I finally bought the new Vanity Fair today. It's one of two magazines I actually buy (the other being The New Yorker) and I don't get a subscription because I rather like buying them at the corner. There's something old-fashioned and proper about choosing them at the Newstand, it implies more of a decision and I like that.

Vanity Fair is basically a gossip rag in designer duds and since I lived in NYC, I read it as one would an old home-town paper - skimming along until I recognize a face or name I've personally met or know. In fact, VF's art director was a friend of mine and there was I time when I was quite smitten by him. I don't know if he worked at VF when we were aquainted but if he did he was low on the totem pole and we never discussed it. He was (and probably still is) dashing and tasteful and attracted to dark men. That would not be me.

I had a job interview once with Graydon Carter, the current editor of VF. At the time, he was editor of GQ and the open position was for Model Booker, the person who handles choosing the models and works with the Agencies. I'd been styling for awhile and knew alot of people involved in the Modeling Business, so it sounded like great fun.

I don't know what I was expecting but up till then I was used to Fashion People being laid-back and laissez-faire. I met with Mr. Carter and we couldn't have been two more different people. I immediately got so nervous as to possibly consider it an Out of Body Experience.

For one, he was wearing a three piece suit. Frankly, I don't recall ever wearing a three piece suit. I sat across from him at his desk and he brought out several headshots which he placed in front of him.

"Who is this?"

Names are not my strongpoint. They're not even on my Point List, they're on my This Is Your Brain On Drugs List.

"Uh... Bobby?"

"It's Jack." he replied in the tone Movie Doctors use when the Amnesia Patient meets their family. "No, I mean who is this?"

For a second I thought it was a trick question. Maybe I was supposed to know their Industry Nicknames: "Jackdog" or "Fleece", something we'd all shout and knock knuckles over when we got on Set.

Mr. Carter looked at me as a headmaster might with a deliquent student.

"This is a customer. He's a young businessman on the go."

Oh. Is he now? I internally let out a huge sigh of relief, thinking Here was a game I could play. He wanted stories for these pictures, backround to fill in the empty spaces where the fashion was supposed to go. He wanted characters.

I pointed to the next picture.

"Architect. Probably drives a Volvo but it's not the newest model. Went to Grad School, played touch football on the weekends with his other roommates. Had a steady girlfriend but nothing serious since he likes to play the field," I leaned over and gave him the ol' wink-wink, " including men."

Mr. Carter coughed and covered his mouth politely which I took as an opportunity to point to the next picture.

"Oh man, this guy is a mess. He looks good now but you should have seen him last year, after the divorce. It was ugly, I'm talking "three in the morning and he can't remember the name of the club he's at and vaguely keeps calculating how much he can spend and still have cab fare" ugly. Like that. Damn."

He looked at me a little puzzled.

"But, you know, now he looks fine. I mean here. Here he's looking pretty good. I'd do him. For a shoot. A photo shoot."

I was looking down at my Talking Face sitting at the desk with the Man In the Three-Piece Suit. I had lost control of my thoughts and my voice wandered over the pictures like a Horror Movie Zombie. My words couldn't stop, I said things and looked back at what I'd said laying like a covered body in the middle of the road.

A few minutes later, we were shaking hands and I was walking out of the Condé Nast building. It was a bright day and the brilliance of being in Manhattan mid-town was pleasure in itself. I took a walk and soon the entire incident was replaced by Fashion Aliens with the bizarre idea it had gone well. I pictured myself in a smart three-piece suit surrounded by Super-Models, males natch, and making and breaking careers over my ever-present fax machine (since cell phones hadn't taken over the world yet).

Had I gotten the job, I may have ended up working with my friend at Vanity Fair. Years and years of unrequited love, deducing meaning from his every gesture, forcing a Scene which begins in His office and ends with me crying in Mine. Finally, unable to work side-by-side with The Man I Love, I quit and move to Cleveland to be Model Booker for Cleveland Sears.

Man, I'm glad I turned that job down.

3:09:40 PM    sro home /