One Reason Why I Always Liked Tony Curtis

That and his impeccable diction, rivaled only by Olivier.

Curtis is famous for an apocryphal line, rendered as "Yonda stands da castle of my fodda" or similar. This chestnut used to be quoted in Radio Times whenever the film, "The Black Shield of Falworth", was on BBC television, and found its way into a 2007 study of Tony Curtis's work by Clive James. It clearly derives from American snobbery about Curtis's origins, and has crossed the Atlantic unchecked by film writers.

Curtis has denied ever saying that line, but he did actually say a similar line in the movie, "Son of Ali Baba", released in 1952, that reads, "This is the palace of my father, and yonder lies the Valley of the Sun", and he did deliver it in a markedly New York accent.

He never forgot his roots as Bernard Schwartz from the Bronx, New York.

RIP, Tony.

Tony Curtis - 1925-2010