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Bennett CerfBennett Cerf
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Session:         Page of 1029

Q:

Did you stay in London the whole three weeks or did you go on to the continent?

Cerf:

I stayed in London for the first week. For the week-end John Emerson proposed that we visit Stratford-on-Avon, and promptly hired a Rolls Royce. I don't know who paid for it, but he was a great con man. Mind you, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes was just finished; it wasn't published yet. I had met a young salesman from Scribner's named Gilbert Vail. He decided to come with us, too, for the week-end. So the four of us set forth in our Rolls Royce and drove up to Stratford-on-Avon. We were very irreverent, I'm afraid, screaming with laughter at all the guides and souvenirs and tourist traps. And before dinner, Anita--I don't know how she did it--got hold of a tennis ball. We went out in the street at Stratford-on-Avon and started playing catch. Anita wound up and threw the tennis ball right through a window. I remember the three of us running like hell down the street in Stratford-on-Avon. We fled back to our hotel screaming with laughter. Nobody ever caught us, but I can still hear the crash of that tennis ball going through a window. It was a pretty hard tennis ball and she threw it pretty hard. I still have the picture of Anita Loos, who within six months was one of the most famous girls in the United States, running down that street. Till this day when we meet we recall that day with delight.

Q:

Where did you go next?





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