Claire Danes de Lune
August 17, 2011 | Talk of the Town
Claire Danes
Manhattan can be a hot mess in August, but last Wednesday Dispatches got a last-minute invite to lunch at La Grenouille to celebrate the HBO documentary about Gloria Steinem (still sexy) called Gloria: In Her Own Words. Capote lunched here with his swans. I was seated between Kim Cattrall and Debra Winger!
Cattrall talked about working with Polanski, who is apparently a bit of a hothead. And when I told Winger I’m obsessed with A Sheltering Sky, she said she had just visited Bertolucci, who is temporarily in a wheelchair. Winger wore a Tiffany blue cardigan. I could listen to her voice forever.
Thursday I raced off to Surf Lodge in Montauk to attend Linda Wells and Savannah Buffett’s benefit for Playing for Change, an organization that creates bands made up of street performers. Jimmy Buffett joined them to sing "Happy Birthday" to Wells. Richard Gere and Carey Lowell danced like high school kids. I also spotted W’s Stefano Tonchi, who recently adopted twins but who still finds time to go spinning (as does Wells).
Richard Prince debuted a show on Friday at Guild Hall in East Hampton called "Covering Pollock." Large vintage photographs of Pollock reproduced on canvas were covered by images of Sid Vicious and lesser pop icons. Afterward the Karmely family opened the gardens of their former Gardiner mansion for cocktails and dinner in a far-off tent.
At Bridgehampton Polo on Saturday, Dispatches encountered Linda Evangelista and her wee son Augustin. Wow, does she make a beautiful mom. Later that night gifted fellow Hamptons scribe Michael Braverman opened his gracious home—complete with a stately library—for a dinner benefiting the East Hampton Library. He greeted guests beside a table stacked with works by authors he was honoring: The A Circuit by Georgina Bloomberg, The Amorous Busboy of Decatur Avenue by Robert Klein, I Have Nothing to Wear by Jill Martin and more. Dinner was served in tent with a bejeweled sculpture on every table. Think summer yellow tomato towers and sea bass in parchment.
And at the Cinema Society debut of the new Showtime series Homeland, Paul McCartney and Nancy Shevell brought their own pizza. Hamptons cover gal Rachel Zoe had her doppelganger sister in tow. Claire Danes is a standout in the series, and kudos to Judy Licht and Jerry Della Femina, who opened their home to Danes on a night when moonlight glimmered on the sea. Even Mary-Kate Olsen hung out by the bonfire.
I also caught up with Marci Klein. Some decades back we once hit every nightclub in Key West. “I’m sure you’ve been back a thousand times since," I told her. She said no, she never had, but that that she remembered it as a great, great weekend—as was this one.
BY JEFFREY SLONIM
