Are Valentine and Olga Rei really the former child superstars they told the author of New York's socialite cover story they are? Stunningly, these notorious liars may have lied about that too! At least, that's what New York's own Daily Intel's Jesse Oxfeld thinks.
Sure, Olivia Palermo is on the cover of New York magazine. But Isaiah Wilner's hotly anticipated article isn't really about her at all. Nor is it really about Valentine and Olga Rei, the Russian stepsiblings who have finally officially outed themselves as the creators of now-defunct website Socialite Rank, which "wiped out what little dignity New York society had left." (Hilarious!) It's especially not about Lydia Hearst, who had complained to Socialite Rank that she'd been told the article would be about "my career as a model and entrepreneur and success and my handbag"—she is mentioned in the article only as a "nonstop e-mailer" of the site. And it's not about Tinsley Mortimer, and it's not about Fabiola Beracasa. It's not even about unearthing the truth about Olivia's shameful, and possibly fake, letter ("there are four basic theories") to fellow socials, or whether or not Tinsley really elbowed her at that charity fashion show ("the alleged incident"). Turns out, it's all about the mastermind behind Park Avenue Peerage, Socialite Rank's successor-site. He's a University of Illinois freshman named James Kurisunkal. "I live in Urbana, near a farm... I'm like—I'm not even white!" It gets better.
Isaiah Wilner's long-awaited article will be in next week's New York magazine, and the question on everybody's lips is: Who will be the cover girl, boy, or girlyboy? Probably not Kristian Laliberte (pictured here in all his furry glory!) but we can always dream. Other strong contenders are living symbol of the socialzeitgeist Olivia Palmero, last month's living symbol of the socializeitgeist Tinsley Mortimer, and Socialite Rank suspects of yore Peter Davis and Derek Blasberg. (Also: Maybe a completely unknown random person. Your guesses welcome.) Are you so excited? Eeeep! Probably not as excited as Isaiah Wilner, who we hear is looking for this article to open expensive doors for him at, say, Vogue. Good luck to all involved!
Model-heiress Lydia Hearst seems slightly peeved that the controversial New York magazine article Isaiah Wilner's working on won't actually be, as promised, all about her: "They contacted my managers and set up an interview saying it was supposed to be about my career as a model and entrepreneur and success and my handbag, and then when I sat down they said the whole story was about Olivia and that's it. Nothing wrong with that, but it's just interesting that a story would be pitched so inaccurately," she sniped to Socialite Rank. As discussed, she's not the only social-lady who has a bone to pick with Isaiah. What's up with this guy, anyway? Is he just sensibly refining his angle from the general to the specific as he works on his socialite story—hey, like Lydia said, nothing wrong with that!—or is he preying on these girls' gullibility unfairly? Does he have a history of ethically questionable behavior? Let's turn back the clock to the heady late 90s....
Isaiah Wilner, the twentysomething Yalie who published a book about the "media scandals" surrounding Time's founders last year, may be kicking up a bit of a scandal of his own. According to a recent Page Six item, Wilner's working on an article about hot-topic social gal Olivia Palermo for New York magazine. Per Page Six, Olivia fears that she might end up regretting having spoken to Wilner without her new publicist Kelly Cutrone present. But judging from Palermo's brief but storied history of mindfuckery, that item might be a ruse—the same kind of attempt to drum up sympathy as that famous groveling letter to her fellow socialites.
Don't you love it when you've been working on a story for New York mag about the 27th Street nightclub strip for three months and then someone gets brutally shoved down an elevator shaft and then editor Adam Moss is all like, hey, let's do this thing? Dead guy? A peg! Pay day!
