Almost Famous

Close (albeit brief) encounters with the One Percent

Crowded northbound No. 1 train. Mid-December Manhattan weekday evening, headed to Chelsea Piers for the Sports Illustrated Person of the Year Award ceremony honoring the 2015 winner, Serena Williams. Subway car doors open and a bearded man and his female companion board. Is that David Letterman? Indeed it is the late-night talk show kingpin, several months retired from his Late Show gig.

Nobody seems to recognize the celebrity in their midst. Letterman’s beard is ZZ Top-esque and a long way from his clean-shaven appearance on millions of TV screens every weekday evening. I slowly maneuver my iPhone to snap a photo while Letterman is looking down. Click. A couple stops later, I exit at 23rd Street and head west.

Even though I am early for red carpet access, the Daily News assigned spot is the last in a long line of media. Williams, decked out in a classy black dress, arrives for her meet and greet, working her way down the line. I figure by the time she gets to me, I’ll be lucky to get one question asked, if that. And at that point, what hasn’t she been asked?

The tennis great, who had won the ’15 Australian Open, French Open and Wimbledon – just falling shy of the calendar year “Grand Slam” – gets closer. And closer. A rep is parked beside Williams when she gets to me, and I’m on the clock — specifically, for 26 seconds. Go.

“Just the most unusual person that’s reached out to you to congratulate you…”

“Ummm,” says Serena.

“...either today or the last 48 hours,” I muster.

“Uh, I mean, everyone, literally everyone,” says Williams.

D’oh!

“Obama?” I blurt out.

“Pardon?”

“Obama?”

“No, but he always does,” she says. “They (the Obamas?) always do, so maybe soon, but yeah. It’s been amazing. It’s overwhelming, really.”

And then Williams is whisked away.

Roughly two hours separated the near brush with fame (Letterman) and the very brief brush with fame (Williams). There have been plenty of scripted moments over 20-plus years of a sportswriting/journalism career, but it’s the unscripted New York (and beyond) moments that more often than not leave an indelible mark: a random, early-morning run-in with Dominick Dunne at a midtown Manhattan Barnes & Noble; a spontaneous taxi ride with George Plimpton; an impromptu chat with Lou Reed while out for a jog, and my fumbled email exchange with the Rock & Roll Hall of Famer; an intro to Alicia Keys… right in the middle of her hosting duties for her annual charitable gala, the Black Ball; ordering cupcakes at famed Magnolia Bakery ahead of Rita Ora; an almost interview with Jack Nicholson during halftime at a Lakers game.

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The late Kevin Buckley was an editor at Playboy when I first met him in 1998, the result of a business deal we negotiated – Hugh Hefner’s signature men’s magazine would run an excerpt from a book by Arianna Huffington, published by Crown, my employer at the time. And Playboy would throw a party at the venerable Elaine’s to celebrate.

(Me with a couple of Playboy Bunnies, the late Kevin Buckley (c.), and the late Osborn Elliott (r.) at Elaine’s in 1998 for a book excerpt party. Buckley would introduce me to George Plimpton a few years later).

Buckley, a decorated former Newsweek reporter who had covered the Vietnam War, and I remained friendly over the ensuing years, and when he was an adjunct at Columbia’s J-School while I was a student, it was a no-brainer when it came time to choose an advisor for my J-School thesis.

Buckley later invited me and my now wife Beth as guests to the Century Club, or Century Association, its formal name.

The midtown private club, founded in 1847, has had its share of bold-face members over its nearly 200-year life span, and on the night we went, actor Alec Baldwin leaned over from his chair to say hello to Buckley, and famed Paris Review co-founder and bon vivant George Plimpton bummed a taxi ride with us to the Upper East Side, where he and I both lived.

It was quite the undertaking, all three of us trying to squeeze into the back seat of a Crown Victoria. Beth and I are 5’7 and 5’9, respectively, and Plimpton was 6’4, so it was like trying to shove Herman Munster and two average size humans into a locker stall.

Plimpton had every bit the gift of gab during the ride, at one point grilling Beth about the Chronicle of Philanthropy issue in her bag, and at another point divulging that he didn’t come up with the hilarious lines, “... no more tom foolery, no more balleyhoo…” in his Good Will Hunting scene with Matt Damon. The script, he said, was all Damon and Affleck.

I hadn’t yet embarked on my sportswriting career, so to this day I am kicking myself that I didn’t pepper Plimpton with questions about Sidd Finch, The Paper Lion, or his many other sports journalism dispatches.

When the taxi arrived at 72nd and First Avenue, a couple blocks from each of our apartments, we three got out and I expected a quick wave goodbye. But Plimpton suggested a nightcap at Hi Life, a long-since shuttered bar/restaurant that used to be on the corner of 72nd and First.

Nightcap with Plimpton? Sure!

But as he bent his frame into the front entrance, the packed bar crowd immediately turned to see the famous author and society fixture. Plimpton got cold feet. “Ah, maybe another time,” he said.

The party ended there.

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The Literary Guild used to throw lavish holiday parties back in publishing’s heyday, teasing the event with big-name authors year to year. I scored a gala invite in 1999 while working for Crown Publishing, and when I arrived at the Waldorf-Astoria, I was running late and dashed through the maze of opulent rooms toward one bank of elevators. The doors were just about to close when I squeezed in. One other sharply-dressed man was inside, but I didn’t look to see who it was. The doors started to close again when a couple of other attendees on my heels shouted to hold the elevator. The man next to me calmly pressed the “hold” button while simultaneously pressing his back against one side to make more room in the small square space. I did a double take when I finally did look up — the sharp-dressed man was two-time Oscar winner Gene Hackman. The acclaimed actor was a guest of honor for his newly published book, Wake of the Perdido Star.

The elevator climbed to the requisite floor and spit out its occupants, all except Hackman. Somebody had to press the “hold” button.

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That same year, 1999, Crown published Dominick Dunne’s The Way We Lived Then (Recollections of a Well-Known Name Dropper). Even though Dunne lived near the Random House building (then on 50th St. and Third Avenue), it was a rare occasion for him to visit Crown Publishing’s offices. The only time I had met Dunne in person was for the book launch party of The Way We Lived Then.

Until one random morning commute with a coffee stopover.

Dunne, dressed to the nines, was the only other patron at the Barnes & Noble bookstore on Third Avenue near our offices (but which has long since shuttered). It was early enough that the cafe was the only part of the store open for business. The rest of the floors were dark, although still accessible to intrepid book readers. Or acclaimed authors/Vanity Fair writers.

After I bought my coffee, I spotted Dunne in a darkened aisle – more specifically the cookbook section. Clearly not the category where his titles would find shelf space. I could see that Dunne was flummoxed.

“Hi, Mr. Dunne, it’s Christian Red. I work at Crown in the subsidiary rights department. I worked on your most recent book,” I said, extending my hand.

“I can’t find my books anywhere,” said Dunne, without missing a beat. “Infuriating. Can you help me find them? Shouldn’t they be out front?”

He was partially correct. I explained to him that while his latest book might be up front with the other new releases, his back titles were probably in the fiction section. I added that he’d have to wait until the store opened so he wouldn’t be stuck in the dark.

“Thank you for your help,” he said. And with that, Mr. Dunne disappeared into the abyss, probably in search of the fiction aisle.

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Genuine rule of thumb – if I don’t get a run accomplished in the morning, it likely ain’t happening that day. There are exceptions.

Saturday afternoon in the spring of 2009. My wife had travelled to the U.K. earlier in the year to attend a memorial service for Hercules Bellville, a relative on her mother’s side. Bellville was a successful movie producer, but his back story was way more colorful: hanging out with Hemingway in Spain in the 1950s; friendships with everyone from Roman Polanski to Jack Nicholson to David Byrne to Lou Reed.

And Reed was just who I happened to run into – almost literally – as I started on my jog from SoHo to Hudson River Park. Just before I crossed the West Side Highway, I saw a dude in jeans and a white T-shirt, smoking a cigarette near a fire escape stairway. Scruffy hair. Craggy face. Day-old stubble.

That looks like Lou Reed. It is Lou Reed.

I stopped a couple yards from him as he eyed me suspiciously. Some loony fan?

But I had an ace up the sleeve. The Bellville U.K. memorial was not the only one planned. There were discussions about a New York memorial, too, and my wife had been approached to help with the organizing.

“Are you Lou Reed?” I asked.

“Yeah,” he said, still a little wary. Another drag of his cigarette.

I introduce myself, and then quickly pivot to the important intel – my wife is related to Bellville, and there may be a memorial in New York. Would Reed be interested to know more? Why yes, yes he would.

And that’s where things went sideways. Quickly. Lou freaking Reed, Rock & Roll Hall of Famer, proceeded to tell me his personal email address. I had no cell phone. No pad and pencil. Only an iPod with my playlist – which happened to include “Walk on the Wild Side.”

When I say that Reed’s email address was quirky, it might as well have been in Sanskrit. He started dictating a couple letters. Then there were some numbers and symbols (maybe an ampersand?). Before he got to the @, I was already in the big weeds, but nodded my head just the same to try and save face. I can’t even remember if Lou Reed was an aol.com or hotmail.com kind of guy.

I thanked him, said that I would be in touch with more info when I had it, and then proceeded on my way, trying to shield my embarrassment.

As it was, the NYC memorial for Bellville never happened, but there was an L.A. version, hosted by Oscar-winner Anjelica Huston later that spring. My wife attended that memorial as well, but there were no Lou Reed sightings.

Hopefully he wasn’t still waiting for an email from me.

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Robinson Canó hadn’t yet bolted for the Seattle Mariners. Canó, the talented Yankees second baseman, was a free agent after the 2013 season and every New York sports media person was trying to get the scoop on whether he would return to the Bombers or seek riches with another MLB team.

After the 2013 regular season ended, there was the usual slew of NYC sports/entertainment events, charity and otherwise, where baseball writers try to get intel of any sort. One such event was Alicia Keys’ early November charitable “Black Ball” at Hammerstein Ballroom near Penn Station. Then Daily News gossip reporter and colleague Lachlan Cartwright had scored an invite. Canó and Yankee teammate CC Sabathia would be among the VIP guests, and hopefully Cartwright would be my contact to get me in and get access to Canó.

Sometime earlier that year, another Daily News gossip reporter, Brian Niemietz had told me about New York-born billionaire Stewart Rahr, a frequent subject in the Gotham gossip pages. Niemietz had cultivated a good relationship with Rahr. Even more important, Niemietz had done so to the detriment of the New York Post’s Page Six section, which had somehow (at least then) drawn Rahr’s ire.

To say Rahr was (still is?) an eccentric billionaire is putting it lightly. I somehow got on his master email list, and he would periodically flood the email ether with crazy, one-sentence declarations about his rise to the top. He had attained his billionaire status after he sold the family pharmacy business.

For a stretch of time, I would be part of an email chain that would on any given day include the likes of Bill Clinton. Or Leo DiCaprio. Or Alicia Keys.

It was a perfect storm of events, then, that led me to the Black Ball, and a chance meeting with both Canó… and Keys. Soon after I arrived, I was escorted by security up to the balcony area, the equivalent of nosebleeds at a sports stadium. I resigned myself to not getting any scoop. That is, until I emailed Niemietz and told him my situation. He then called Lachlan, who got in touch with Rahr, one of the gala’s honored guests due to his sizeable charitable donation.

Moments later, Rahr’s bodyguard, Big Tommy, called my cell phone and said he was coming to find me. How he already had my cell is still a mystery, but when Big Tommy — the “big” was not a misnomer — came to collect and bring me downstairs, I wasn’t going to question anything. I was deposited at Rahr’s personal table, in the center of the floor.

To my right was a table with Steven Van Zandt and his wife. Nearby was Clive Davis. And all the way in the back was a table with Sabathia and Canó. It was the only time I will probably ever score a better seat than a New York Yankee. As Mel Brooks said in “History of the World, Part I,” it’s good to be the king.

I went to interview Canó, and he and Sabathia’s jaws dropped. Canó wouldn’t divulge any new news, but just getting him at that event was good enough for a sports gossip item. I returned to Rahr’s table, and no sooner had I sat down than Rahr motioned for Keys to come over.

“This is my good friend, Christian Red, of the New York Daily News,” he said as Keys extended her hand. Her face said something totally different, like: Who are you again? And how did you get a seat at the best table in the room?

My good friend Stewart Rahr, of course.

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There is never not a line at Bleecker Street’s Magnolia Bakery, as was the case on a late August Saturday in 2016. On the way back to the A/E subway train to the Upper West Side, I stop off at Magnolia for a sweet tooth fix. When it’s my turn to order, the girl behind the counter is staring past me and she seems frozen in awe. She’s motioning to her co-worker to look past me, too.

“Who’s here?” I ask without turning around.

The girl whispers to me, “Rita Ora.”

In the tiny store space, the British songstress, dressed down in a “i used to be cool” T-shirt, soon draws a crowd. She’s with British DJ Samantha Ronson, but nobody there stops Ronson to take a selfie. Ronson is yesterday’s news, or as Billy Joel once sang, “…if I go cold/I won’t get sold/I’ll get put in the back in the discount rack/like another can of beans.”

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Post-9/11 outing at the legendary Chumley’s speakeasy on Bedford and Barrow.

I’m with my now wife, Beth, but had only been dating a few months. We’re with another couple I know from publishing/grad school circles. They leave after one round, while Beth and I stay to linger into the later evening.

All at once, a giant chunk of the “Sopranos” cast walks in the side entrance, led by the late James Gandolfini and Joe Pantoliano. They take up an entire corner of the pub, and word circulates that the group had just come from visiting a firehouse from Ground Zero.

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The Yankees had already been ousted in the first round of the 2005 playoffs, so the New York offseason baseball stories were in high demand by late October, and my assignment for the evening (and possibly, early morning) was to hang out at the Chelsea nightclub, BED NY.

Yankee outfielder Gary Sheffield was rumored to be making an appearance.

I took my wife along for the night, and when we arrived at the 27th Street address, a PR rep for BED whisked us past the lengthy line.

Let’s just say that the whole concept of the club – attendees would sit (lay) on comfy mattresses with full linens, comforters and pillows while imbibing and eating – is a little skeevy. How often are the linens cleaned? There were also private beds with curtains, and well… you get the idea.

We got a steak dinner and a couple drinks comped, and we sat on one of the “beds” waiting for Sheffield. And waiting. And waiting.

The PR rep would periodically circle by to see how we were doing. She seemed a little more tipsy each time. At one point, late in the evening, Giants defensive end Michael Strahan strolled in. “Big Mike,” some guy near the front said as Strahan made his way to one corner. When I wrote about his appearance for a Daily News gossip item, I had to get a comment from the Giants, and a team rep said Strahan was there for a “paid appearance.” Oddly, he was also there the same day that Giants patriarch Wellington Mara had died.

[https://www.nydailynews.com/2005/10/30/the-score-hearspoker-world-turns-on-a-rod/]

Also at BED that night? Rapper Ja Rule. In one of the curtained beds.

By midnight, and with no Sheffield in sight, Beth and I were ready for our own bed. We didn’t take a doggie bag to go.

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Joe Torre wasn’t supposed to be introduced as the new Dodgers manager until a couple days later, but I was dispatched to L.A. anyway, to try and get a scoop. Torre had only just split with the Yankees, after the club had been ousted in the first round of the ’07 postseason.

Since I had time to kill while in Hollywood, I offered to cover a Lakers game. Star Kobe Bryant was by 2007 showing signs of frustration in La La Land, even reportedly demanding a trade in May. Between him and coach Phil Jackson, there was bound to be some kind of story to generate. The News offices were in favor, so I not only covered a Lakers practice, but the Sunday Nov. 4 game at home against the Jazz.

My STAPLES Center media seat was above one sideline, but I could clearly see Jack was in attendance. Was there any chance to try and interview the legendary actor? I had the Hercules Bellville connection to drop. I decided I would shoot my shot at halftime.

I left my seat at the buzzer and made my way down to the tunnel where the players — and hopefully Jack Nicholson — entered and exited. No security stopped me. I waited to try and bag the elephant. The clock ticked down. Fans returned to their seats. The noise level started to become deafening. Perhaps it’s not to be.

And then, as I start to turn back toward my seating section, Nicholson comes up the tunnel, resplendent in his signature shades and flashing his famous smile. He was carrying what looked to be some popcorn. No one was around him.

Until an instant later, when a phalanx of security boxed me out and a cordoned rope was put in place. The third quarter was about to begin.

There would be no conversation with Col. Jessep.

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My first New York apartment had William Styron and his wife, Rose, as fellow building tenants and Brooke Shields as our next door neighbor.

There were a handful of times I saw Shields out on the street, including a late-night return to her townhouse with then husband Andre Agassi during that year’s U.S. Open tournament.

Styron was the only tenant in my building who owned his apartment unit. While his wife was always smiling and sociable when I would see them, William Styron… not so much. Still, having read most of his books, I wasn’t going to let an opportunity pass to have him sign my copy of Lie Down in Darkness.

The building super encouraged me to ask the reclusive author first before placing a book copy next to his door. One early evening, after coming back from running an errand, I spotted the Styrons’ front door ajar and Styron himself sitting on the edge of their bed. Rose Styron was nearby unpacking.

I knocked on the open door gently, my heart pounding out of my chest. Styron didn’t look too pleased I was intruding.

“Hello, I’m your neighbor upstairs, Christian Red. I’m sorry to bother you, but I wanted to say that I am a huge admirer of your books,” I said. I figured the word “fan” might sound too creepy and stalker-like.

Styron extended his hand to shake mine, and then said bluntly: “I don’t usually socialize with my neighbors.” Okaaayyy then.

I relayed the exchange to the super, who said he would try his best to get my book signed. A few weeks later, a present was waiting outside my door. It was as much socializing as William Styron was ever going to do — at least with Neighbor Christian Red.