"I never sat for Mapplethorpe."

My late father collected books on ballet and dance. He has a huge collection of rare and out of print books. It's a really fabulous private collection.

One of the books is a 1986 book of photography by the Dutch choreographer Hans Van Manen. Dad saw the book mentioned in a European dance magazine--only the title and publisher. Since it was not published, nor available in the US, it took quite an effort to get it. A family friend, an older Dutch woman named Hanni, was going to visit relatives so Dad asked her to purchase a copy of Portrait. She found a copy and brought it home and gave it to my dad. It was very good thing that the book came shrink-wrapped because little prim Hanni would have had a heart attack. Though the book was called Portrait, there was only a small section of portraits of such people as Marcia Haydee of the Stuttgart Ballet and obscure Dutch artists. Most of the photos were homoerotic photos of naked male dancers, with and without erections, alone, together, ejactulating, spitting, swallowing, masterbating, etc. (And a token nude female.) None of us were expecting this at all! The weirdest thing of all was the fact that one of the naked men was someone who went to ballet school with my sister and me. All of the photos are black and white and "artistic." Anyway . . .

A few years later I am working at Rizzoli Bookstore and we are having a signing for a book of fashion photography by designer Thierry Mugler. The author photo looks extremely familiar. Is it? It IS! It is one of the rare clothed portraits in Portrait! I decide to bring in the book to get Mugler to sign his photo for my dad.

We've set up the signing and Mugler has arrived. We take him to the offices to hang up his coat, etc., and I ask him to sign the Van Manen book. I try to show him the book. He is in a hurry, glances down and disdainfully says "I never sat for Mapplethorpe." and is about to brush me aside. Wait! It's not Mapplethorpe but Hans Van Manen. That gets his attention and he stops short! Hans Van Manen?! I nod and we go into the breakroom so he can look at the book. He explained that the photo was taken at three in the morning, he had just gotten off the plane and was tired. Then he left the next day and never saw the completed book. He asks if he can look at it. I tell him sure! He sits down and slowly flips through it. He is rather shocked that my father would have such a book. I explained about the dance book collection, Hanni, our suprise and everything. He takes out his pen and scrawls,

"To Jim!

The Mysterious Book!

Thierry Mugler '89"

The book signing was great. Dianne Brill, in her previous incarnation as party girl and fashion muse, spilled her glass of champagne over the balcony of the second floor onto the store manager's head. She leaned over to shout an apology, he looked up and was in love.

Blue Dreams of Brown

I used to work for a small non-profit publisher out of the City University of New York. At one point, our offices were on the City College campus at 138th Street and Convent Ave in one of the original CCNY 1910 buildings.

Our UPS man was a fine specimen of Latin masculinity. His name was Augusto and he was big and muscular, good-looking with dark hair and eyes, white teeth, black moustache and the deepest dimples. He was also very nice and had charm for days. The office was 100% female and we used to refer to Augusto as the UPS Hunk.

I was the person in charge of shipping so I had to deal with Augusto the most. We got along famously. He used to call me "Saracita" or "Mamacita" and I used to call him "Robusto" or "Papi chulo" though occasionally I'd call him "Papi CULO" when he was being a jerk. It was the typical meaningless, make-work-easier-and-more-enjoyable flirtation. We were comfortable with each other. (He was hot after one of my co-workers, Jenn Dorr, a goddess whom I used to refer to as "The Temple of Jenn Door") Anyway . . .

One night a few weeks after we moved up to the City College location and my relationship with Augusto was quite new, I had a very strange dream about him. All I remember of it was being either in mid-town Manhattan or Herald Square in the pouring rain and Augusto was there with his UPS truck, except that it was a HUGE truck, almost 18-wheeler. For some reason I had to make sure that all of these folding chairs were arranged in rows in the back of the truck and when I went into the container, Augusto was there STARK NAKED! I just looked at his face in my dream, realized he was naked and high-tailed it out of there. I didn't even check out the package! (If anyone wants to interpret this for me, please feel free to leave it in the comments.)

Well, the next day I told Augusto that I had had a dream about him and he was naked. He turned bright red. Then I told him that I didn't look and he said, "Why not?"

The Crush Files Case# 187: Christopher Walken (cue the cowbell . . .)

According to Saint Jerome, I spent most of my childhood sitting in the dark. To a certain extent this is true because New York was filled with dance companies, musical endeavors and experimental theater. If we weren't at the ballet we were at The Public Theater seeing some god-awful, mediocre, or amazing play. One play we saw was Thomas Babe's Kid Champion. It was 1975 (and I am pretty sure it was the premiere run of the play in NY) and I don't think I had turned 10 yet. From what I recall, the play was about the rise and fall of a rock star called Kid Champion. Kid Champion was played by Christopher Walken. This was before Annie Hall and The Deer Hunter sealed his reputation as a creepy weirdo. I had never seen such a beautiful creature. He had beautiful platinum blond hair, long almond eyes, chiseled cheekbones, and a gorgeous red, rosebud mouth. Delicate, androgynous, but masculine. Slender, super cool and super sexy. Even at 9-years old I felt it.

I don't remember much about the play itself. I remember being fascinated by one of the female groupies whose costume included flowers painted on her face and on her naked breasts and being fascinated by depictions of drug use and what seemed to be real pot on the stage. The one scene that I remember most vividly, however, was the rock concert scene. Kid comes out and instead of performing, he begins a long, ranting monologue about people not knowing who the real "him" inside, they are only interested in the outer rock star persona and god-knows what else like that. He begins to strip — to expose the real person beneath the glitter that is "Kid Champion." Well, Christopher Walken strips down to a teeny, tiny metallic silver bikini brief. I'm sitting there having a heart attack terrified that he will expose himself and secretly willing it at the same time. Anyway, Christopher Walken-as-Kid Champion hooks his thumbs into the waistband, starts to pull down the silver bikini briefs to bare his soul and nether regions when the character is SHOT! Well that put the kabosh on that! I don't remember much else about the play. I must have had stars flashing in my eyes for the rest of it or maybe the rest wasn't worth remembering.

I should find a copy of Kid Champion and read it to see how it jives with my memory. And just to show you how gorgeous:

 

and the best scene from an interesting movie, Christopher Walken as a pimp stripping down to boxers and not bikinis in Pennies From Heaven: