Title: Around the World in Eighty Days
In 1989 the Marine Police Headquarters building in Tsim Sha Tsui (now the Heritage 1881 Hotel) became the Bombay Central Police Station - for just a few days. The production team of the then new film 'Around the World in 80 Days' staring Pierce Brosnan as Phileas Fogg, Julia Nickson as Princes Aouda, Eric Idle as Passepartout and Peter Ustinov as the long-suffering Detective Wilber Fix, asked for permission to film a number of scenes at the Marine Police HQ building.
I was working there at the time and enjoyed watching the brilliant Ustinov in action. Prior to the shoot I recall there was a kerfuffle over the air conditioning units, which in those days protruded from the walls along the corridor. If you look at the shot of Peter Ustinov remonstrating with the 'Bombay Director of Police' (actor Dan Ferguson) you can see a large blue box on the wall behind him.
At first the production team covered the air con units with flowers, but that didn't work, so they fixed plywood boxes around the air cons hoping no one would notice them. It seems to have worked. I have also included here a photograph of the corridor as it is today, now a part of the Heritage 1881 Hotel.
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