Married author and Vanity Fair contributing editor Peter Biskind had a two-year affair while writing a book about Warren Beatty, according to a woman who claims she was his mistress.
Manhattan artist Dawn Ellis told Page Six that Biskind — who’s wed to author Elizabeth Hess — seduced her after they met at a party two years ago and that they carried on a passionate affair until a few weeks ago.
Mustachioed Biskind — who dishes on Beatty’s trysts with Hollywood beauties, including Madonna, Diane Keaton and Natalie Wood, in an upcoming biography — wrote Ellis dozens of love notes until they split.
A “decimated” Ellis then claims she called Biskind’s wife and announced, “I am your husband’s mistress.”
Ellis, in her 20s, told us she fell quickly for Biskind, 69, at party when she was mourning a close pal’s death from cancer. She related, “Peter said something and made me laugh for the first time in a year and a half.” They spent nights together at her Manhattan apartment and “hours” on the phone. Ellis said, “Neither of us had any expectation that we would actually fall into such an intertwined, true love. I really loved this man, and he loved me.”
Biskind wrote dozens of love notes seen by Page Six to Ellis, adorned with hearts, strings of X’s and signed, “Your adoring, P.”
Ellis said, “He is a man of uncommon valor and chock-full of class. We shared a mutual sense of humor. It was a very healthy relationship — but then it turned toxic.”
When the pair split, Ellis called his 57-year-old wife. She explained, “I did not want or expect him to leave his wife. My purpose was for a sense of justice.”
Through a Simon & Schuster spokesman, Biskind declined to comment, and he didn’t respond to e-mails.