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Terry
Allen Kramer
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Judith
Giuliani
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Serena
Boardman
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Mort
Zuckerman
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Susan
Magrino
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Euan
Rellie
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Lunch
at Michael’s, the Passing Parade: Broadway
and Wall Street’s Terry Allen Kramer holding
forth with Judith Giuliani, Serena Boardman, and Pamela
Gross, while at next to them at the table in the window
were Roger Ailes with Rick Leventhal,
Shep Smith, and Bill Hemmer (Laurel
Touby of Mediabistro.com who takes an every-Wednesday
inventory of the Michael’s crowd, described them thusly: “… all
in black suits and pastel shirts like East Village undertakers …”).
And one table over was Joe Armstrong, known as
the Mayor of Michael’s
with Newsweek’s Dorothy Kalins; while
in the corner, Freddie
Gershon with Ann Sweeney. And next to
them Mort
Zuckerman with
music impresario Tommy Mottola; Atoosa Rubenstein with Jeff
Bercovici, and Elizabeth Dye. On the
other side of me, my former employer Judy Price (founder
of Avenue magazine) with Sandra
Lee. When they
left, the table was taken by Dorothy Parker of
the Media Age,
Fran Lebowitz, and Errol MacDonald; and
on the other side of the bar, my present employer, Chris
Meigher of
Quest magazine.
Also:
Former executive editor (and once an editor of mine) of HarperCollins
Larry Ashmead with the head of HarperCollins, Jonathan
Burnham. Amazingly, Jonathan also moonlights as the piano
accompanist of the New York Times’ traveling metropolitan
minstrel, Bob
Morris at the Cutting Room. Larry, who retired from HarperCollins
a couple of years ago is finishing his book, Funny Names
of Famous People (or, knowing Larry, it might just be Famous
Names of Funny People) and will be returning to the business that
he
loves and loves him back, as a literary agent, in January.
Also at the tables down at Michael’s: PR honcho Elizabeth
Harrison, Deb Shriver of Hearst, modeling world legends who started
it all: Jerry and Eileen Ford; Sony’s Rob
Wiesenthal with
Playboy’s Christy Hefner; at another table, Sony Pictures
Steve Mosko, Henry Schlieff; Janice Min of US
Weekly with Gabriel
Sherman of the New York Observer; media maverick Walter
Sabo, Stephanie Smith of mediaweek.com with Terry
McDevitt of Conde Nast; Susan
Magrino, the doyenne of PR for Martha Stewart (Susan has her own
bigtime agency) with Amy Stanton, director of
marketing at Martha Stewart Omnimedia, discussing next week’s
launch of the new book, Martha Rules (but only with a velvet glove,
of course).
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Pamela
Gross
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Ashley
Schiff |
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Fran
Lebowitz |
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Chuck
Dolan |
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John Ashcroft |
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Then there was the heartthrob columnist of the Daily News Ben
Widdicombe with a couple of throbbing hearts; plus Time
Inc.’s Peter
Wolf, which, speaking of, at another table, were, Keith
Kelly, the media columnist for the Post with Jim
Kelly (no relation, I
think), of Time.
Wait, there’s more: film producer Beverly
Camhe (The Celestine
Prophecy, The Believers), bi-coastal art consultant Barbara
Guggenheim, Cablevision’s Chuck Dolan, Rubenstein
PR’s Ashley
Schiff,
the fairygodmother of Jazz @ Lincoln Center.
I was with Euan Rellie, the British investment banker, who is headquartered
here in New York with his firm of which he is founder and managing
director, BDA (Business Development Asia) who is married to fashion
editor and clothing designer Lucy Sykes (her company: Lucy Sykes
Baby) with whom he has a young son named Heathcliff.
Mr. Rellie, I learned after lunch, was considered the real heartthrob
of Michael’s today, bearing a striking resemblance according
to his fans, to Jude Law, a fact which eluded this contemporary
film-illiterate reporter.
And then, if that weren’t enough, among this clamoring crowd,
there was a man who, passing my table, stopping to say hello to
Terry Allen Kramer et al, who looked amazingly like a younger version
of former US Attorney General John Ashcroft. And lo, whattaya know,
but it was John Ashcroft (looking younger than his media image).
Mr. Ashcroft, I also later learned, has his own company, called
the Ashcroft Group, and he was lunching with one of his associates,
Juleanna Glover Weiss.
So there you have it; Michael’s and why they call it the
Media Restaurant of New York. |
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