Monday, September 5, 2016





Langan's Brasserie was, when it first opened and for several years after, one of the only places to go in London. It was owned in partnership by Micheal Caine and Peter Langan. Peter Langan started in the restaurant business at the lovely Odin's. He married the owner's daughter and then bought the place. Odin's was in Marylebone, slightly off the beaten track for those days, but it immediately became popular with artists and writers. Hockney and Prockter designed the menu. Langan, following the example of the Paul Roux, owner of La Colombe d'Or in Saint-Paul de Vence in France, (Picasso and Matisse were regulars) very astutely accepted works of art in exchange for dinners. Proctor introduced me to Odin's and I have happy memories of it. He once said to me, "I go to restaurants not for the food, but the people who are there."

Not long after Langan's opened in 1976 I went there one morning to photograph Michael Caine. I brought with me my nine year-old daughter Cathy. I introduced her, and he replied, "'ello darlin'." She has never forgotten it. As an actor, Michael Caine can speak English well with any accent, but, in conversation, he sticks to his very own Cockney.