Graydon Carter
How Green Is His Valley? At Vanity Fair's Enviro-Bash, Brokaw Brags of Bison
On Monday, April 28, in the subterranean auditorium of the New York Public Library, Vanity Fair hosted a cocktail hour and convocation of experts grandly titled “Redesigning the World: A Green Way to the Future.” And environmentally concerned New Yorkers Mary Richardson Kennedy (wife of Robert Kennedy Jr.< read more »
Where Will Magazines Be Ten Years From Now?
In the next five years in Graydon Carter’s world, you’ll walk onto a plane, or a subway, or a soon-to-be-invented mode of transport, and you’ll tuck a little electronic book under your arm. Inside that little book, which will be very expensive at first but soon will cost $150, there’ll be a series of mylar “pages,” and there will be small buttons off to the side, and once you hit one of them, whoooosh, words and photos from Vanity Fair will suddenly appear. read more »
St. Vincent's Hospital Redevelopment: Won't Someone Think of the Waverly Inn?
Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter showed up almost three hours in to this morning's Landmarks Preservation Committee meeting on the proposed St. Vincent's Hospital rebuilding in the West Village.
"I'm against it!" he said. The proposed towers would very nearly cast a shadow over his nearby restaurant, the Waverly Inn, after all. read more »
Diller, Graydon Put Oscar Parties on Chiller, But Others Plow Ahead
With the writers’ strike and all, what’s goin’ on with the Oscar parties? read more »
Solidarity! Vanity Fair Cancels Oscar Party
Vanity Fair just announced that they are planning to cancel their annual Oscars after-party.
Here's the entire announcement, as posted on VF Daily this afternoon:
After much consideration, and in support of the writers and everyone else affected by this strike, we have decided that this is not the appropriate year to hold our annual Oscar party. We want to congratulate all of this year’s nominees and we look forward to hosting our 15th Oscar party next year.
Magazine Nabobs Resolve in 2008 to Kick Bad Habits: Waverly Inn, Post
Each New Year brings with it the obligatory slate of resolutions. And like some college-level sociological experiment, each New Year also brings with it a slate of stories about what famous people have resolved to either quit—smoking, say—or begin—usually something kind of boring, like marathon training or French classes. True to form, WWD recently called some executives in the magazine world to ask them what they hope to accomplish, respectively, in 2008.
Vanity Fair honcho Graydon Carter, who also happens to own a restaurant famous for its tony, truffled mac ‘n’ cheese, is working towards “less food, more exercise.” Meanwhile, Mr. Carter’s publisher, Edward Menicheschi, wants more-or-less the same thing, though he was slightly more specific, aiming to “cut back to four nights a week at the Waverly.” read more »
Spitzer Pits Remnick Against Carter in Conde Nast Duel
Back in August, New Yorker editor David Remnick assigned writer Nick Paumgarten a profile on Eliot Spitzer’s rocky first year as governor. In late September, Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter assigned writer David Margolick a profile on Eliot Spitzer’s rocky first year as governor.
Mr. Paumgarten had his first conversation with Mr. Spitzer two weeks after Labor Day—the first of six conversations they’d have by around the time Mr. Margolick first approached the Spitzer camp. In the end, Mr. Margolick would meet with Mr. read more »
This Is Café Society?
Tears at the Old Town
The Round-Up: Tuesday
- Spitzer likely to approve Freedom Tower. [NY Times]
- New owners plan big changes for former Albee Square. [NY Times]
- Related's condo plans for former Dakota Stables. [NY Post]
- Old Town Bar, Graydon Carter feud. [NY Post]
- City Council mulls bill to tighten reins on bars. [NY Sun]
Did we miss any New York City real estate news this morning? Please send along tips and links.
Gender? I Don't Even Know Her! Sklar Charges Sexism, Carter Bristles
Susan Morrison--a former Spy editor, and so friendly with former co-worker Graydon Carter, and now an editor at the New Yorker--made a wee gibe about a new piece by Christopher Hitchens, which was just published in Mr. Carter's magazine, Vanity Fair. That piece explains why women aren't funny.
Salad and chicken and a roll were served, as well as a fluffy cheesecake.
The Huffington Post's Rachel Sklar was seated at a table with Conde Nast's director of public relations, Maurie Perl. Mr. Carter was talking about how it was difficult to grow up, and become friendly with people, and still manage to make fun of them. It was easier when we were young, he was saying, and when you're older, you find people are people.
Rachel Sklar had her hand up and, in preface to her question, made a seque comment about women being people too.
She wanted Graydon Carter to tell her why Vanity Fair had published the article that Mr. Hitchens had written.
"You just proved my point," Mr. Carter told her, according to people who were present. He meant that she was humorless.
And so Ms. Sklar had inserted herself into the big feminist bear-trap Mr. Hitchens had set. (The game, which dates to at least the mid-70's, is traditionally played like this: You write an article like that, and those who humorlessly complain are then treated as the proof in the pudding of the article. Which doesn't of course make the complainers any less humorless.)
(Oddly enough, the game doesn't work on black people.)
"And I really wanted to hear him talk about why he published that because he's sitting up there as an arbiter of All Things Funny," Ms. Sklar explained later.
Graydon Carter didn't know who she was. They weren't friends. They'd never worked together. "Who are you?" he asked. She told him she'd already written about the Hitchens piece and offered to send him some links. He wanted to know if she was funny for the Huffington Post.
Ms. Sklar called the Hitchens piece "ungood."
Mr. Carter did not in the end answer her question.
Kurt Andersen entered the fray. Someone present noted that people had gotten that look where they're looking at the floor and smiling in an interesting way.
Mr. Andersen asked Ms. Sklar, what was Mr. Carter supposed to do? If a columnist wrote a piece, and if he's supposed to kill it....? Ms. Sklar said she had thought that editors evaluated pieces before they ran.
After the exchange, the next questioner wanted the Spy alums to talk about Separated at Birth, a feature in which pictures of two or more unlikely people who are found to carry some noticeable physical attribute are juxtaposed.
"I always thought we'd bond over being Canadian," Ms. Sklar said later, via Google Chat, of Mr. Carter. "Oh well."
The Transom
The Transom
The Transom
The Transom
The Transom
The Transom
Hey! Remember Us?
Hey! Remember Us?
Spy: The Book of the Magazine
I Spy.
The other day, someone who will remain nameless accidentally left The Transom alone in an office. In that office was a copy of the Spy book, which comes out in a few months and will supposedly retail for 40 bucks or so. The nice publicist from Miramax Books recently declined to send over a copy, claiming there just weren't any on hand. OH YEAH? WHO'S ON HAND NOW, SISTER?
Behind the Music: Inside the Editor's Studio....
It's big. It has lots of pictures. It's gorgeous. Great reprints, great photos. Can't wait. It's also got lots of opportunities for editors Graydon Carter, Kurt Andersen and George Kalogerakis to autohagiographize. But really—if they don't, who will? And why shouldn't they? You should know, you've been ripping them off for years! (Yes you!)
Your Friends and Editors
read more »
The Observer's Queer and Sultry Summer Dress Code
In light of other publications' recent instructions about office dress code, we thought it was time for our own in-house reminder about appropriate attire.
Lady reporters, as per the recent slew of gossip-girl-about-town "novels," are required to wear 2.5+ inch bitch heels and a constant air of anxiety and lustiness mixed with exasperation. (Yoga mats are optional attire.) Male reporters are required to wear something horribly pleated up front, the scent of bourbon, and must also wear tidy sweater vests and "unusual" blazers, just this side of professorial.
Male and female editors both are permitted to bare midriffs, intentionally or otherwise. Male editors must shave at least once per month.
The web editor is instructed to wear a white belt at all times; also, a t-shirt promoting a band that is based in Brooklyn which was purchased at a concert in 2002 or 2003, New York's "irony is dead, no really, Graydon Carter said so" years.
White pants on Fridays are mandatory, with flesh-toned thongs or underwear beneath. Your amount of muffintop-overspill is at your discretion.George Gurley is required to wear human shoes in the office.
The editor-in-chief must wear khaki pants and should decorate his blue button-down with no fewer than two coffee stains each day.
Thank you for your attention to this matter.
Michael Roberts to Vanity Fair
Michael Roberts
Full release after the jump. read more »
—Gabriel ShermanYour Conde Nast Opportunity Awaits
Magazine Publishers: OK, Maybe We Can Take a Joke After All
"We didn't contact lawyers," said Howard Polskin, the MPA's vice president of communications. "It's behind us; we're moving on."
In front of 1,000-plus magazine-industry folks at Lincoln Center, Stewart had given the four editors on the dais—Vanity Fair's Graydon Carter, Cosmopolitan's Kate White, Time's Jim Kelly and Men's Health's David Zinczenko—a barbed, nearly Tucker Carlson-class working over. Among the highlights: "I don't consider print media as relevant" and "I didn't say you don't have your place; it's at the children's table."
That left the association--which has been campaigning tirelessly on the theme that people will still be reading (and, yes, sir, advertising in!) the extremely relevant format of ink on glossy paper for decades and decades and decades into the future--gagging on the toy in its Happy Meal. But with Stewart having been paid in advance, the MPA's most attractive option apparently was to swallow hard and stop fussing. read more »
--Gabriel ShermanBest Comment Ever
"A bunch of us 'managerial appointees' in DOT had fun ordering the tearing up of the pavement outside Vanity Fair's offices back in '96 or '97 on the same day that its issue containing the article asserting that Rudy was sleeping with Cristyne hit the newsstands. We never told City Hall we were doing it, however, maintaining plausible deniability for the big boys downtown. I think that day we tore up the block where Graydon Carter lived, too. Both the magazine's and Carter's streets were due for repaving, and we just, er, pushed them up the priority list a little. I doubt Bloomie's people have the same bal... um, chutzpah, frankly..." read more »
News of the coming Vanity Fair story broke August 4, 1997. Can anybody over at DOT check this out for us?Metaphysics of a Magazine
The Graydon Carter Enigma: Why Is He so Hot to Bash Bush?
Off The Record
Off the Record
Pataki and Bruno: The Midwest Mentality
May Day for New Oligarchs
Filmmaker May Sue Evans, Carter To Stay In the Picture
Toby On Top
Bob Is Love
The Monster's Ball
Getting the News Out, as Well as New York, Vanity Fair, Talk, Harper's, The Village Voice, Etc.
Back to School-Gird for Cold Showers, New York!
September Calendar
Griffin Dunne's Tract Is a Cautionary Movie
Slouching Toward Hollywood
Cipriani Unzipped
Graydon Carter Aborts His Sun-and-Fun Weekend With Barry Diller
Brill's Contempt and the Killing of Sister Jenny
A Tense Best-Picture Victory for the Miramax Mogul Who Stormed Oscar Beach
