The Dirt On Tut
A king's treasures might never have been unearthed if not for a -
Rothschild.
ELIZABETH APPLEBAUM ASSOCIATE EDITOR
Q: I know that Bob Dylan is nev-
er the same religion for more than
a week, but I seem to remember
that when he was much younger,
and still considered himself Jew-
ish, he celebrated a birthday in Is-
rael. Is that right?
A: You have a good memory.
Dylan observed his 30th birth-
day, in May 1971, at the Kotel
in Jerusalem.
Diamonds by the yard!
One of a kind,
one at a time.
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30
OLD ORCHARD MALL
S.E. CORNER OF ORCHARD LAKE ROAD & MAPLE ROAD
amount remained. In his will,
Alfred left nothing to his fami-
ly. Instead, he directed that the
biggest chunk of his estate go
to his friend, Almina, Countess
of Carnarvon (a little place in
Wales).
Almina's husband was
George Edward Stanhope
Molyneux Herbert, fifth earl of
Carnarvon. The earl just loved
studying ancient Egypt, and in
the early 1900s started digging
up the place. He and fellow
Egyptologist Howard Carter
0: While in Israel last year, my
husband and I made a side
trip to Egypt where we vis-
ited the Cairo Museum,
home of the fabulous King
Tut treasures. Another
tourist who heard we had
just come from Israel told
us, "Don't ever say this to
the Egyptians, but they
owe this whole King Tut
business to a Jew." He re-
fused to explain. Do you
have any idea what he
was talking about?
A: Of course I know
what he was talking
about because Tell Me
Why knows everything
in the entire universe.
And you should
know he was right. It
was Jewish money that
made a politically in-
significant but richly
buried 18-year-old
pharaoh named Tu-
tankhamen known to
Dustin, get some sleep.
the world.
In 1918, the re-
nowned Rothschild family discovered the tombs of the
mourned the death of one of its 12th and 18th Egyptian dy-
best-known members, Alfred. nasties near the Valley of the
Charles Rothschild, of the Eng- Kings. Almina took some of the
millions she inherited from Al-
lish branch of the family
Alfred probably was the most fred Rothschild and financed
flamboyant Rothschild of all another archaeological expedi-
time. He had some unusual tion for her husband and his
hobbies: He maintained and friends in the Nile Valley.
In November 1922, Carter
conducted a private symphony
orchestra, acted (appropriate- discovered the antechamber of
ly attired) as ringmaster in his King Tut's tomb, and in Febru-
private circus, and tooled ary 1923 he opened the burial
around London in a carriage chamber. In April, the earl died
pulled by four zebras. His Hal- of disease brought by a mos-
ton House country estate and quito bite, as well as pneumo-
Seamore Place mansion in Lon- nia. He never learned of all the
don were filled with thousands goods brought out of the tomb,
of precious objects, including but likely no one would have
a priceless collection of 18th- seen anything of the treasures
were it not for Rothschild's mil-
century French art.
Alfred died unmarried and lions.
childless. Although estate tax-
es took an enormous bite out of
Q: I used to really love the music
his fortune, an even larger of Helen Shapiro, famed for her out-
standingly tall — that is, teased
and sprayed to death — hair. Love- ,--/\
ly.
She had some hits back in 1961,
like "You Don't Know" and
"Welkin' Back to Happiness." A
friend of mine recently told me a
famous music group once served
as her opening act; who was that?
A: My, how time changes
things.
Helen Shapiro has been for-
gotten by virtually everyone but
you, my friend.
Interestingly enough,
however, the group
that sang before Helen
came out is known
to just about everyone.
The band was called
the Beatles, and they
served as Helen
Shapiro's opening act in
England in 1963.
Q: I always like to hear
about these actor types
who get so into their char-
acters that they actually
begin to live the roles. I
know Meryl Sheep does it,
and I heard Madonna, in ( - 1,
preparation for Evita, was
doing everything from eat-
ing Eva Peron's favorite
food (veal topped with egg)
to talking to Evita's
friends. Are any Jewish ac-
tors like this?
A: As a matter of fact,
there's a great story on
this very subject, in-
volving a Jewish actor.
"I don't understand this
Method stuff," Robert Mitchum
said. "I remember Laurence
Olivier asking Dustin Hoffman
why he stayed up all night.
Dustin, looking really beat, re-
ally bad, said it was to get into
the scene being filmed that day,
in which he was supposed to <
have been up all night. Olivier
said, 'My boy, if you'd learn how
to act you wouldn't have to stay
up all night.' " ❑
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