The glitterati primed for their close-ups blanketed the red carpet for a fanfare evening of landmark hip-hop musical Hamilton.
There was much air kissing and flash-bang-wallop-what-a-picture as the regenerated Dr Who Jodie Whitaker mingled with Sir Tom Jones and Bryan ‘Breaking Bad’ Cranston, Rolling Stone Ronnie Wood, Helen Bonham-Carter (the next Princess Margaret in Netflix’s The Crown) and a crush of film, television and theatrical luminaries celebrating the story of one of America’s – until now – lesser-known founding fathers.
Yet, there was one person almost everyone wanted to say hello to and be photographed with.
Diana Mackintosh – née Tonna, who used to work for the Times of Malta during the war – got a lot of attention.
There will be an even more lavish amount of it today [January 27] as she celebrates her 99th birthday. Indeed, with the speed of today’s world it’s but a moment until she should get a formal message, rather than a ‘phone call’, from the Queen.
They first met in Malta, where Diana was born and the Queen spent “some of the happiest days of my life” in the immediate post-war years when Prince Phillip was a naval lieutenant stationed on the island. They were young women with untold lifetimes ahead.
So, it’s appropriate that Diana will be toasted at a reception this evening in her home town and at one of the Queen’s favourite hotels, the Phoenicia, just outside Valletta. It is being hosted by her sons Cameron, Robert and Nicky. Family members and friends are flying in from around the world.
She’s special but not because of her longevity, rather for the joyful manner in which she has come close to scoring a century, a feat perhaps explained by remarkable genetics and a charming bloody-mindedness to get on with and enjoy life, no matter what.
She’s also celebrated – and it’s not too much of a stretch – for, arguably, without her audiences would not be clamouring for tickets for Hamilton in London or have enjoyed shows like Les Miserables, Miss Saigon, Oliver, Phantom and Oklahoma and the one that began it all, Cats, in 1980.
She helped her eldest son, theatreland’s grand success story, Sir Cameron Mackintosh, and worked as his unpaid secretary.
She recalls: “To be a producer, Cameron had to have a show – and a cast.
“There was an aspiring talent company run by a man called Barry Burnett and Cameron telephoned him saying he was producing a musical. The response from Mr Burnett [who is a guest at tonight’s reception] was a snooty: ‘Send a script’.
“Well, Cameron was his own shoestring and, an hour later, he delivered the script to Mr Burnett who saw a very young man and told him: ‘Please tell Mr Mackintosh I’ll be in touch when I’ve read it.’ ‘I am Mr Mackintosh.’
“They spent the next five hours becoming friends and talking about musicals. He offered Cameron a desk in the office, which was two rooms in Piccadilly across the road from Fortnum and Mason… I don’t think Cameron ever paid the rent on the office so it was a great surprise that he could afford a secretary – me, a secretarial status symbol.
“I, of course, had more in my purse than Cameron.
“I could never be mum. I had to act as a detached and quite imperious secretary, the gatekeeper to the great producer. I had to be more dragon lady than mother, fielding difficult phone calls and placing hopeful ones. And it was fun, this scrapping about and helping Cameron…
“I had… ‘friendly’ producers quizzing me about how Cameron could afford a secretary and if I tried to explain who I was, Cameron would scream: ‘Don’t tell them you’re my mother’.
“The nostalgia effect makes it hard for me to recall having doubts but I suppose I must have had concerns. It’s just that I buried them deep for all the boys went off and did their own things… Robert was off being a musician… Nicky was still at boarding school so I had time to help Cameron at the office.
“I don’t, and didn’t, have much influence with Cameron but I did and do tell him what I think; if I’d seen someone in a play or on television who wasn’t much good, I’d tell him. Still do.”
She is all about the business of getting on with getting on
At a recent theatrical party many were transfixed by Diana’s enthusiastic, tireless dancing.
Younger dancers wondered who the guest was. ‘Oh, that’s Cameron’s mother,’ they were told. The answer resulted in disbelief and awe and mystified arithmetic. Still is for many.
The indefatigable Diana, was, as ever, intent on enjoying every last moment of the evening. And that is her only taboo. She won’t slow down. She is all about the business of getting on with getting on.
Now, as 2018 takes off, Diana retains about her the conjuring confidence of, appropriately, a Mary Poppins.
She displays a nimble choreography, is fiercely independent, thriving, often driving her sons to distraction and herself to the shops, whizzing about London for lunch with friends, scuba diving and sailing, precise in dress and manner. Her eyes pass over obstacles to fix on opportunities.
I have no precedent for her: “I have continually told my sons I want a toy boy but I’ve had to make do with people like Hugh Jackman and Russell Crowe and David Hasselhoff, Michael Ball, Michael Crawford, Ian McShane, various Henry Higgins and, I must say, some rather charming Fagins, as well as Stephen Sondheim, Plácido Domingo and, one of my favourites, the Duke of Edinburgh. I do like to flirt. ‘The Hoff’ [David Hasselhoff] likes to come to tea.”
Her house in St John’s Wood, London, is elegant and tall, with several sets of stairs and is where I worked with her on our book Being There. At first, I made the error of attempting to help with tea trays. It was made clear that she would most happily carry the tray, with full china tea service and gluten-free walnut cake, up and down the stairs herself. I’m now allowed to help but only because she knows that I know she doesn’t need it.
She has a fierce pride in being capable and I don’t believe it is simply to do with defying age but a legacy of when being so was truly a matter of life and death.
Diana’s war was quite an apprenticeship but it was only that, a dramatic start to an extraordinary, high-energy life.
Tonight will be an event at the Phoenicia Hotel.
Half a century ago, Diana attended another glamorous gala evening, for the Queen when she visited Malta in 1967 as part of a Commonwealth tour.
“That evening I was able to get a photograph of the Queen and Prince Philip on the dance floor and very much the centre of attention. It was a wonderful evening and I held on to that photograph until I gave it to her 30 years later at a Royal Charity Gala, in June,1998.
“I was to be in the Royal Box with the Royal couple and was guided toward my seat.
“As I walked into the box, I could see all these faces at the end of craning necks and looking at me… I didn’t know where to look, it was most embarrassing… I couldn’t wait to sit down and out of the way but I had to wait for the Royal party before I could do that.
“The Queen and Prince Philip glided in. My face was red but, soon, everyone else was flushed with excitement.
“If you’re excited about life that’s all that matters.”
Douglas Thompson is author, biographer, broadcaster and international journalist.
Being There: The Extraordinary Life of Diana Mackintosh, by Diana Mackintosh and Douglas Thompson, will be published later this year.
beingdianamackintosh@gmail.com