Impresario Gino Empry is a Toronto legend. He has been personal publicist to "Honest" Ed Mirvish and flack-turned-friend to many a celebrity -- from Tony Bennett and Eartha Kitt to Donald O'Connor. He's the guy who booked the talent at the fabled Imperial Room in Toronto's Royal York Hotel. And for the past 28 years, he's done PR for Playboy magazine, whose June issue will feature the nakednews.com television news readers in the centrefold. He spoke to Deirdre Kelly on a recent break from his hectic schedule.

When I have some extra money, I will go hunting again for another Roman gladiator figurine. I love them. They're so hard to find. They're about 18 inches in height, they're bronze with that beautiful black stone -- I forget what you call it -- and they're carved. It's taken me 12 years to get four of them.

The first I found was in an antique shop in the basement of Old Ed's, the restaurant. It was a kneeling figure of a slave that had been hurt and I bought it right away.

Then in a flea market in Berlin, I found a gladiator in full regalia -- ready to go into the arena, practically. He was posed in such a fashion that he looked like he wounded the captive slave so I put them together like a picture.

The third one I found in an antique shop in South Africa and it is a runaway slave. So I placed him in such a way that it's like, "Oh my God! One of my friends has been hurt! If I stay here, that gladiator will kill me!"

And the fourth one, I just found him a couple of weeks ago in New York on Madison Avenue near Central Park. I was looking through the window and I thought, "He's beautiful. He's the right height. He'll suit my collection." But he's not a gladiator. He's a Belvedere Apollo. It cost $4,000 (U.S.). I managed to talk him down from $5,000. I must have spent that much on the phone haggling. I call it the designer's discount. So when I got him home -- I have a grand piano and all these figurines are on the piano -- I put him on the piano so that it looks like he's admonishing the gladiator, and looking like he's feeling sorry for the fallen slave and telling the runaway not to worry, it will be okay. A bit of imagination, eh?

My heritage is Italian. My father's side of the family comes from near Rome. He used to tell me stories about the ruins. My real name is Emperatore, which means, of the Caesars. And my police friend tells me I am like a Caesar, always ordering people around.

My father was a wonderful man, but very shy, and never a father figure to me. So I kept looking for strong men to give me what I felt I needed -- authority. Being of Caesarean heritage, the gladiator represented strength and power, and with my imagination, the slaves were even stronger because they had to put up with being slaves and running away from it all. And of course, Apollo's a god, the ultimate father figure, the strength personified. He ain't afraid of nobody.

I'm both a gladiator and a slave. I'm a slave to my work and I'm a perfectionist. I insist on things being done right. There are no loose ends with me. I think I waste a lot of energy worrying about periods -- punctuation, I mean.

I seem to be a collector by nature. When I go around the world, I pick up things. I have another group of figurines, not gladiators. They are from Zimbabwe, natives, and they look like they're trying to climb to the sky, for freedom. They're very strong.

We all want freedom -- freedom from poverty, freedom from sickness, freedom from tragedy. We all want happiness. I grew up in an Italian ghetto so there was a lot of reason to fight for freedom. My family wasn't well off at the time. We were wretchedly poor. We had to count our pennies. In the Italian ghetto, there were gangsters and rough types. I used to get beat up because I liked school. I remember my mother telling me there's more than one way to fight a battle. Use your tongue. So I learned to use my mouth -- which is very useful in my business!

Just looking at my figurines brings a kind of tranquillity. It's like, okay, you can relax now, the big boys are here, the strength is here -- if you know what I mean."