Latest news with #GraydonCarter
New York Times
a day ago
- Entertainment
- New York Times
The Concorde-and-Caviar Era of Condé Nast, When Magazines Ruled the Earth
As the longtime editor in chief of Vanity Fair, Graydon Carter was accustomed to big expenses: chauffeured town cars, five-star hotel stays, writer salaries that stretched into the mid six-figures. But in early 2001, he wondered if he had gone too far. Annie Leibovitz, the magazine's chief photographer, had run up a $475,000 bill on a cover shoot involving 10 world-famous actresses — Nicole Kidman, Penélope Cruz, Sophia Loren — and an elaborate stage set, complete with a mantelpiece and a genuine John Singer Sargent painting, which was flown from Los Angeles to New York to London. ('It was like Vietnam, the expenses,' Mr. Carter recalled.) Now, he needed to tell his boss, S.I. Newhouse Jr., the billionaire owner and patron of Condé Nast, about the latest line item on his tab. 'I do have to talk to you about something,' Mr. Carter said as the men sat down for lunch. 'It's a good-news-bad-news situation.' 'What's the bad news?' Mr. Newhouse asked. 'Well, I think we just shot the most expensive cover in magazine history.' A pause. 'What's the good news?' 'It looks like a $475,000 cover.' It was the equivalent of roughly $850,000 today. Mr. Newhouse was fine with it. At its 1990s and 2000s peak, Condé Nast captivated tens of millions of readers with its glossy manuals to the good life: Vogue and GQ for fashion, Vanity Fair for celebrity, Gourmet for food, Architectural Digest for real estate. Editors like Anna Wintour, Tina Brown and Mr. Carter were the ultimate cultural gatekeepers, venerated and feared. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
Spectator
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- Spectator
Dear Mary: Where should I seat Hollywood stars at dinner?
Q. My husband and I have recently made very good friends with some neighbours in France. They know I am having a 60th birthday party in London and have assumed they will be invited too. My problem is one of these new friends is a world-famous Hollywood actor and his wife is famous in her own right. I am worried about where I will seat them. I wouldn't want to give the impression to a roomful of my oldest friends (none of whom is famous) that I think the 'stars' are more important than they are, but neither do I want to offend the stars, who I fear will expect to be next to us at the top table (and possibly even sitting side-by-side American style). What should I do? – Name and address withheld A. The Hollywood party veteran Graydon Carter, author of When the Going was Good: An Editor's Adventures During the Last Golden Age of Magazines kindly steps in to advise. 'Have two long tables if possible. No wider than 30 inches. You sit in the middle of one table and place your husband in the middle of the other, facing each other. Put the world-famous movie star across the table from you and the wife who is famous in her own right across from your husband. Find the most interesting four people among the rest and put them on either side of the famed couple. Then select the second most interesting group of four people and put two of them on either side of you and the other two on either side of your husband. Movie stars as a rule don't have a lot to say outside their own bubble of interests – themselves, their work, what you think of their work. So make sure there's sufficient alcohol and pray for the best.' Q. I now live in Scotland but have a pied-à-terre with garden in London, normally rented out, which I'm going to use myself to give drinks to old friends. I've realised I only have 15 possible places to sit – but 50 coming and since these old friends are old now, most will want to sit. Help! – J.B.-H., Edinburgh A. Ask the most reliable guests to each bring their own chair to the party. If they are much-loved friends, they will think it fun to carry a collapsible chair to a social event and no more of a nuisance than wearing the correct kit for Royal Ascot. Q. I have moved into a house with three other recent graduates, none of whom respects my ambition to learn mindfulness. How can I get any peace to listen to the app? – T.W., London SW18 A. Churches are perfect venues in which to practise mindfulness (via headphones) undisturbed. They are spiritually appropriate and mainly empty.
New York Times
6 days ago
- Entertainment
- New York Times
An Actor, a Bookseller and a Chef Walk Into a Voting Booth
Graydon Carter, the longtime chronicler of New York City's glamorous set, is just looking for 'somebody who can make the pipes work.' Sarah McNally, one of the city's top booksellers, said her employees would 'hate' whom she was ranking first. And Sonia Manzano, who spent 44 years on 'Sesame Street' as Maria, understands her candidate has no charisma. That's just the way she likes it. With the June 24 Democratic primary just days away, the race for mayor has consumed New Yorkers and divided them into camps. Our famous neighbors, it turns out, are no exception. The New York Times asked dozens of them to share their ranked-choice ballots. The results are not scientific and they diverge from polls of likely primary voters. But they illuminate how some of the people who write Broadway hits, run celebrated kitchens, fill television screens and shape the skyline view the city's challenges and the crop of 11 Democrats vying to lead it. Many chose not to tip their hands, invoking the principle of the secret ballot, or another sacrosanct New York rule: Do not risk offending the powerful. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
The Guardian
21-06-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Graydon Carter: ‘The closest I've come to death? A tense argument with Russell Crowe at an Oscar party'
Born in Canada, Graydon Carter, 75, moved to New York in 1978. He became a staff writer on Time magazine, followed by Life in 1983; in 1986, he co-founded the satirical publication Spy. He edited the New York Observer for a year before becoming editor of Vanity Fair in 1992; he retired in 2017. His memoir, When the Going Was Good, is out now. He lives in New York City with his third wife and has five children. When were you happiest? My first week in New York in 1978, when I was about to start as a writer at Time. And my first week in the south of France after retiring from my job of 25 years as editor of Vanity Fair. Which living person do you most admire, and why? It will be the one or two or three senior Republican leaders who take a public and forceful stand against the ugly lunacy of the Trump administration. What is the trait you most deplore in yourself? Intermittent laziness. What was your most embarrassing moment? That time I congratulated a waitress on being pregnant. Aside from a property, what's the most expensive thing you've bought? My children's education. Describe yourself in three words Content. Cheerful. Appreciative. What would your superpower be? To be able to fall asleep in five minutes. What has been your biggest disappointment? That I didn't go to Turkey during the pandemic for one of those male hair treatments. What is your most treasured possession? A cardboard Leica camera my then 13-year-old daughter made for me for Christmas. Inside was an accordion strip of photos of the two of us. What do you most dislike about your appearance? Thinning hair. And thickening everything else. What is your most unappealing habit? My wife has weaned me off most of them. What is the worst thing anyone's said to you? 'Didn't you used to be Graydon Carter?' What is your guiltiest pleasure? Hermès handkerchiefs – and two scoops of vanilla ice-cream after every dinner. To whom would you most like to say sorry, and why? Canadians are trained to say sorry to almost everything and everyone. What did you dream about last night? I dreamed that my penis was much larger than it is. Which words or phrases do you most overuse? It's all good – which is code for the opposite. How often do you have sex? Like most people my age, hourly. What is the closest you've come to death? Getting into a tense argument with Russell Crowe during one of the Vanity Fair Oscar parties. What single thing would improve the quality of your life? The metabolism I had in my 20s. How would you like to be remembered? With dozens upon dozens of beautiful women weeping over my casket. What is the most important lesson life has taught you? Be generous and kind. Honestly, those two things did everything for me. Tell us a secret I still smoke a cigarette every morning at 11. It sets me up for the day.
Irish Times
16-06-2025
- Business
- Irish Times
Your biggest career move? Choosing a spouse or partner
If your boss ever invites you and your spouse to a work party, do you accept immediately, confident your charming, supportive partner will boost your standing in the office? Or do you automatically turn down the invitation, knowing there is a high chance your loud-mouthed, prickly other half will be an embarrassing blight on proceedings and your career? Lucky you if you can answer yes to the first question. You have won one of life's great lotteries by acquiring a vital, yet under-appreciated asset: a partner who makes working life easier rather than harder. I thought about this the other day as I was reading When The Going Was Good, the recent memoir by former Vanity Fair magazine editor Graydon Carter . It ends with a list of life advice that includes what Carter thinks are the essential ingredients to look for in a mate, namely someone who is Fisk: funny, interesting, smart and kind. READ MORE He's right. These traits are hugely important and not to be taken for granted in corporate life. Over the years, I have come across a non-trivial number of people who have succeeded despite their actively disagreeable spouses. As it happens, I have ended up with a partner drenched in Fisk qualities, a sentence I would type even if he did not read almost everything I write. I had not realised quite how fortunate this makes me until this week, when I spoke to an academic who has spent years studying career advancement. 'For women with high ambition, you must find a partner who will support your career,' says Anna Carmella Ocampo of Spain's Esade business school. 'Otherwise, the evidence is clear: just stay single.' This is partly because women are still stuck with what Ocampo calls the double bind of pressure to be a perfect partner and parent, as well as a perfect worker. For those overloaded with family responsibilities who can't afford childcare and other home help, something often gives, like a career. This pressure is pernicious, even for the brightest budding female leaders. A 2017 paper by three economists who studied the behaviour of students in an elite MBA programme in the US revealed this in bracing detail. The research showed single, female students dialled down open displays of career ambition if they thought they were being watched by their male counterparts – and potential future partners – rather than by other women. The single women participated 'much less' in class than married women and, when asked for their job preferences, said they would work fewer hours, travel less and get paid less if they expected their classmates to see their answers. If they thought their answers would stay relatively private, they responded in the same way as non-single women. Employees with emotionally competent spouses had as much as 26 per cent more of the traits that bosses value But women are not the only ones who stand to gain a lot from a career-supporting spouse. A paper Ocampo published this year suggests there are sizeable benefits for men and employers too. The study looks at something psychologists think is a big factor in success at work, so-called 'emotion regulation ability', or the way people manage their own and others' feelings. Existing research has focused on the way that high levels of this type of emotional competence can make you better at certain jobs, more valuable in teams and, crucially, more desirable to bosses. But a worker can gain a lot from having a spouse with the emotional ability to boost their resilience, confidence and general capacity to navigate the world of work, Ocampo and her co-authors found. Employees with emotionally competent spouses had as much as 26 per cent more of the traits that bosses value, compared with those with less helpful partners, the study showed. [ Gen Z is leading the charge back to the office Opens in new window ] Importantly, that competence was drained if such spouses were burdened with family demands, meaning it is in both employees' and employers' interests if workers have the time and flexibility to help share domestic chores. It might seem obvious that a happy home life makes for a happier and therefore more productive work life. But that is far from the case in many workplaces, where domestic life can often be regarded as at best irrelevant, and at worst an irksome distraction. The bottom line is, do your best to find a full-Fisk partner. And then find a job with the flexibility to let you help them stay that way. – Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2025
