Travel Blog

The death of Peter O'Toole made me think of Jeffrey Bernard, whom he played on the London stage in the early '90s. The play's title, Jeffrey Bernard Is Unwell, was taken from the line that appeared after the High Life column in the London Spectator whenever Bernard failed to produce his Low Life column. "Unwell" became a code word for "hungover." Bernard pretty much divided his time between the track and his pub, The Coach & Horses, but the two milieus provided him with enough material for his minimalist art. As expected, he had bad luck with women; one of his great lines, which I hope was in the play (I never got to London to see it, and of course it never made it to Broadway) was: "I wish the police would block off memory lane."