Page 203 - James Caan - The Real Deal

19 · An Amazing Day

we had to find a way to make ours better. Could we really get Borg
and McEnroe? Such was the calibre of the people on the board
that one of them knew Borg and another knew someone who was
very close to McEnroe. But that still wasn’t enough; we decided
that we had to make our tennis tournament unique.
The obvious venues in which to hold it – Wimbledon or Queen’s
– were often used for corporate entertaining, and we thought there
would be a limit to how much we could raise in those venues,
assuming they’d let us play there in the first place. Then someone
hit on the idea of holding it on the tennis courts at Buckingham
Palace.
‘Do you think we’d be able to?’
We all turned to Andrew. ‘I’ll ask Mummy.’
I served three years on the board and personally raised over a
million for the NSPCC before my work commitments meant I had
to step down, but before I left a letter arrived from Prince Andrew
saying he was really proud of what the board was achieving and
thought it would be a good idea for us all to have dinner to see if
there were other options we could explore. When the Queen’s son
invites you for dinner, it’s a big deal, especially when the venue is
Buckingham Palace!
I’d never been to the Palace before, but I knew lots of people
who had been invited to garden parties there so I was aware that
it was often used for social events. Nevertheless, it was pretty
exciting and I was really intrigued to see inside the place. I had
driven round Buckingham Palace countless times, and it was an
odd sensation to turn in through the gates instead of looping round
the Victoria Memorial. A security guard signalled that I should
stop.
‘Good evening, Mr Caan.’
How did he know my name? It was only later that I remembered
my PA had been asked in advance for my licence plate details for
security.

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