Prince. Not the royal. The artist. Not one who will be king of England. One who is king of music.
Prince worked the Montreal Jazz Festival. An 11:30 performance. He took the stage maybe midnight. While his backup singers back-upped, he pranced back and forth across the stage so the audience could see him. He did hip-shakes, rump-shakes, struts and little else until about 1 a.m., when he really opened his tonsils.
At 2:30 a.m. he split, clambered into his limo and back to the hotel. Then he decided to do more . . . but not without making the audience wait. And wait. Finally, to the famous words, “Dearly beloved”–back into the limo, out of the limo, back onto the stage.
Finally, a rendition of his famous “Purple Rain.” He entertained until 3:30 a.m.
Either everyone else is nuts or he is.
A few deadlines ago, the name Forbes was big-time wealth, power, success, yachts, parties, celebrities, headlines. Its invitations came, its phone calls got answered. I at tended Malcolm Forbes’ 70th birthday party in Tangier, Morocco, when he chartered three planes and flew more than 500 big names from Elizabeth Taylor to Henry Kissinger.
St. Martin’s now publishes “The Fall of the House of Forbes” by its magazine’s former editor. Stewart Pinkerton did not write a valentine. Gritty stuff like:
Malcolm Forbes’ death, what preceded it and was it suicide.
“Bumbling” Steve Forbes‘ two nowhere presidential runs, which were only “a $75 million sales call.”
Young male staffers hiding when Malcolm sailed by.
Creation of the famous “Rich List” franchise.
Osmosis from a boring, second-rate stock tip sheet to a respected business publication.
Fierce succession battles.
Family’s management removal by rocker Bono‘s investment group.
Dirty dish. Like a $156,000 bottle of “Thomas Jefferson wine” becoming salad dressing. Elizabeth Taylor smacking Malcolm with a Harry Winston box. Gianni Agnelli’s fight with Malcolm. Where are his beloved Fabergé eggs. Outrageous behavior, outrageous sex.
What reduced this century-old important publication to a blog post? A story of “hubris, greed, quirks, machinations, foibles, hopelessly divided family and awful decisions.”
Nice little read.
EVERYONE’s getting trashed. Next up Wiley & Sons’ “All the Things You Are: The Life of Tony Bennett.” Author David Evanier says, “I doc ument a tougher Tony than the smil ing persona he projects.” He tells of Columbia Records’ contract — thick as a phone book — which Tony “tore in half with bare hands” plus “punching the business manager in the jaw.” The jaw owner then instantly fell down. “Tony said, ‘Good day,’ and walked out.”
So if you already devoured “War and Peace” twice, here’s another nice little summer read.
STEVEN Spielberg thanked a colleague for staging a “bar mitzvah” at Auschwitz whereupon they played his taped address at the concentration camp site . . . It’s soon Fashion Week. Anyone recall Donna Karan was the first designer in the tents? . . . Kurt Russell swears he likes all Kate Hudson‘s beaux from A-Rod to this newie who gave her a baby. He’s eager to stay neutral . . . The Latin Quarter’s 1,000-strong lesbian celebration had Lil’ Kim as its star attraction.
NEW Liv Tyler, Terrence Howard, Patrick Wilson film is “The Ledge.” About a whole pile of things including faith, its writer is Matthew Chapman, the great- great-grandson of Charles Darwin, who wrote about things heavier than Tony Bennett and Malcolm Forbes. Like, for instance, the theory of evolution. So has Chapman anything from Darwin?
“We had the complete first edition of all his books signed ‘Charles Darwin,’ ” said Chapman. “They passed through the family but they were too valuable, and we couldn’t give them the needed care so we sold them to a museum.
“I never gave much thought to being his descendant. Many not only rejected the theory of evolution as opposed to creationism, they reviled it. I realized how hated the poor old codger was. It’s where did man come from . . . who created him . . . who created the God who created God . . . it’s an endless loop. Pressure to succeed and doing so in comparison to my ancestor was such that I turned my back on academia and moved to Hollywood.”
Is faith thus a part of your writing?
“It’s a thread. My next movie’s a complicated teenage love story set in 15th-century Florence about the middle of the Rennaissance and how 100 works of art like Botticelli and Fra Angelico were burned because they were thought lewd.”
Yeah. Right. OK. And he thought Darwin was complicated?
SENIOR citizen: “Doctor, must your medication be taken the rest of my life?” Doc: “Yes.” Lady: “So how serious is my condition? Because this prescription is marked ‘no refills.’ ”
Only in New York, kids, only in New York.