High life
Furry stories
Taki
hey are so pushed for humour in this town that this golden oldie is currently numero uno among the laughing classes: Animal rights zealot confronts a leggy, tanned blonde outside Le Cirque. 'Do you know how many poor animals were slaughtered for that coat?' hisses the cru- sader. 'No,' hisses the blonde right back, 'Do you know how many men I had to sleep with for it?'
My friend Priscilla Ulmann, wife of a man who belongs to 82 clubs in the Big Bagel alone (one less than Chuck Pfeifer), had an even better one last week. This time it was in front of Mortimer's. Animal zealot: 'I'm going to throw paint all over your coat next time.' Priscilla: 'Good. It is very well insured and I want a chinchilla for the spring,' Needless to say, I find these people so outrageous that I'm seriously contemplat- ing wearing a white mink for the duration. The whole brouhaha is political, and the zealots are a bunch of cowardly vermin. Half the furs in the Bagel are worn by black drug dealers or eight-foot tall black basketball professionals. I have yet to see any of those `gents' harassed by activists. But show me a lifted rich lady posing at a 'photo opportunity' and I'll show you a target for publicity-seeking lefties.
The other outrage in the land of oppor- tunity is the one over Aids. Zealots of the gay lobby are waging war against a health official who, rumour has it, once upon a time back home in Indiana threatened to quarantine Aids carriers who deliberately spread the dreaded disease.
The gay lobby is also after the scalp of the Mayflower Madam, my old friend Sydney Biddle Barrows. All poor Sydney did was to write a book on manners in which she advises hosts to alert their guests when planning to invite an Aids victim to dinner. Sydney only meant well, because people are very touchy on the subject. She's been forced to eat humble pie as a result, although I love the idea of people like her teaching some manners to the nouveaux.
And speaking of nouvelle society, the Nineties are supposed to be a nicer, gentler decade, but one wouldn't know it from watching some of the star players. Take for example Mrs Carolyne Roehm, the wife of the world's shortest man but with the longest reach, Henry Kravis. Mrs K. is hardly Lydia Languish. In her short, meteoric rise to the bottom, she has managed to take French lessons, cooking classes, equitation (and to spell the word as well) and tennis, while attending chic charity bashes nightly, running her desig- ner business and overseeing four palatial houses filled with portraits of everyone's ancestors but hers and her husband's.
I admire her stamina, and even more so her ambition. People may write and talk about Sammy Glick types like Gutfreund, Steinberg, Kravis and Milken, but it's their wives, the Susan Gutfreunds, Judy Taub- mans, Gayfryd Steinbergs, Pat Kluges and Dimitra Papandreous who are the success stories of the Eighties and, I predict, the Nineties. They are the ones who will see the world of designer clothes, of antiques, of chic charity balls and of air-kissing remain safe for democracies like ours, while our beloved ethnic minorities will continue to remain non compos mentis from drugs and booze.
In the meantime, I've had a lovely time in the Bagel. Last week I dined with Marina Volkonska, a great admirer of Count Tolstoy's, whose husband was my roommate at boarding school and who as of late has hit it big in business. We talked only about the Tolstoy case, but I cannot say more because the sainted one has gagged me for the duration. Next week I will tell you about a case of greed that will make Aldington look human. The tale is from Hollywood, where else?
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