henry saw me noticing, and his eyes twinkled.
He was much concerned about the future of the Mansion. "Our landlady is the Queen," he told me. "The Crown Estate agents have always tried to keep the lease terms reasonable, but the price of property is making the most alarming advances. I've raised my prices as much as I dare. Henry Jr wants to take over and make this a luxury hotel. Well, it's in the blood. But it frightens me. What kinds of loans will he have to take out? How will he make the payments?"
He brought Henry Jr around to meet me. This was a handsome, pleasant man; friendly, confiding. He said he hoped to keep the charm of the Eyrie Mansion. "But at the prices I'll be forced to charge, the public won't stand for this," he said, regarding the carpets, frayed at the edges, and the furniture somewhat nicked, and staring balefully at the gas fireplace.
As it happened, the gas fire was one of my favorite features. On jet-lagged winter mornings, before dawn, I'd awaken to a flat chilly as I liked it, pull on warm clothes, and venture out into the crisp night to walk up to the newsagent on Piccadilly. I'd buy the Telegraph, Independent, Guardian and Times, and a large cup of hot coffee from an all-night shop around the corner. With these I would return to the Mansion, tune in Radio 3, sit in my low easy chair before the fire, and dream wistfully that such was my life.
Later one winter's day, I set out to walk across Hyde Park from Kensington Gardens to Hyde Park Corner. It was raining, but that was fine with me; I had my Simpsons umbrella. What I didn't know was that the gates to the park were locked at dusk. This I discovered on a notice inside the gate I'd intended to use. I could see the traffic hurrying past up Serpentine Road from the direction of the Royal Albert Memorial. There were a lot of taxis.
Unfortunately, an iron fence topped with spikes stood between me and the road. It began raining harder. I scouted and found a low tree branch that might just allow me to stand atop the railing. That meant climbing a hill slippery with wet grass. I failed twice, and became smeared with mud. Digging in the point of my umbrella, I finally made my way up the hill and on to the limb, then balanced on the fence – but it was a good leap down to the sidewalk, and I could easily imagine myself with a sprained ankle. Or worse: impaled on the fence.
Pedestrians hurried past, apparently not seeing me. I tried calling for help. I was ignored. Well, if you were hurrying through the park in the rain and saw a fat man with a soaked coat, smeared with mud, balanced on a fence with a filthy umbrella, what would you do?
"Hey, look, it's Roger Ebert!" an American kid said. He was with a group of friends. "No way! Is that really you?"
"Yes, it is," I said. If I had been Prince Charles, I would have answered to "Roger Ebert".
"Far out, dude! What are you doing up there?"
"Trying to get down," I observed.
They helped me down and asked for my autograph, which was gladly supplied. I opened my umbrella, hailed a cab, and was at 22 Jermyn Street in 10 minutes. That was one of the occasions when I lit the gas fire and treasured it beyond all reason. After warming up, I filled the big tub for a bath. It was deep, and as long as I was tall. I tinted it a bright green with Wibergs Pine Bath Essence, inhaled warm pine, and reflected that you are never warmer than when you have been cold.
Word came in 1990 that Henry Jr had taken over operations and closed the hotel for renovation. In his announcement, he wrote: "I agreed to buy the hotel from my father, famous for his wonderful eccentricity." Of course, Henry Jr discontinued the gas fires.
The Eyrie Mansion was renamed 22 Jermyn Street, and my wife Chaz and I stayed there many times. I liked it, she adored it. When I said I missed the gas fire that you lit with a match, she gave me one of those looks I got when I said I would rather drive a 1957 Studebaker than any newer car. Or eat in a diner than a trendy restaurant. Or wear jeans. You know those looks.
As the luxurious 22 Jermyn Street, the hotel prospered. Croissants and cappuccino were now served as an alternative to full English breakfast. There'd be a flower on the tray. Clients included movie stars and politicians, who valued its privacy and its absence of a lobby. Doddy and Henry Sr would have been proud.
But in autumn 2009 Henry Jr wrote to us: "Sadly the lease has expired and the greater part of the city block in which the hotel is located is to be redeveloped by the Crown Estate as a project named St James's Gateway, over the next two or three years. Like much else in London, it is planned that this very comprehensive and handsome project will be completed in time for the Olympic Games in 2012."
Just what Olympic guests will be looking for in London. One more god-damned comprehensive and handsome project.
© 2010 The Ebert Co. distributed by Universal Uclick.This is an edited extract from Roger Ebert's blog, rogerebert.com
• This article was amended on 26 February 2010. The first paragraph originally read, "the whole block is going", including Getti the Italian restaurant and the Jermyn Street theatre. This has been corrected. Elsewhere in the piece Russell & Bromley was removed from a list of shirtmakers.