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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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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Looped on Broadway

This past Saturday night I had a real treat, sitting second row center at the Lyceum Theater, seeing the great Valerie Harper in her Broadway tour de force as Tallulah Bankhead in LOOPED, a riveting one-woman (and two man) production with Harper “nailing every last laugh with a professionalism that the real Bankhead would surely admire,” wrote the New York Times.

Sitting with my best friend (and lawyer), Michael Gordon, I was amazed by Valerie’s virtuoso performance, gut-wrenching and compelling from start to finish. Although backstage afterward with Michael and me, she confided that she was fighting a cold and that an onstage coughing spell was not in the script, you’d never know anything was wrong, as she marshaled her forces with hilarious “dahlings” sprinkled over countless jokes. Supporting her in every possible way is her fantastic manager-producer-husband Tony Cacciotti, who hospitably welcomed us backstage after the performance. back links check Valerie was dressed down in slacks and a baseball hat as she greeted her fans outside the theater.

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Judge Judy

Even in the company of the great Katharine Hepburn, Elizabeth Taylor, Nancy Reagan, and Carol Burnett, one of my favorite interview subjects of all time is the incomparable Judge Judy, the charismatic powerhouse who reigns over the highest-rated court session on TV, with more than ten million viewers tuning in daily.

Amazingly, she’s been #1 for the last 700 weeks! Beyond ratings, nobody can surpass Judy’s astute judgments, spicy humor, supersonic mind, and no-nonsense attitude.

And best of all, fear is not in her vocabulary—as she says the things we all want to.

“LOOK at me, Madam!” shouts the Queen of small-screen Justice to an evasive witness.

“Does it say ‘stupid,’ here?” she inquires, pointing briskly to her forehead.

“They don’t pay me because I’m beautiful,” she mugs sweetly to the cameras. “I’m real SMART, so watch it!”

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