Mon Oct 20th
Jamie Wyeth had invited me to lunch for Ted Kennedy’s birthday party, but in the morning he called and said that Rose Kennedy was only having a small one and he didn’t realize that, so I couldn’t go after all, but I think it was just maybe Jamie changing his mind. Went home at 8:30.
Saw on Metromedia that they took the idea from our proposal that they turned down and then went and did it themselves - they had Dinner with Bella Abzug on TV. But they did it boring and corny and it made me so sad.
Fri Oct 17th
Took five hours to get to Miami. Paid for Catherine’s ticket. It was night in a minute, a long flight. Charlie Cowles met us in a great car, warm and wonderful, but it was 11:00. Time changes. Past the Fontainebleau, things like that. Took us to his mother’s place on Indian Creek Island on the grounds of a private club, had a lot of waterfront property. Met the mother and father, Mr. and Mrs. Cowles. Had sandwiches. Fred and I were in the guest house, Catherine was in the main house. Read Anforum which Charlie Cowles owns and went to bed.
Wed Oct 15th
Doug Christmas’s P.R. woman, Esther, arrived from church with an autograph from Jane Wyman, she’d asked for it while Jane Wyman was kneeling.
First supposed to have lunch with Bianca Jagger, but Wendy Stark said we could all have lunch at Coco Brown’s and I didn’t want to but Fred thought it was a good idea. The first car left, we were in the second, and we had a house number 36912 in Malibu. When we got there we couldn’t find it, but then the first car came along with Richard Weisman in it and he went to knock at 36910 because there was no 12, and the person who opened the door was “Mary Hartman,” with her funny braids on.
She said she’d have a party for us if we couldn’t find the party we were going to. But just then Coco Brown came by in another car with Wendy Stark and they said it was just down the block, that Wendy’d got the number wrong.
We got to the house and Bianca was there. She’d had a fight with Mick and he’d left that morning for New York - she’d accused him of an affair with Linda Ronstadt.
Walked down the beach with Bianca past the house of Larry Hagman, and he was standing on the beach in a funny uniform like a foreign-legion outfit, doing funny hand things, and I guess he’d gone off his rocker. While we were going by the sea came up and wet my shoes.
Spent three hours trying to make dinner plans, Bob Ellis, Diana Ross’s ex, and Alana Hamilton seemed too drunk. Bianca didn’t want to be with Miranda because she was the sister of Sabrina, Jed said he was hungry and he’d eat anywhere, and Wendy wanted us to go to Max Palevsky’s because she thought it would be good for us - he was going to have us over to see his art collection.
And so finally when we got together we went to a restaurant called Orsini’s, Italian food. Fred screamed at Catherine and told her how rude she was to him in front of everybody.
Tue Oct 14th
Suzie Frankfurt arrived with Marcia Weisman. They had a Rolls Royce so we Rollsed over to the hospital, Cedars-Sinai. Lots of people waiting, I sold $1,500 worth of stuff for a benefit. Marcia was very pushy. If anyone took a picture they had to pay $10. If I signed a can they paid $5. She told them that my prices would go up in the afternoon to $100 a poster, when actually they were going to go down to $6.
Dropped back at the hotel. Picked up by Doug at 1:30 and a camera crew filmed us in the limo on the way out to Venice for my opening. Before the opening we went to see Tony Bill’s apartment, he bought a building across from the Ace Gallery with the money he’s making from either Taxi Driver, The Sting, or Shampoo.
The Ace Gallery was very crowded, people around the block waiting to get in. Russell and I signed the Russell Means posters. Viva and Paul Morrissey were there. There were a couple of other people from the old days - Cockettes.
I got so tired of signing posters all afternoon that I skipped out at 5:00 to the limo. Suzie invited us along to have a drink in Bel Air at her model friend Cheryl Tiegs’s and her husband Stan Dragoti, who works for Wells Rich Greene. Fred was bitten by a big dog when he opened the wrong door when he was looking for the bathroom, but he didn’t say anything about it until there was lots of blood coming down his leg. He just put some alcohol on and then we left at 7:30.
In the lobby ran into Annie Leibovitz and Jann Wenner. Susan Blond left a message saying she was with Michael Jackson at Top of the Rox. Jann and Annie had just gotten back from there, the Grammys had just finished up, so everyone was drunk. A couple of boys in the lobby tried to pick me up.
Sun Oct 12th
After you PAY SOMEBODY BACK you never run into them any more. But before that, they’re EVERYWHERE.
Rode out to the Ace Gallery in Venice to do a press conference. Called the office in New York in the morning and Ronnie told me it was Andy Warhol Day on The Gong Show. Back at the hotel I had lots of messages. Dinner at Marcia Weisman’s. Ryan O’Neal was there and Sue Mengers. Ryan was leaning against the Morris Louis and put a big dent in it. He was sour. I had all the Guinness kids with me - Catherine, Erskine, and Miranda - and it turned out Miranda’s twin sister Sabrina had been Tatum’s nanny and Ryan’s secretary when Ryan was filming Barry Lyndon in England, and Ryan hated her, so he was taking it out on Miranda, and she went to the bathroom to cry. Sabrina is actually a groupie, even though she’s a Guinness.
Sue looked terrible and so did Ryan. They left early because, I think, they thought “nobody” was there. Hollywood people are rotten. They all play these games with their A, B, and C groups and it’s just too stupid. That’s why when they come down, they really come down. One thing about Bianca, she really has class because she’ll go anywhere.
Sat Oct 11th
I went to tour the Gemini Gallery with Sidney Felsen and his partner. At Gemini I got an idea. They can now print 10’ x 10’ and I’m going to think about it. Done an hour earlier than supposed to, decided to walk around, the shops just so exciting.
A person ran after me and it turned out to be Jackson Browne. He invited me to come to the recording studio across the street to hear his new record. He was adorable.
The cab strike was on so Catherine and I found a limo outside, had to meet Tyrone Power’s daughter Taryn at 5:00 at the Imperial Gardens restaurant on Sunset. Back for Fred, had to give him money. He went off to Paul Jasmin’s cocktail party for Divine where he met Tab Hunter.
Thu Oct 9th
Arrived in sunny California. Dropped Suzie Frankfurt off at the Simon’s on Sunset Boulevard in glamorous Beverly Hills. Called the Beverly Hills Hotel but they were out of rooms so we had to stay at the Beverly Wilshire. Catherine called her half-uncle Erskine who was in town, he’s just a little bit younger than she is. He’s been traveling around the world all year with his cousin Miranda Guinness, the twin sister of Sabrina. Went to Allan Carr’s. He has a great house. As soon as we got there he wanted us to leave because he was having a dinner and his guests were arriving and when we turned the corner Jed and Catherine almost fainted because they saw the Fonz sitting there. Allan gave us a tour of the house, he said Ingrid Bergman built it and Kim Novak lived there after her. Took us to every bathroom and closet, showed us how the bed went up and down like a barber chair. Meanwhile Suzie was talking to the Fonz. She asked him what he did, he said he was “An Olympic Swimmer,” and Suzie was so excited because she’d “never met one before” - she kept asking him what year and if he knew Mark Spitz, and everything. By this time the Fonz sort of got annoyed and couldn’t believe anybody didn’t know who he was. She still didn’t know who he was after I said, “He’s the Fonz.” The Fonz talked very serious, he tries to be very heavy. He told me how much he liked me because of “famous for fifteen minutes,” and something about closets from the Philosophy book - empty spaces and things like that. I was so excited meeting him that I couldn’t think of anything to say.
The David Begelmans arrived. We had to leave because the dinner was about to start. There were white orchids on the girls’ plates. Allan took us in and showed us the table and the food before he kicked us out. That was funny.
Wed Oct 8th
Cabbed up to Suzie Frankfurt’s and there was a lot of traffic. Suzie is designing clothes for women who’re over the hill, and it’s a funny idea, they’re the wrong colors and they emphasize the wrong places, she’s going to try to get into that business on Seventh Avenue and she’s also trying to go into antiques as a business. She’s going to go with us to California on Wednesday - Norton Simon, remember, is her cousin.
Tue Oct 7th
Leo Lerman called in the afternoon and commissioned a portrait for Vogue’s one-time-use only of Queen Elizabeth.
