Curtis laid to rest with Armani scarf and favourite book

ACTOR Tony Curtis was buried on Monday with some of his prized possessions – a Stetson hat, an Armani scarf, driving gloves, an iPhone and a copy of his favourite novel, Anthony Adverse, a book that inspired his celebrity name and launched a robust film career that spanned decades and genres.

The 85-year-old Oscar- nominated actor who starred in such films as The Defiant Ones and Some Like It Hot died last Wednesday at his home in Henderson, a Las Vegas suburb, after suffering cardiac arrest.

More than 400 celebrities, fans, friends and family members gathered to say goodbye at a public funeral in Las Vegas.

A montage of Curtis’s famous film roles opened the sometimes solemn, sometimes mirthful service attended by California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, porn star Ron Jeremy and Vera Goulet, widow of Broadway singer Robert Goulet. The crowd laughed as an animated Curtis appeared in a scene from the television series The Flintstones and sparred with actor Kirk Douglas in Spartacus.

Friends and fans lined up outside Palm Mortuary and Cemetery well before the funeral. Inside, seven colourful paintings and three black-and-white drawings by Curtis stood on easels, while a photo of the young, dark-haired actor was projected on a screen. The coffin was draped with an American flag.

Actor Jamie Lee Curtis, Curtis’s daughter from his first marriage with actress Janet Leigh, welled up as she described a man who was, she said, “a little meshuga” – Yiddish for crazy – but always full of life.

“All of us got something from him. I, of course, got his desperate need for attention,” she joked.

The father and daughter were estranged for a long period but eventually reconciled. Curtis took pride in his daughter’s on-screen credits, which include Perfect, Halloween, True Lies and the new comedy You Again.

Rabbi Mel Hecht called Schwarzenegger to the front of the room for an impromptu farewell. The Austria native recalled Curtis as a generous mentor who encouraged Schwarzenegger’s Hollywood career when others told him his foreign accent and name were too much of a handicap.

“You are going to make it,” Schwarzenegger recalled Curtis, a Bronx native, telling him. “Don’t pay any attention to those guys. I heard the same thing when I came here.”

Curtis’s sixth wife, Jill Curtis, eulogised her husband of 12 years. She recalled how he dismissed their 45-year age difference when friends asked if he was worried about keeping up with a younger wife.

“Well, if she dies, she dies,” she said her husband would deadpan in reply.

The funeral was followed by the burial and then a reception at the Luxor hotel-casino on the Las Vegas Strip.