NI CKY HAS L AM
Recently, in St Petersburg, Vladimir Putin's home city — into which he is pouring money in time for the 300th anniversary of its founding — a friend and I bought two icons in a seriously scruffy street market for $20 apiece. We put them in our suitcases. The customs man at Pushkovo airport removed them, saying, 'You can't take these out of Russia without a certificate from the Hermitage.' But we only paid $40 for them,' we said airily. 'That's my salary for a month,' he replied.
Do we want London to be the new Las Vegas?' asked Simon Jenkins in the Evening Standard. Perhaps not, but that's infinitely preferable to it becoming the new New York. There's a depressing drift across the Atlantic of rich, bored women who, realising that even the newest new money there is no longer impressed by their perfect little black coutures and gobstopper-cultured pearls, are inflicting themselves on London. Their idea of a night out involves being with the same age-and-income-group people at some recently invented obscure charity evening, jewels at their taut throats and Botoxed pout in place by 7 p.m. After a drink-minimal and smoke-free dinner of pretentious morsels, they are home by 11. The latest of these horrors is being touted at a f10,000-a-couple ticket, added to which you have to sit in silence while some wellworn pop singer hammers out those basic harmonies. You may, however, with enough scheming, be nodded to by Camilla during this torture.
The whole point of London life is its varied content. The rich don't only want to see the rich, the young mingle gracefully with the old and scruffy artists with dashing dukes and dusty dowagers. Straights love gay clubs; academics and actors enjoy the company of country cousins. Give me a one-armed bandit every time over the anodyne blandness of these Manhattan money-matrons.
The provost of Eton, Dr Eric Anderson, invited me to a dinner in College Hall for OEs who left in the same year as I did. About 70 of us, in varying stages of decrepitude, rolled up, vaguely recognising faces in some cases not seen for about 45 years. At the high table was seated an unknown gentleman, who appeared to be the most distinguished and venerable of all. As he rose to make a speech, he was introduced as the current, but retiring, Head Master, at 60 the youngest man in the room. Floreat Estee Lauder, I say. This dinner by chance took place on the anniversary of the death of H. Jones, the gallant colonel awarded the VC posthumously in the Falklands war. Earlier in the day, I'd remembered that on the night 20 years ago when we heard the news I'd got rather tired and emotional and sent a telegram to his regiment somewhere in those islands at the other end of the world. Next morning, I had no recollection of what I'd said and was panic-struck with embarrassment. Later, the operator rang, saying they were having great difficulty getting the telegram through. Phew, thank God, the relief. Later, he rang again. 'We managed. We were determined, as it was exactly the sort of message soldiers want to hear.' Leaving the dinner at Eton, I came face-to-face with H.'s memorial tablet on Cloisters wall. I wish he'd been alive to tell me what I'd written.
In Los Angeles for the Oscars — well, not for the actual awards, as nobody who doesn't have to sits through that interminable event — I was astounded and
delighted to find that everybody smokes like bonfires in spring. LAX is a carpet of butts. Limos and taxis actually ask if you want to, with none of that sanctimonious 'If you put down the window, guy' guff that you get here. All restaurants have an outdoor puffing area (with heaters to counteract the 60° California evening 'cold), which are always the most crowded. Sitting on the superb Four Seasons hotel terrace with a bunch of Brit thesps, we saw the most ravishing girl and the handsomest man fly down the steps and leap into an open jeep. They were Halle Berry and her husband Eric Benet. Eyes popped, jaws dropped, fags fell from lips. She has that stellar luminous sexuality of legends like Dietrich, Hedy Lamarr or Ava Gardner, plus the clean-cut beauty of her idols Lena Horne and Dorothy Dandridge. That jeep's gonna take her a long way.
Later, I went to watch hitshot architect Basil Walter and lighting Lucifer Patrick Woodroffe transform Morton's restaurant (and parking lot) overnight into the setting for what must surely be the most glamorous annual party of the 21st century. This year, Vanity savoire Faireyland was a vast translucent cube, shot with lasered logos and tables massed with crystal squares of grape hyacinth, shorn by a team of geishabeautiful girls flown from Japan. 'To make something look like a million, you have to spend a great deal more,' Patrick said laconically. But even he couldn't have foreseen the final coup cie thecitre — a powercut. In the sudden dusk, everyone lit the Zippo lighter that Graydon Carter thoughtfully puts at each place-setting. Like fireflies darting in some southern celluloid night, the stars kept right on dancing.
I'm writing this from the Bouches-duRhone, and blissfully witnessing that magical moment when spring hourly transforms the landscape into a tapestry of glistening greens. Three jets d'eau thrust metres high below the terrace, and, beyond the gigantic maze, little black bulls munch emerald grasses. Les Pradelles is, I'm sure, the most perfect house created in my lifetime: in size (not huge), in scale (breathtaking) and decor (alas, not mine). It is a birthday weekend for a beloved friend with her young children, and the gaiety cannot be dampened even by the death of the Queen Mother. I first saw her when, aged seven, my parents took me to Cambridge for the unveiling of the restored windows in King's College Chapel. Maybe the daylight shouldn't be shone on monarchy, but Queen Elizabeth, even then, glowed from within.
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