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A Thunderstorm, Liz Smith, and Canine Fun at Barnes & Noble

Posted October 4th, 2010 in Friendship by Glenn Plaskin

Planning my Barnes & Noble bookreading was like planning a wedding. It went on for months. There was the advertising  in the New York Times, New York Post, the three local Battery Park City newspapers; the art department at Hachette Book Group USA designed a two-sided brochure;  5,000 of these flyers were printed for the neighborhood, including 2,000 of them put under every door in my apartment complex. We also passed them out at our Battery Park City block party, and otherwise spread the word in dogs parks, pet shots, restaurants, and my vet’s office! Moreover, the New York Post did a feature story on the book that appeared right before the bookreading, announcing the night, while our local newspaper, The Broadsheet, also did a feature interview. After all this build-up, including my passing out Katie adhesive stickers to anyone I could, telling them they could stick them anywhere they liked–the big night was finally here! I had even arranged for a celebrity to host the evening, the legendary LIZ SMITH who agreed to moderate, not just introduce me but engage in a full-length conversation that I believed would be more effective, and entertaining.

My puppy Lucy and the Katie book both on the New Arrivals Table!

And, at last, the night was finally here. But just as I was leaving to pick up Liz Smith in a car, with my puppy Lucy skipping alongside me, seemingly disaster struck. The one thing that will keep people away from any bookstore at 7 in the evening is a severe thunderstorm combined with high winds, right?! Could anything be worse? An author must therefore pray for good weather, but getting my wish was not my fate. Just as Lucy and I stepped out of my building to get into the car, rain started pouring down, the sky darkened, thunder booming away at us as we pulled from the curb. Feeling disheartened, we trudged uptown to get Liz. It took almost 45 minutes to get there, and another 45 to get back downtown to the Tribeca Barnes & Noble. Liz, an incredible trooper, could easily have canceled the evening, as she had a wicked cold and cough. In fact, in the car, amusingly on the way downtown, she was swigging back a bottle of cough syrup with codeine in it. I was so nervous about the weather–and fearing that nobody would show up–that I jokingly suggested that I needed a little codeine too (which I did!) About 15 minutes before the reading was to start, we were still nowhere near the store, but I called the B&N community relations manager, Carolyn Hughes, who had been incredibly helpful in planning every detail of the evening. I asked her if people were arriving. “We have about 30 people so far,” she said, my heart sinking as I thought to myself: ‘I went to all this trouble and we’re going to wind up with 30?!” But the show must go on. Finally, after 90 minutes in the car, at 7:05 p.m., Liz and I arrived at the store late and were brought in through a back entrance up into the green room. Maybe thanks to a prayer or two, the rain had stopped about 15 minutes earlier–suddenly gone with only a light mist of moisture still threatening the night. Once we were in the green room, Carolyn walked in with a smile. “We have an overflow crowd, standing room only, about 150,” she announced. What?! “That rain stopped and everyone arrived at the last minute.”

Liz, Glenn, and Lucy Backstage at B&N

My spirits soared. It was such a poignant night, especially because some of the main characters in the book were there. John,the single Dad who moved into our building with his three-year-old son Ryan, had flown all the way from Paris France to be present at the book’s debut. Also on hand was the wonderful Georgian physician, Naia, who had lovingly taken care of Pearl, our matriarch, and star, of the book. Also

Dear friend Peg, my sister Debby, Lee, who rescued Pearl on 9/11, and Naia, Pearl's caretaker in her final years

there was the lovely Lee, our neighbor who had rescued Pearl on the Esplanade during that horrible Tuesday, September 11, 2001 .

NYC Police Commissioner Ray Kelly, Lucy, and Me

Veronica Kelly, Glamorous As Always

Shaking hands with my neighbor Sy, longtime friend Michael Simon in bow tie to his left, to his left Sy's wife, Esther

And so the show began. Carolyn introduced Liz as “someone truly extraordinary, a Living Legend of New York, the former gossip columnist who toiled for more than 35 years in the vineyards of the New York Daily News, New York Newsday, Newsday itself, the Los Angeles Times, for 70 syndicated Chicago Tribune newspapers culminating in a long stint for the New York Post where she insists she was fired a year ago in March.” Liz then followed it up by saying: “I’d like to re-introduce myself. I am the former Liz Smith. I used to be a big shot GOSSIP columnist but now I am just an Internet nobody like everyone else in the world. However, I do still have one claim to fame. Glenn Plaskin has been my fevered fan for more years than I can remember. So much so that when I went to rave about his book KATIE for a jacket plug…I had to disqualify myself as being impartial. I am partial to Glenn and his dog. I do want to say that even before publication, KATIE has received more space, more media fill, more PR, more heated discussion than anything since the 1936 search for who was to play Scarlett O’Hara in Gone With The Wind. Katie will be even more famous after today. So you picked a good time to be here.” I was amused and touched by all this as I sat with my new puppy Lucy in the green room. Before I came out, Liz introduced the Katie book trailer, a 4-minute video with music that captures the essence of the story. Afterward, with many tears in the audience, I finally came out. There were my friends, my neighbors, my family, many of the characters described in the book, alongside people I’d never met, with people standing all along the perimeter. And then the conversation rolled as Liz and I traded anecdotes about dogs and movie stars–including a spirited exchange about the legendary Kate Hepburn. When it came to the time I was going to read a passage from the book, Lucy began chewing on my papers, bored with the entire evening and ready to get some action. After finishing a chapter from the book titled “Prancing With The Stars,” in which Katie meets hotel queen Leona Helmsley and Miss Hepburn, the evening ended with hugs and autographs. Liz stayed behind, as she was surrounded by the audience, kindly signing Katie books. One neighbor of mine who is 90-years-old went up to Liz for an autograph, and Liz signed it this way: “We may be 90 (Liz isn’t!) but we’re still here!” How can I ever thank Liz Smith for her generosity in hosting this evening, even when she was feeling ill, and in doing it in such a charming, beguiling way? One of my favorite moments of the night was when she sardonically said: “It must have been so comforting sleeping with a dog….” to which I answered: “Liz, I’ve slept with a lot of dogs, but Katie was a lot better!” Liz finished by saying she’d host my next bookreading, “probably in a wheelchair.” “I’ll be in one too,” I told her, both of us laughing as we left the stage, with lots of KATIE books in people’s hands–and hopefully their hearts.

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The Perfect Baked Potato: The Magnificent Katharine Hepburn

Posted April 27th, 2010 in Celebrity, Katie, New York, Reflections by Glenn Plaskin
Katharine Hepburn

Katharine Hepburn

People often ask me: ‘Who was your all-time favorite interview subject?’

Over a period of thirty years, having met or interviewed hundreds of celebrities–legends including Elizabeth Taylor, Audrey Hepburn, Meryl Streep, Jacqueline Onassis, Calvin Klein, Nancy Reagan, Oprah Winfrey, Barbara Walters–all of them unforgettable–one radiant personality stands out in my mind as most magnificent–and intimidating!

And that would be the great Katharine Hepburn, who as a child, I first saw in the movie “Guess Who’s Coming To Dinner?”

Growing up in Buffalo, New York, I never could have guessed that, decades later, I’d be the one invited to dinner at the Miss Hepburn’s East 49th Street Turtle Bay townhouse, discussing, as we did, my biography of the legendary Vladimir Horowitz, which she kindly read, the catalyst for our first meeting.

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New York Legend, Global Phenomena: The Unbeatable Donald Trump

Posted April 16th, 2010 in Celebrity, Reflections by Glenn Plaskin
Donald Trump

Donald Trump

Mega Achiever Donald Trump, who I’ve known for twenty years, doesn’t need much sleep–and he doesn’t get much, overseeing a multi-billion dollar empire that includes vast real estate holdings, his NBC hit reality series, The Apprentice, and countless other business ventures–including the Miss Universe Organization, Trump University, Trump Entertainment Resorts, even menswear and bottled water!–all if it keeping him busy from dusk to dawn.

The most meticulously organized person I’ve ever known, Trump also, more privately, devotes himself to his family–to his exquisitely beautiful (and very nice) wife, Melania (debuting later this month on QVC with a costume jewelry line), their four-year-old son, Barron, and of course to his older children, Donald, Jr., Ivanka, Eric, and Tiffany.

One of the amazing things about the multi-tasking Donald, I discovered when I first met him, is that his mind misses nothing, and that he’s eerily calm as he goes about his day, accomplishing more in a 24-hour period than most people could manage in a month.

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Accidental Friendship, The Very Best Kind

Posted April 16th, 2010 in Friendship, Katie, Reflections by Glenn Plaskin
Peg Wallis

Peg Wallis

Last night, with balmy spring temperatures soaring to nearly 80 degrees, I had to take advantage of the sunset on the Hudson, pictured below, by having dinner outdoors.

And I happily took in the water views (and grilled salmon) with my close friend and confidante, Peg Wallis, the brilliant life coach who travels around the country giving workshops to large corporate audiences, skillfully teaching how we can become better team players, think “bigger” and out of the box, and push beyond perceived limitations to the boundless possibilities within.

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