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42nd
Street and 7th Avenue
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Went
with Peter Rogers, Liz Smith and Ann Richards to
see Bill Irwin off-Broadway in “The
Harlequin Studies,” a play he wrote, directed, produced
and appears in. It was at the Peter Norton Space over on West
42nd near Tenth Avenue. A guest, I was. Had never seen Irwin
before and don’t know much about him except that he’s
been a highly lauded and respected comic/actor/composer/writer/
director/ producer on Broadway (and off-) for years now. This
night: Actors, dancers (in harlequin costume), musicians. A
lot of pantomime, with strong suggestions of Charlie
Chaplin including a fleeting moment of impersonation.
I think it’s pantomime.
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Ann
Richards
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The place was
packed and the audience loved it from the start, with much laughter.
I didn’t quite get it at first. I worried, especially at
the beginning, that I didn’t have the cultural sophistication
to “get” what I was seeing. I get caught up in such
confoundments, if there’s such a word. However, as the show
moved on quickly – only a little more than an hour in length – I
found myself leaving my intellect behind and enjoying the man’s
genius, an unassuming , scintillating genius.
There were two little boys, about seven and
ten with their father and mother, in the
seats in front of us, just to the right. They looked
like brothers and they were enthralled and very amused.
It was a joy to watch, both the play and the children.
They “got” it all. I could see it was double
a joy for the parents also. The father adored his children
and their enjoyment. I could see it when he’d turn
and look at them, beaming as they watched. A beautiful
evening. When it was over, Irwin and his brilliant cast
and musicians got a standing ovation.
I feel like I’m with a celebrity when
I’m with Ann Richards. By which I
mean, I’ve been in the company/presence of a lot
of famous people in my life, but most are always somehow
seem a little bit “over there” – into
that audience recognition. Not Ann. She’s so down-home
in inflection and sensibility: a very smart, canny woman,
who loves to tell a good joke, often very folksy, and
calls herself a “political technician.” But everywhere
you go people stop and look, and gently nudge one another: “that’s her.”
It’s all very appealing, the her. Part of it’s
probably that rich silver-white concisely cut coif of hers. She doesn’t
miss a trick and often drops a trenchant comment into the conversation,
but it’s expressed like your best next-door neighbor passing
a still warm apple pie over the backyard fence. But being with her
in public is like being with a celebrity.
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Peter
Rogers and Liz Smith
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Afterwards we
went over to Chez Josephine, Jean-Claude Baker’s
restaurant on West 42nd Street for dinner. As we were leaving two
men in their thirties were passing by. When they saw her, they
applauded and cheered. “Take back our country for us Governor!” one
of them exhorted. They love her. I don’t know if she ever
heard them; she was busy getting into a taxi and giving the driver
directions.
I don’t quite understand what she does politically these days
but I know she’s got her hand in it. She’s also making
a good living speech-making. All over the country. They pay her a
lot, I don’t know what that means. I only know that I’d
pay to listen to her anytime; you always learn (and don’t feel
terrible afterwards). Corporations often hire her, I hear. I asked
her what she talked about. “Oh, everything ... whatever they
want,” she said, like a very reliable hands-on volunteer at
a disaster.
It’s grueling work, traveling all over this vast country, Minneapolis
one night, Columbia, Missouri the next, and then back to New York
or down to Texas, and then on to Indianapolis. It’s not glamorous.
When it’s over, it’s back to the four walls of the hotel
room and onto the airport the next morning. A friend told me she’s
doing it so she’ll have enough to eventually retire back to
Texas with her children and grandchildren. And myriad friends and
followers.
When she got into the car when we picked her up, the first thing
she asked Peter Rogers was if he knew “why is it there are
those socks that slip down the ankle until the heel is bared, like
when you were a kid in grade school?” We all laughed at the
juxtaposition of images: the white haired woman and a splindly bare-ankled
schoolgirl.
She told us she’d bought these socks at some street fair near
her apartment because they were such a good buy. But when she put
on a pair to go out on this night, (she was wearing a simple black
pantsuit), by the time she got down to the lobby, they were already
deserting her ankle for the heel. So she went back and changed for
some more dependable socks and threw the new ones away.
She subleases a condo while staying in Manhattan (where she is also
an executive with Public Strategies, a high level corporate public
relations firm). Evidently the condo is someone else’s investment,
furnished for efficiency more than for coziness. I asked her what
it was like. She said it was done by the famous decorator “I.
Kay Uhh.”
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Looking
east from 42nd Street and 8th Avenue
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Pronouncing
Ikea as if it were an individual. “With those black leather
couches with cushions that are on a slant, so that you slide right
off of them when you sit down to watch TV ...?”
Tomorrow night, Tuesday after Columbus Day,
all kinds things are going on in New York. There’s
the cocktail reception and private viewing of the Bill
Blass estate collection up at Sotheby’s.
Big, big. I’ve been told they expect this sale
to be one of the biggest, if not the biggest, since that
of Jackie Onassis.
Blass had so much stuff and his taste was considered without peer.
And he loved to buy. He had warehouses of stuff he’d collected,
besides what filled his home. And there are a lot of people out there
who’d give anything for a touch of his touch.
Then over at BAM is the opening night benefit performance
of “Split Sides, An Evening, By Chance” with the Merce
Cunningham Dance Company, Merce Cunningham, Radiohead,
Sigur Ros, Robert Heishman, Catherine Yass, James Hall and James
F. Ingalls. Mr. Cunningham is another scintillating genius,
his dance company more than a half century old and a good chunk of
his audiences are half that age and even younger. So this is a hot
ticket.
Then down at the New York Studio School, they are holding
their annual fundraising benefit, honoring Alex Katz and Hugh
Gourley. The School is housed in Gertrude Vanderbilt
Whitney’s old studio back in the days when she was
planning the establishment of the Whitney Museum of American Art.
Her great-granddaughter Nancy Whitney, along with
jewelry designer Christopher Walling are co-chairs.
And, same night, the Mount Sinai Breast Health
Resource Program are holding their annual
benefit honoring Beth Rudin DeWoody.
Mrs. DeWoody, the daughter of late New York real estate
mogul Lew Rudin, through her grandfather Samuel
Rudin’s foundation, has been a major contributor
to cultural, philanthropic and civic causes for the last
twenty years in New York.
She’s also a world class art maven (and traveler) and makes
friends with all kinds of people everywhere she goes. I know; I’m
one of the legions. I met her when she was just out of UC Santa Barbara
and all these years, two grown (great) children and two marriages
later, she’s still the same to me and with everyone. Beth.
Still more: over at Cipriani 42nd Street, there should be hundreds of
the literati and most likely some of the glitterati turning out for
the 50th Anniversary party for the Paris Review, edited
by the late and legendary George Plimpton who died
just a little more than a week ago.
This was going to be George’s shining hour (or one of them,
considering how much territory he covered on the planet and in his
experiences). But we’re going to have to go it without him.
Although I’m sure it won’t be a grieving affair. George lived,
and he will continue to... somewhere out there. His presence will
be felt here, too, on this night. |
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