Capote once wrote, "There are certain shades of limelight that really wreck a girl's complexion." And after attending five Tribeca premiere parties in six hours last night, I couldn't agree more. The night was longer than a Ken Burns film and almost as glamorous as Capote's own Black and White Ball.
As I sit down to write this at three o'clock in the morning, all I can wonder is how Dominick Dunne does it. I saw the octogenarian lawyer-turned-political muckraker leaving the Vanity Fair party at eleven thirty last night. He looked a vision in his tortoise shell frames, comb-over, and baggy double-breasted suit.
VF's swank dinner hosted by Robert De Niro and Graydon Carter at The State Supreme Courthouse was the only one party I did not get into. Remind me to scold Graydon the next time I see him at Saint Ambroeus, his favorite west village hangout. The restaurant designed a menu for the party that was almost as rich as the guest list. Take that Wolfgang.
Had I eaten the meal of Cannelloni, lamb chops, and strawberry mousse on Genoise, I would have never made it to the pugilistic party for "Blue Blood," a fabulous documentary about the famous boxing rivalry between Oxford and Cambridge. The party was held at Trinity Boxing, the city's ritziest boxing hall, and had a guest list that included Chelsea Clinton, supermodel Maggie Reiser, and Federico Furio from the Sopranos. But the real stars of the evening were the boxers themselves. Guests mingled with pro boxers, oxford boxers, and inner-city amateurs. Midway through the party some of them got in the ring and duked it out while the Grey Goose-sipping guests casually looked on. After one of the more "lightweight" boxers had an asthma attack, Martin Snow, Trinity's owner and celebrity trainer, turned to me and said, "This guys got more excuses than a pregnant nun." Fearing that he might throw me into the ring, I nodded and promptly signed up for a lesson with the six-foot-four former heavyweight.
Before arriving at Trinity, I swung by "The Big Bad Swim" party at the Mandarin Hotel in the AOL Time Warner building. This quirky dramedy, about a motley crue that meets weekly at a beginner's swimming class, had a party that was more packed than a public pool in July. But I did get to meet Ishai Setton, the charming up-and-coming director of the film, who is in serious talks to option Dave Eggers' novel, "You shall Know Our Velocity."
After chatting with him, I moved on to the "Boy Culture" party, which was held at the Starlite lounge in the Lower East Side. The party had died down by the time I arrived, or so I hope. Not wanting to go home on a quiet note, I hopped over to the meatpacking district, where the film "Cocaine Cowboys," a riveting doc about Miami drug lords in the early '80s, was having an after-party at Lotus. Though the place was packed, it wasn't hard to find the director, a Don Johnson character sporting a white blazer and shoes to match. "In Miami, we wear white from Labor Day to Labor Day," he explained.
It was two o'clock by the time I arrived; Alex Baldwin and Stevie Van Sant from The Sopranos had long since departed. As Mickey Munday, star of the film and drug smuggler par excellence (he was in the Medellin Cartel), lectured me on the dos and don'ts of phone tapping, I could feel my eyelids slowly descending. Not being a Cocaine Cowboy, I decided to make my exit. As I made my way to the door, director Billy Corben grinned and yelled over the thumping techno, "Lightweight." I had seen some lightweights that evening and decided that just plain beat would be a better word.