His name is Edward, Edward Coffrini Dell’Orto and his mobile number ends in 007. Born in 1969, Milanese, two children Marcello and Vittoria, administrator of the Admiral Hotel in Milan, the family hotel which became the headquarters of the first Italian Bond Club twenty-five years ago and one of the largest collections in the world on 007, on which Coffrini Dell’Orto wrote 8 books, not to mention the family bond with the most famous spy in the world: «The underwater Lotus Esprit from the film “The Spy Who Loved Me ” was equipped with the carburettors produced by my family. There’s a bit of us in the James Bond myth».
And it was a James Bond toy car that set his passion for 007 in motion…
«A Corgi Aston Martin that I played with in the courtyard of Via Ausonio where I lived. A toy car with tire guards, revolving license plates and an ejection seat that shattered when it fell from the hotel reception desk. I cried so much that my mother ordered another one just like it in England.”
All right then.
“No way. I got one with fewer tricks. So I decided to dismantle them both and build a super equipped one. I was 7 years old. It’s the first piece in my collection.”
How many pieces are in your collection.
«More or less six thousand, all displayed in my hotel, including a life-size statue of Sean Connery. How much did the collection cost me? I don’t even want to know…”
First Bond film seen?
«At the Gloria cinema in Porta Vercelli: “The Spy Who Loved Me” with Roger Moore. It was a shock. For me, the real Bond has always been him, not Sean Connery.”
You also met…
«I must have been 9 years old, I spent my holidays in Punta Ala where Luisa Mattioli, Moore’s Venetian wife, had a home. One day I was going to the beach in a swimsuit and slippers and at a certain point I found him in front of me in a light blue safari jacket and beige trousers. He was like a god. Friends begged me: you who always meet him, can you give me an autograph?
Have you met all the Bonds?
“Everyone except Timothy Dalton. And then the Bond girls: Ursula Andress, Daniela Bianchi and Luciana Paluzzi who I had as a guest in the hotel, Halle Berry, who I escorted to the London premiere of “Die Another Day”. My goodness, how beautiful…”.
Pierce Brosnan And also came to Milan.
«He opened the boutique of the brand of one of Bond’s watches. I gave him my club membership card in exchange for the only autograph he gave and which I jealously guard.”
And Daniel Craig?
«I was an extra in his film “Casino Royal” on Lake Como, so I can say that we worked together…».
What an experience And was?
«Crazy emotion, which didn’t let me sleep at night despite the crazy cold, the exaggerated tension on set, the hunger that never ended. And quite a bit of disappointment.”
WhyAnd?
«I had to play a doctor who pushed Bond in a wheelchair. Then a snowfall wiped out the scene, so I’m just a cameo: a doctor walking behind Bond.”
But not Bond And ever come to Milan?
«In books yes, in films never».
Really?
«On paper he stayed at the Westin Palace Milan, had lunch at Savini, appetizer, risotto and chocolate cake, and at Giannino’s, artichokes and Milanese ossobuco. John Pearson’s biography says that he “made no attempt to gorge himself on culture and antiquity: he liked the Milanese with their big, fast cars and spoiled women.”
But how would Bond find himself in Milan?
«He can only like Milan: an ultra-modern city, where there is fashion, beautiful women and nights that offer everything. However, he would need “Q” to build him a special car to avoid the chasms on the road.”
Has she ever experienced a‘James Bond experience?
«Covid was a war for me, I came close to selling the hotel. Thousands of euros in taxes but my rooms were empty, with meaningless green passes, refreshments that never arrived and absurd bureaucracies. I ended up in the hospital with a perforated intestine from stress, then my grandfather from up there gave me a hand. It was a massacre but we took advantage of it to redo all the rooms and left again. Maybe not even Bond would have been able to escape a nightmare like mine.”
