Nick Paumgarten interviews the actor who plays "The World's Most Interesting Man" in a series of Dos Equis commercials. He turns out to be, if not the most interesting man in the world, pretty interesting:
A montage of highlights from the real life of Jonathan Goldsmith might include (had there been cameras present) footage of him rescuing a stranded climber on Mt. Whitney, saving a drowning girl in Malibu, sailing the high seas with his friend Fernando Lamas (the inspiration for his Interesting persona and, according to Goldsmith, “the greatest swordsman who ever lived in Hollywood”), and starting a successful network marketing business (“I was a hustler, a very good hustler”), which, for a while, anyway, enabled him to flee Hollywood for an estate in the Sierras. Among the outtakes might be glimpses of his stint as a waterless-car-wash entrepreneur. “I love the old philosophers,” he said. “I have a large library. I am not a die-hard sports fan. I love to cut wood.”...
He had an equally peripatetic career off the lot, the particulars of which he’s saving for a book. He divulged one old surefire tactic: knowing that Warren Beatty kept a penthouse suite at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel, Goldsmith used to wait in the lobby for the young women who’d been summoned there, and he’d intercept them, saying, “Warren sent me down. I’m terribly sorry, but he had to cancel the meeting.”