Lunch at a Landmark, dinner with a star

The Maine Monument stands at Merchant’s Gate, a park entrance named in 1862 to recognize the importance of commerce and business in New York City. The monument honors the 258 American sailors who perished when the battleship Maine exploded in the harbor of Havana, Cuba, then under Spanish rule. 5:30 PM. Photo: JH.

October 6, 2009. Sometimes sunny, sometimes cloudy, cooling; the weather yesterday in New York. Accu-weather said we’re in for a next few days of colder air.

In New York the headline in the tabloids was about Dave Letterman having sex with some woman who works on his show. This is old stuff but it still plays. It’s called sex at the office. Isn’t that why everyone’s so into “Mad Men”? With Letterman people pretend to be shocked. I think it’s a device for kidding yourself.

The tabs, however, are quite puritanical about it. They’re like the parents in the 50s whose kids assumed they never had sex until they were married, and then never with anyone else. If at all. Many didn’t even know their parents had sex until they were taught (or heard about the Facts of Life, as it was known). Before that it was beyond imagination. Let alone with someone outside the house.

The Times’ headline (far right hand/top of the page column) yesterday was about Private Equity Funds and their leveraged buyouts. It was a piece on ill-gotten gains presented as if it were in the New York Social Diary. The piece demonstrated how a leveraged buyout affected one company – Simmons Mattress (bankrupt) and the jobs (gone) lost, while the PE guys got rich-rich-rich.’

The Financial Times leading article was on how if CIT goes bankrupt Goldman Sachs will get one billion ($1,000,000,000) back for having invested in it. From us. The US taxpayer. Which is not to be confused with the U.S. Government.

If you put the papers in a time capsule that won’t be open till 2200, what will they think we were like? Idiots, maybe?

Life in New York also: Yesterday at the Seagram’s Building the New York Landmarks Preservation Foundation held at “Lunch at a Landmark” with Cesar Pelli, the Argentinian-born architect who is famous for designing some of the world’s tallest buildings including the Petronas Twin Towers in Kuala Lumpur. At 83 (next Monday), he is still working. Mr. Pelli spoke after his introduction by Charlie Rose. But more about that later in the week.

Last night the choice open to this reporter was the National Arts Award at Cipriani 42nd Street where honorees included Robert Redford – who received his Lifetime Achievement Award from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the artist Ed Ruscha, and Salman Rushdie. Also expected at the party were Desiree Rogers, the White House Social Secretary, Caroline Kennedy-Schlossberg, Ed Schlossberg, Vera Wang, Dennis Hopper, Redford’s new wife Sibylle Szaggars-Redford and his daughter Amy Redford.

I didn’t make it on time, distracted by other editorial obligations. I’d hoped to get myself to the cocktail reception to get some pictures but I didn’t make it. I was also committed to a movie screening of the 1957 MGM classic “Designing Woman” with Lauren Bacall and Gregory Peck. Miss Bacall was also in attendance, along with her pal Rex Reed. The evening was hosted by Charles and Clo Cohen.

Charles Cohen, (standing) last night's host and benefactor of the soon-to-be new screening room at the Lighthouse, his mother Gloria, his father (seated) and his wife Clo Cohen.

After the screening, Rex Reed interviewed Miss Bacall (her friends call her Betty). She’s a formidable character if you see her out and about in New York. And at times, that’s putting it politely since she’s not one for small talk with strangers. I’ve seen her at theatre, at Zabars, at Swifty’s, many places because she gets around. I’ve never met her and I wouldn’t go up and introduce myself. It makes me laugh to think of it but that’s the vibe the lady puts out there. And it’s as effective as her performances: you believe her.


	Newlyweds Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall at their wedding reception at the farm of novelist Louis Bromfield in Mount Vernon, Ohio. January 1, 1945.

So as a result I get to look. Last night with Rex Reed – who is obviously a good friend and unquestionably a great fan – Miss Bacall was that forthright personality with that voice that remains the lure it had on the psyche's ear when she first made an appearance on screen at age 19.

Today she’s age 84 -- according to the numbers. I only calculated it because it was curious to observe the woman who back in 1944 told Bogie to “just whistle,” and “put your two lips together and blow,” (which she recited again last night to the utter delight of any movie fan – some people were mouthing the words as she said them). She was quite clearly much older and yet quite clearly just as vital.

Reed asked her about Bogie. He was dying of cancer when she made this film – in which she looked like the star she was. He died the year it was released. It was tough, as you might imagine. She talked about what he was like.

The tough guy character/personality to the movie audiences was at home a soft-spoken, book-reading, sensitive man, a well-brought-up boy from Manhattan who had a solid career on Broadway (as a young actor), appearing in seven plays before he went to Hollywood to make “The Petrified Forest.”

She talked about how a movie star’s public personality is usually developed by the role that made him or her the star. The personality works so well for the audience that the perception is set, although it may have little to do with the real person. She was referring to her husband but she of course was referring to herself.

Shayne Lamas, Lorenzo Lamas, Arlene Dahl, Lauren Bacall, and Carole Holmes McCarthy.

Miss Bacall said that acting is the toughest occupation of all. You put yourself out there and sometimes it works, and sometimes it doesn’t. And that’s it. She hates the word celebrity. The notion of star that she was referring to is barely applicable today. She said that Jack Warner (who owned the studio where she became a star) was afraid of actors so he didn’t talk to them,or pay much attention to them. They were properties, assets.


On a trip to Washington to publicize a new film, at the national press event, President Truman attended and sat down to play the piano (he was famous for his "Missouri Waltz"). Charles Einfeld, whom Bacall described as a brilliant public relations man, said to her: "go get up on the piano." She thought it was a questionable idea but she did as she was told, 20 years old that she was. It was photographed and became one of the most famous famous photographs of the era. President Truman's piano playing wasn't very good, she was reported to have commented afterwards. Last night she told us that his daughter Margaret Truman didn't think much of the move "although he seemed to like it."

At MGM – where “Designing Woman” was made, they developed their stars. MGM was the Tiffany of the studios. You heard it over and over from those who worked out there during the so-called “Golden Age.”

Miss Bacall’s favorite actress was also on the Warner lot – Bette Davis. As a kid Betty Persky/Lauren Bacall saw Davis’ films “twenty times over.” And when she herself became a star, she came to know Davis. Davis was also a famously nettlesome individual at times. Even an old crab.

I once went to a screening at the Academy in Los Angeles after which she was given an award. She wore a black boater like straw hat and a black dress. She still had those Bette Davis eyes, albeit wearier, and she was very old and rickety, and very thin. It didn’t matter. She sat up schoolmarm erect in her chair and leaned out to the audience when she spoke.

It was pure joy to see that chin up, to hear that voice ratta-tat-clatter, and that inflection; and as I write this, I can remember the moment as clearly as when I was there. Pure joy.

Miss Bacall was like that last night (not the rickety part, no no). The magic part. Pure joy for this audience of New Yorkers in her thrall.

Afterwards at dinner at Le Cirque, Mark Ackerman, the new CEO of Lighthouse announced that Charles Cohen, our host for the evening’s dinner was going to underwrite the renovation and refurbishment of the screening room at the Lighthouse. The room is used for Academy screenings here in New York. Charles’ gift will also update the equipment to state of the art. The screening room is a useful asset for the Lighthouse and Charles’ gift will enhance the economic possibilities for the Lighthouse and its work.

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