Albert Finney Slept in My Bed

Los Angeles, California

Caught your attention, now didn't I? Well, while the afterglow of Kona is still somewhat with me, I thought I might relate one more Kona Village story. And I will start by telling you five things about me that are extraordinary. Now, don't go away. I don't actually mean things that are inherently about me. Rather, this is more about things that have happened to me, mostly through the luck of being in the right place at the right time. And they are (and I am totally excited to introduce the bullet format into my blog):

• Saw The Beatles in concert

• Have seen three no-hitters pitched at Dodger Stadium (Bo Belinsky, Fernando Valenzuela and Kevin Gross). Belinsky, by the way was pitching for the Angels who utilized Dodger Stadium during the first few years of the franchise

• Have experienced the Northern Lights in Washington State. Seriously. No drugs involved in this 

You see, it's not like I'm extraordinary (on the contrary). But when you think about events which have occurred in your life, I believe that we can all come up with a short list of rather extraordinary happenings. Now, added to this list are a couple of things that seem to be about luck, karma, or what have you. And they are:

• I ALWAYS find excellent parking. I call it "TV Parking" because it is like on that old TV show, The Streets of San Francisco. Drivers on that show were always able to pull up into a parking place right in front of the Buena Vista (cafe in San Francisco famous for Irish Coffee and immortalized, so to speak, in the opening scene of the film When a Man Loves a Woman). Anyway, parking thusly in the heart of Fisherman's Wharf in San Francisco is, in a word, impossible. But I do have that kind of luck when it comes to parking. I'm famous for it.

• I have a finely-tuned radar for spotting celebrities. The list is long, but to name a few: Barbra Streisand (at a nursery in Calabasas, California), Steve Martin (California Pizza Kitchen), Clint Eastwood (Piatti restaurant in Carmel), Doris Day (Rio Grill which is also in Carmel), Julie Andrews & Blake Edwards (Michael's restaurant in Santa Monica, California), Billy Wilder (also at Michael's on same evening as Julie and Blake -- she went over to talk to Billy at his table), Cyd Charisse (at a workout studio in Encino, California), and both Jake (Hungry Cat, Hollywood) and Maggie (Le Pain Quotidien in Bev Hills) Gyllenhaal, just to name-drop a couple for the younger gen.

OK, I am not unaware that the celebrity-spotting game kinda flies in the face of what I wrote about a few posts back, dissing our celebrity-du-jour culture. But, I grew up in Los Angeles. Celebrity-spotting has always been a participation sport here. And that goes back way before paparazzi and Paris Hilton (I can't believe I've now written that name in a blog post. Circling the drain). And anyway, I think we should embrace our contradictions, don't you?


So, with all of the above in mind, here is the short list of celebrities that I would love (or would have loved, in the case of those who are DYK -- Dead, You Know) to have spotted: Paul Newman; Robert Redford; Daniel-Day Lewis; Colin Firth (be still my heart); Diane Keaton (mostly because Billy saw her at a McDonald's in Santa Monica, which makes him one up on me). And if the list were longer it would certainly include Albert Finney.


I was pretty young when my sister was studying English Literature in college. Still, she took me to a revival movie theater to see the Tony Richardson film Tom Jones. I loved it. And the actor who played Tom Jones was amazing. His name is Albert Finney, and after viewing the film I had a huge crush on him. When I was a bit older, I saw a movie that changed how I conceptualized marriage (for better and worse). It was Two For The Road, with Albert Finney and Audrey Hepburn. It was at the beginning of a love affair with the later Stanley Donen films -- my favorite being Once More With Feeling, which is hard to come by but you can occasionally catch it on TCM. It stars Yul Brynner and Kay Kendell (FABULOUS). But I digress. This post is about Albert Finney.

I heard somewhere along the line that he had spent time at The Kona Village, which isn't surprising. Through the years a ton of celebrities have stayed there. Some have come regularly, and some we have seen while we are there. But I'm not going to divulge that information because it flies in the face of what is special about the Village. However, I do need to write about Albert Finney's stay there. From what I heard, the staff liked him a lot. He lived large, enjoying the food and good wines at meals. He was kind to the employees, and I suspect a lot of them may not have known who he was. We heard from guests whose stays had overlapped with his, that he was a bit of a character. But it wasn't until a couple years after hearing these stories that someone mentioned which hale was his during his stay (for refresher on what a hale is, see post entitled Kona Hanu. Oh, never mind, a hale is like a cottage).  And, lo and behold, Albert's hale was OUR hale! The very same one we stay in every year when we go to the Village.


It was a long, long road from viewing Tom Jones when I was in junior high school, to learning that we had stayed in the same hale, showered in the same shower, and slept in the same bed, albeit at different times. See what can come to those who are not impatient for the arrival of serendipitous events in their lives? And, so it is that I can truthfully state that Albert Finney slept in my bed. Or I slept in his. Same difference. Now if I could just figure out where Colin Firth goes on vacation . . . And thanks again for reading my blog.