Miami Beach
I thought it a good time to visit, neither spring break debauchery nor fashionista pretence time. So I signed up yet again for the judo championships, trained very hard and flew down with four buddies hoping to stay in a family hotel near the water, a bit like Bogie stopping at a place in Key Largo and running into Johnny Rocco, a crime tsar grown old and bitter and played by Edward G. Robinson. In that wonderful golden oldie, Claire Trevor played Rocco’s alcoholic mistress and portrayed the hooker as a sympathetic victim. (She also won the Academy Award for that role.)
Well, I’ve got news for you. There are no hotels like the one in Key Largo left anywhere in Florida, no Claire Trevors and certainly no Bogies. Sure, there are plenty of Johnny Roccos around, but they’re Cuban, they’re very fat, very loud, and much too vulgar even for Miami off-season. The judo tournament was being held at the Doral ‘Golf resort and Spa’, as far removed from what I was hoping for as Humphrey Bogart was from Michael Jackson. The Doral golf resort and spa means you never hear a telephone operator’s voice, only recordings, and the only time I had some individual attention was when I went for a walk on the golf course and was intercepted by a very polite heavy in a buggy who informed me that walking on the course was for golfers only. In other words, one can be staying and paying at the Doral, but one cannot be walking on the course unless one pays extra. Par for the course, pun intended.
So my friend and fellow judoka Mark Brennan, an NYU professor, did the next best thing. He and I visited the fat spa, where some very eager flunkies were very eager to help us lose weight. ‘That won’t be necessary,’ Mark informed them, ‘everyone’s made weight already; I’m here for my sister. I wonder if you can help her?’ He then went on to explain how his sister is extremely overweight and that he always needs to buy two seats on the aeroplane for her, and also needs to have a child occupying the third seat as she tends to spill over even with the two places. ‘She weighs close to 700 pounds,’ he told them, looking grave and concerned.
It did the trick. People popped out from everywhere offering their services and assuring us that they could turn the pachyderm into a Twiggy in no time. (Mark, needless to say, has no sister, but that’s neither here nor there.) ‘Yes, I believe you,’ said Mark, ‘but who will arrange for the fork-lift and the truck to bring her down here?’ That threw them. Those boys could guarantee weight loss but no one was about to commit to the extra expense and bother of a fork-lift to pick her up and the two-ton truck to bring her down.
In the meantime, one of our team, Brian Pereira, was skipping rope in one of those plastic suits that induce sweat, and he did it for one hour in the extreme heat, losing six pounds of water and making the weight by half a pound. ‘Six pounds in one hour, can you do better?’ Mark went on hounding the poor people at the weight-loss centre, until we dragged him off to the fights.
The last time I was in Miami was the first time I won the gold, back in 2007. This time no one bothered to show up in my age and weight class, so the whole thing was for naught. No butterflies the night before, no resolutions that this is really the last time ever, no restless sleep until dawn and then extreme sleepiness until fight time. To tell you the truth and nothing but, I love judo and karate, not necessarily in that order, but the people one meets in tournaments make me a bit of a Lady Bracknell.The ex-Soviet Union ones are almost subhuman, their bald heads and thick necks and dead eyes as distinctive as their total lack of any modicum of civil behaviour. They are and always will be total slobs. The Cubans from Cuba are almost as bad. Arrogant, aggressive, much too loud at all times, very anti-American and very similar to their ex-communist cousins from the east. I stuck to my own kind, refusing to mix with hoi polloi and got some lousy looks as a result.
Sure, Miami is a shithole for the rich and vulgar, and the Russians who fill the place do not help. Latino women on the strip walk beautifully and are feminine and chic. The Russians are all blonde, all on very high heels, and are mostly hookers. Latino women work as waitresses, beauticians and receptionists, those from the ex-Soviets hook for a living. The men are too tanned, too tattooed, and talk too loudly on their mobile telephones. But the weather was cool and overcast, which was welcome, the food in some of the bistros on the beach simply wonderful, and I leave in a very good mood for the south of France and my first movie role.
In the meantime, if any of you needs to speak to me, furrgetaboutit. I’m in make-up, in my trailer. If there’s something extremely important, call my agent. He’s a nice chap and is taking a very large cut for his services. And if you’re interested, he also provides hookers and special services. See you on the Riviera.
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