The Political Is Extremely Impersonal At 'Radar'
Last night Radar, which is a magazine, threw a party at Goldbar for its new Politics issue. Outside, someone said that if Goldbar disappeared at that moment from the face of the earth, no one in New York would be offended. But there were free drinks, gold plated skulls, a slew of enemies and a couple of friends and a few awkward situations. Nikola Tamindzic was there to capture the gilded glory of it all.
On our way in, we brushed past Julia Allison. Her breasts, "outsized badges of femininity," were like two convicts struggling to escape the confines of her dress. "If you see any single men, give them my number!" she called after us. We did, and they were gay.
The best gay by far wasn't Maer Roshan, who is not gay so much kind of nicely paternal, but Greg Garry, Radar's photo director. When asked about Whoopi's reaction to his cover he squealed, "That fucking bitch! What a cunt! That bitch! I mean, she dated a white dude who went around in blackface!" A girl in gold lamé stretch pants and a butterfly sequined top said, "Yeah, Tony Danza." No dear, Ted Danson. "Yeah, Ted Danson!"
Both Emily Gould (who was there) and I noticed that their newest employee, Alex Balk, had lusciously eyelashed pyrite eyes—and that they lacked the feral hunted quality that they had when he worked with us. He looks like one million dollars in change and his skin shone with an inner light.
I talked to some guy in a suit that turned out to be Maer's lawyer, a man named Douglas A. Hand, Jr. On his business card, j.d. and m.b.a. are in minuscule letters, as if majuscule (or serifs) are too ostentatious. He was the only one reading Radar. (At least, at the party!) Maer had given him a copy. "You know, Maer's always trying to assert his rights with Yusef. It is the battle between editorial and publishing." That's Yusef D. Jackson, head of Integrity Multimedia LLC.
Yusef's boy reporter Neel Shah was wearing a cardigan. New York Observer gossip reporter Spencer Morgan was wearing a $1,500 Paul Smith blazer. His grandfather had bought it for him.
As the night wore on, Pol Pot jokes cropped up more often due to the presence of skulls at the bar. "What's Pol Pot's favorite pick up line?" I ventured. "Khmer, I've got something to show you!" It worked neither as a joke nor a pick up line.
Soon enough though we were all headed to the Lolita Bar for the afterparty. Maer ducked out to buy some Marlboro Lights. By this point Page Six magazine's Rachel Syme had joined us. Later in the night so did New York mag's Jada Yuan. All of us talked about Page Six honcho Richard Johnson a lot—you know, the guy who promises to rape non-ugly lady reporters in his column.
I said I thought a theological case could be made that he is the devil. Maer Roshan's boyfriend Matt, who sometime appears on "30 Rock," said, "Did I just hear the world theology?" I said he had. And then weirdly Nick Denton, our own personal Yusef, appeared, along with Aaron Hicklin, editor of Out. I thought Maer and Nick hated each other but Nick explained to me that nothing is ever personal.