Todd, came back... came back to Europe, by this time he was, I think, married to Liz, and I had one of these phone calls, ‘Get your ass over to…’ and, I really didn't, I said, 'I'm not going, I'm not going, I'm not going to be treated that way'. And, half-an-hour later I was at the Messel Suite at the Dorchester, you know. Mind you to... to see Liz Taylor was… was... she was so beautiful in those days.
And so he wanted me to design the party for the opening of the film – and that's a little anecdote, but I think it might be… and so, I designed the party – he was, I think, in the South of France, or Hollywood, or somewhere – for 3000 people, and The Telegraph was sponsoring it. And I showed my concept to whoever ran The Telegraph and they thought it was beautiful.
And then I had to fly over to Paris to meet with Todd and Liz to show him the sketches. And the publicity man of United Artists met me, and I said, 'What hotel am I staying?' He... he said, 'Well, you're staying in... in Todd's suite'. I said, 'That must be a mistake, you know, I don't want to be there', and I know Todd wouldn't like that, so... and he was just married to Taylor, you know. So this man said, 'No, no those were definite instructions'.
And I just flew over, you know, to show him the sketches, so I was going round... I didn't have pyjama, nothing. So I saw the film at night. I stayed in Todd's bed, he comes... arrives at 07:30 from the South of France on Le Train Bleu, or something like that, with Liz, goes into his bedroom, and finds me in bed. And I couldn't get out because I didn't have any pyjamas on, you see, so it was a very awkward situation, and he went straight into the – Liz had her own room somewhere – and he went straight into the... the bathroom to start shaving, and showering, and so on, because he had meetings afterwards. And then... I also had certain criticisms of one or two things on Around the World and he didn't like that. So, he said, 'Ken Adams doesn't like Around the World'. I said, 'I didn't say that, Mike, now don't… '. So, to cut a long story short, 'Show me your fucking sketches', he said, you know. So, by this time I had my underpants on, you see, and I'm showing him the sketches, and he said 'They stink', and walked out of the room, because he had a press conference downstairs.
And Liz sneaked in from her room and she said, 'Oh, they're absolutely divine', and about 50 minutes later I got a call from Mike, he wants to talk to me downstairs at The Meurice. And, he said, 'I've reconsidered my opinion, they're subtle'.