WESTSIDER CLEVELAND AMORY
Author, radio humorist, and president of the Fund for Animals
EASTSIDER MAXENE ANDREWS
An Andrews Sister finds stardom as a solo
WESTSIDER LUCIE ARNAZ
To star in Neil Simon's new musical
EASTSIDER ADRIEN ARPEL
America's best-selling beauty author
WESTSIDER ISAAC ASIMOV
Author of 188 books
WESTSIDER GEORGE BALANCHINE
Artistic director of the New York City Ballet
WESTSIDER CLIVE BARNES
Drama and dance critic
WESTSIDER FRANZ BECKENBAUER
North America's most valuable soccer player
WESTSIDER HIMAN BROWN
Creator of the _CBS Radio Mystery Theater_
FERRIS BUTLER
Creator, writer and producer of _Waste Meat News_
EASTSIDER SAMMY CAHN
Oscar-winning lyricist
WESTSIDER HUGH CAREY
Governor of New York state
WESTSIDER CRAIG CLAIBORNE
Food editor of the _New York Times_
WESTSIDER MARC CONNELLY
Actor, director, producer, novelist, and Pulitzer Prize-winning dramatist
EASTSIDER TONY CRAIG
Star of _The Edge of Night_
EASTSIDER RODNEY DANGERFIELD
The comedian and the man
WESTSIDER JAN DE RUTH
Partner of nudes and _Time_ covers
WESTSIDER MIGNON DUNN
The Met's super mezzo
EASTSIDER DOUGLAS FAIRBANKS JR.
A man for all seasons
WESTSIDER LEE FALK
Creator of The Phantom and Mandrake the Magician
WESTSIDER BARRY FARBER
Radio talkmaster and linguist
WESTSIDER SUZANNE FARRELL
Star of the New York City Ballet
WESTSIDER JULES FEIFFER
Screenwriter for _Popeye the Sailor_
EASTSIDER GERALDINE FITZGERALD
Actress, director and singer
EASTSIDER JOAN FONTAINE
Actress turns author with _No Bed of Roses_
WESTSIDER BETTY FRIEDAN
Founder of the women's liberation movement
WESTSIDER ARTHUR FROMMER
Author of _Europe on $10 a Day_
EASTSIDER WILLIAM GAINES
Publisher and founder of _Mad_ magazine
WESTSIDER RALPH GINZBURG
Publisher of _Moneysworth_
EASTSIDER LILLIAN GISH
78 years in show business
WESTSIDER MILTON GLASER
Design director of the new _Esquire_
WESTSIDER PAUL GOLDBERGER
Architecture critic for the _New York Times_
EASTSIDER MILTON GOLDMAN
Broadway's super agent
EASTSIDER TAMMY GRIMES
Star of _Father's Day_ at the American Place Theatre
WESTSIDER DELORES HALL
Star of _Your Arms Too Short to Box with God_
WESTSIDER LIONEL HAMPTON
King of the Newport Jazz Festival
WESTSIDER DAVID HAWK
Executive director of Amnesty International U.S.A.
EASTSIDER WALTER HOVING
Chairman of Tiffany & Company
EASTSIDER JAY JACOBS
Restaurant critic for _Gourmet_ magazine
WESTSIDER RAUL JULIA
Star of _Dracula_ on Broadway
EASTSIDER BOB KANE
Creator of Batman and Robin
WESTSIDER LENORE KASDORF
Star of _The Guiding Light_
EASTSIDER BRIAN KEITH
Back on Broadway after 27 years
WESTSIDER HAROLD KENNEDY
Author of _No Pickle, No Performance_
WESTSIDER ANNA KISSELGOFF
Dance critic for the _New York Times_
WESTSIDER GEORGE LANG
Owner of the Cafe des Artistes
WESTSIDER RUTH LAREDO
Leading American pianist
EASTSIDER STAN LEE
Creator of Spiderman and the Incredible Hulk
EASTSIDER JOHN LEONARD
Book critic for the _New York Times_
WESTSIDER JOHN LINDSAY
International lawyer
WESTSIDER ALAN LOMAX
Sending songs into outer space
EASTSIDER PETER MAAS
Author of _Serpico_ and _Made in America_
WESTSIDER LEONARD MALTIN
Film historian and critic
EASTSIDER JEAN MARSH
Creator and star of _Upstairs, Downstairs_
EASTSIDER JACKIE MASON
Co-starring with Steve Martin in _The Jerk_
WESTSIDER MALACHY McCOURT
Actor and social critic
WESTSIDER MEAT LOAF
Hottest rock act in town
WESTSIDER ANN MILLER
Co-star of _Sugar Babies_
WESTSIDER SHERRILL MILNES
Opera superstar
WESTSIDER CARLOS MONTOYA
Master of the flamenco guitar
WESTSIDER MELBA MOORE
Broadway star releases ninth album
WESTSIDER MICHAEL MORIARTY
Star of _Holocaust_ returns to Broadway in _G.R. Point_
WESTSIDER LeROY NEIMAN
America's greatest popular artist
WESTSIDER ARNOLD NEWMAN
Great portrait photographer
EASTSIDER EDWIN NEWMAN
Journalist and first-time novelist
EASTSIDER LARRY O'BRIEN
Commissioner of the National Basketball Association
WESTSIDER MAUREEN O'SULLIVAN
Great lady of the movie screen
WESTSIDER BETSY PALMER
Star of _Same Time, Next Year_
WESTSIDER JAN PEERCE
The man with the golden voice
EASTSIDER GEORGE PLIMPTON
Author, editor and adventurer
EASTSIDER OTTO PREMINGER
Rebel filmmaker returns with _The Human Factor_
WESTSIDER CHARLES RANGEL
Congressman of the 19th District
WESTSIDER JOE RAPOSO
Golden boy of American composers
WESTSIDER MASON REESE
Not just another kid
WESTSIDER MARTY REISMAN
America's best-loved ping-pong player
WESTSIDER RUGGIERO RICCI
World's most-recorded violinist
WESTSIDER BUDDY RICH
Monarch of the drums
WESTSIDER GERALDO RIVERA
Broadcaster, author and humanitarian
WESTSIDER NED ROREM
Author and Pulitzer Prize-winning composer
WESTSIDER JULIUS RUDEL
Director of the New York City Opera
EASTSIDER DR. LEE SALK
America's foremost child psychologist
EASTSIDER FRANCESCO SCAVULLO
Photographer of the world's most beautiful women
WESTSIDER ROGER SESSIONS
Composer of the future
EASTSIDER DICK SHAWN
Veteran comic talks about _Love at First Bite_
EASTSIDER GEORGE SHEARING
Famed jazz pianist returns to New York
WESTSIDER REID SHELTON
The big-hearted billionaire of _Annie_
WESTSIDER BOBBY SHORT
Mr. New York to perform in Newport Jazz Festival
WESTSIDER BEVERLY SILLS
Opera superstar
GEORGE SINGER
46 years a doorman on the West Side
WESTSIDER GREGG SMITH
Founder and conductor of the Gregg Smith Singers
EASTSIDER LIZ SMITH
Queen of gossip
EASTSIDERS TOM & DICK SMOTHERS
Stars of _I Love My Wife_ on Broadway
WESTSIDER VICTOR TEMKIN
Publisher of Berkley and Jove Books
WESTSIDER JOHN TESH
Anchorman for WCBS Channel 2 News
WESTSIDER RICHARD THOMAS
John-Boy teams up with Henry Fonda in _Roots II_
EASTSIDER ANDY WARHOL
Pop artist and publisher of _Interview_ magazine
EASTSIDER ARNOLD WEISSBERGER
Theatrical attorney for superstars
EASTSIDER TOM WICKER
Author and columnist for the _New York Times_
EASTSIDER TOM WOLFE
Avant-garde author talks about _The Right Stuff_
WESTSIDER PINCHAS ZUKERMAN
Violinist and conductor
********
WESTSIDER CLEVELAND AMORY
Author, radio humorist, and president of the Fund for Animals
12-9-78
It's impossible to mistake the voice if you've heard it once -- the tone of
mock annoyance, the twangy, almost whiny drawl that rings musically in
the ear. It could easily belong to a cartoon character or a top TV
pitchman, but it doesn't. It belongs to Cleveland Amory, an affable and
rugged individualist who has been a celebrated writer for more than half
of his 61 years. Amory is also a highly regarded lecturer and radio
essayist: his one-minute humor spot, _Curmudgeon at Large_, is heard
daily from Maine to California. His latest novel, nearing completion, is
due to be published next fall.
_TV Guide_ perhaps brought Amory his widest fame. He was the
magazine's star columnist from 1963 to 1976, when he gave it up in order
to devote his time to other projects, especially the Fund for Animals, a
non-profit humane organization that he founded in 1967. He has served as
the group's president since the beginning; now it has 150,000 members
across the United States. Amory receives no pay for his involvement with
the organization.
The national headquarters of the Fund for Animals is a suite of rooms in
an apartment building near Carnegie Hall. The central room is lined with
bookshelves, and everywhere on the 25-foot walls are pictures and statues
of animals. Amory enters the room looking utterly exhausted. He is a tall,
powerful-looking man with a shock of greyish brown hair that springs
from his head like sparks from an electrode. As we sit back to talk and his
two pet cats walk about the office, his energy seems to recharge itself.
Amory's quest to protect animals from needless cruelty began several
decades ago when, as a young reporter in Arizona, he wandered across
the border into Mexico and witnessed a bullfight. Shocked that people
could applaud the death agony of "a fellow creature of this earth," he
began to join various humane societies. Today he is probably the best
known animal expert in America. His 1974 best-seller, _Man Kind? Our
Incredible War On Wildlife_, was one of only three books in recent years
to be the subject of an editorial in the _New York Times_ -- the others
being Rachel Carson's _Silent Spring_ and Ralph Nader's _Unsafe at Any
Speed_.
"A lot of people ask me, 'Why not do something about children, or old
people, or minorities?'" he begins, lighting a cigarette and propping one
foot on the desk. "My feeling is that there's enough misery out there for
anybody to work at whatever he wants to. I think the mark of a civilized
person is how you treat what's beneath you. Most people do care about
animals. But you have to translate their feelings into action. ... We're
fighting a lot of things -- the clubbing of the baby seals, the killing of
dolphins by the tuna fishermen, the poisoning of animals. The leghold trap
is illegal in 14 countries of the world, but only in five states in the U.S.
"The reason this fight is so hard is that man has an incredible ability to
rationalize his cruelty. When they kill the seals, they say it's a humane
way of doing it. But I don't see anything humane about clubbing a baby
seal to death while his mother is watching, helpless.
"One of our biggest fights right now is to make the wolf our national
mammal. There's only about 400 of them left in the continental United
States. The wolf is a very brave animal. It's monogamous, and it has great
sensitivity."
One of his chief reasons for dropping his _TV Guide_ column, says
Amory, was because "after 15 years of trying to decide whether the Fonz
is a threat to Shakespeare, I wanted to write about things that are more
important than that." His latest novel, a satirical work that he considers
the finest piece of writing he has ever done, "is basically a satire of club
life in America. ... I sent it down to a typist here, and it came back with
a note from the typist saying, 'I love it!' In all my years of writing, I
don't think I've ever had a compliment like that. So I sent the note to my
editor along with the manuscript."
An expert chess player, he was long ranked number one at Manhattan's
Harvard Club until his recent dethronement at the hands of a young
woman. "I play Russians whenever I get a chance," he confides. "I always
love to beat Russians. I want to beat them all." Once he played against
Viktor Korchnoi, the defected Soviet who narrowly lost to world
champion Anatoly Karpov this fall.
"I think he threw that final game," says Amory of Korchnoi's loss. "He
didn't make a single threatening move. I think he was offered a deal to get
the kid and wife out. It was all set up from the beginning. I hate facts, so
I don't want any facts to interfere with my thesis."
Born outside of Boston, he showed his writing talent early, becoming the
youngest editor ever at the _Saturday Evening Post_. His first book, _The
Proper Bostonians_, was published in 1947. "Then I moved to New
York," he muses, "because whenever I write about a place, I have to
leave it." Nineteen years ago, he took on as his assistant a remarkable
woman named Marian Probst, who has worked with him ever since. Says
Amory: "She knows more about every project I've been involved with
than I know myself."
A longtime Westsider, he enjoys dining at the Russian Tea Room (150 W.
57th St.).
There are so many facets to Cleveland Amory's career and character that
he defies classification. In large doses, he can be extremely persuasive. In
smaller doses, he comes across as a sort of boon companion for
everyman, who provides an escape from the woes of modern society
through his devastating humor. For example, his off-the-cuff remark about
President Carter:
"Here we have a fellow who doesn't know any more than you or I about
how to run the country. I'm surprised he did so well in the peanut
business."
********
EASTSIDER MAXENE ANDREWS
An Andrews Sister finds stardom as a solo
2-2-80
Maxene Andrews, riding high on the wave of her triumphant solo act that
opened at the Reno Sweeney cabaret last November, is sitting in her dimly
lit, antique-lined Eastside living room, talking about the foibles of show
business. As one of the Andrews Sisters, America's most popular vocal
trio of the 1940s, she made 19 gold records in the space of 20 years. But
as a solo performer, she more or less failed in two previous attempts --
first in the early 1950s, when her younger sister Patty temporarily left the
group, and again in 1975, after her hit Broadway show _Over Here_
closed amid controversy. Not until 1979 did Miss Andrews bring together
all the elements of success -- good choice of songs, interesting patter
between numbers, and a first-rate accompanist. The result is an act that
is nostalgic, moving, and musically powerful.
"For years, our career was so different than so many, because our fans
never forgot us," she recalls, beaming with matronly delight. "I could
walk in anyplace in the years I wasn't working, and they'd say, 'Maxene
Andrews -- the Andrews Sisters?' Everybody was sort of in awe. So I was
always treated like a star of some kind. But it's nice to work; it's a
wonderful feeling to be in demand."
She is a bubbly, husky, larger-than-life character of 61 with ruddy cheeks
and a firm handshake. Deeply religious, sincere, and outspoken as always,
she remains first and foremost an entertainer.
"I stick to the older, standard songs by great composers," says Maxene of
her act. "You know -- Rodgers and Hart, Irving Berlin. ... My partner is
Phil Campanella, an extremely talented young man who plays the piano
and sings harmony. ... All the talking I do between the songs is ad
libbing. I have never been successful at trying to do material that was
written for me."
She's returning to Reno Sweeney on February 6 for a two-week
engagement, then filming a TV show titled _G.I. Jive_ before taking her
act to Miami and Key West. Nightclub work, she says in her high, bell
clear voice, "is not my future. I would like to get into concerts and I think
that's a possibility -- probably a year from now."
LaVerne, the eldest of the sisters, died in 1967. Patty stopped speaking to
Maxene five years ago because of salary disagreements for _Over Here_.
The contracts were negotiated separately, and when Maxene balked at
accepting $1000 a week less than her sister, the national tour was abruptly
canceled.
"I never in my wildest dreams thought that we would separate, because
we've always been very close," says Maxene sadly. "When people say,
'You're feuding with your sister,' I say that's not the truth. Because it
takes two people to fight, and I'm not fighting anyone. She's just not
talking to me.
"It took me a long time to be able to handle the separation. I used to wake
up every morning and say, 'What have I done?' But now I just throw it
up to Jesus, and I leave it there. I hope and pray that one of these days we
can bring everything out in the open, and clear it up. I love Patty very
much, and I'm very surprised that she's not out doing her act, because
she's very very talented. She's been doing the _Gong Show_, which I --
it's none of my business, but I would highly disapprove of. I think it's
such a terrible show."
Maxene owns a house outside of Los Angeles, and was "born again" a
couple of years ago at the Church on the Way in Van Nuys, California.
When she's on Manhattan's East Side, which is often, she shares the
apartment of Dr. Louis Parrish, an M.D. and psychiatrist whom she
describes as "a true Southern gentleman."
The Andrews Sisters, who recorded such hits as "Bei Mir Bist Du
Schoen," "Rum and Coca Cola," "Don't Sit Under the Apple Tree,"
"Apple Blossom Time," and "Hold Tight," arrived in New York from
Minneapolis in 1937 and took the city by storm with their wholesome,
sugar-sweet harmonies and innovative arrangements. Soon they were
making movies as well. _Buck Privates_ (1940, which featured Abbott and
Costello and the song "Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy," was Universal's
biggest moneymaker until _Jaws_ came along in 1975. "I didn't
particularly care for making movies," comments Maxene. "I found it very
boring and very repetitious, and certainly not very creative. But working
with Bud and Lou was a lot of fun."
Now divorced, Maxene has a 33-year-old daughter named Aleda and a 31
year-old son, Peter, who live in Utah. She has written her autobiography,
but it hasn't been sold to a publisher "because I refuse to write the kind
of books that they want written today. Ever since the Christina Crawford
book came out, that's all the publishers want. ... I think the trend will
pass, because we're really getting saturated in cruelty and lust and
whatever else you want to call it."
Asked about the changes in her life since her religious reawakening,
Maxene says, "Darling, everything has improved. My disposition has
improved. I used to be impossible for anybody to work with. ... I'm now
reconciled to the feeling that I am never alone, and that in Him I have a
partner, and that if I run into a problem that I can't solve, then I'm not
supposed to solve it -- because we're just mere mortals."
********
WESTSIDER LUCIE ARNAZ
To star in Neil Simon's new musical
9-9-78
Bad timing. That's what had plagued me ever since I had tried to get an
interview with Lucie Arnaz last June. Back then, I was supposed to get
together with her downtown, but our meeting was canceled at the last
minute. My second appointment, set for August 31 in her dressing room
just before a performance of _Annie Get Your Gun_ at the Jones Beach
Theatre in Wantagh, Long Island, now seemed in jeopardy as well. I was
kept waiting nervously outside while the house manager insisted that Lucie
was engaged in "a very important telephone call."
But when the young star finally emerged, her face beaming with delight,
I found that my timing could not have been better. Lucie had just received
official word that a major new Broadway role was hers. As we sat down
to talk, Lucie was in one of those radiant moods that come only in times
of triumph. She had been chosen for the female lead in a new musical,
_They're Playing My Song_, which is scheduled to open in Los Angeles
in December and on Broadway in February. The show has music by
Marvin Hamlisch and lyrics by Carole Bayer Sager. The book is written
by Neil Simon.
"I'm a lousy auditioner -- at least, I thought I was," grinned Lucie. "This
new musical will be probably the pinnacle of what I've been aiming for.
... It's about a fairly successful lyricist who's not nearly as successful as
the composer she's going to work with. Neil Simon has always wanted to
do a play about songwriters. It's a very hip, pop musical. It doesn't have
regular Broadway-type tunes."
She flopped back on the sofa touching my arm from time to time for
emphasis, and chatted on in her mildly raspy voice. Finally she moved to
a seat in front of the mirror and invited me to keep talking while she put
on her makeup. There is a quality about her that suggests toughness, but
this impression melts away under her girlish charm. At 27, Lucie is
already an 11-year veteran of professional acting and singing. When she
performed at Jones Beach this summer, up to 8,000 people per night came
to see her.
Lucie first transplanted herself from the West Coast to the West Side on
a full-time basis last winter, although, she admitted, "I had a New York
apartment for four years which I would visit every couple of months. For
some sick reason, I really like New York. There's a lot of crazy people
doing strange things on the streets, but there's also a lot of creative forces
here.
"I went to do an interview this morning for my radio show and it started
raining. By the time I had walked six blocks I was looking terrible, and
it suddenly occurred to me that I would never present myself like that in
California. In New York, who gives a damn if you've got water on you
when you come to work? On the West Coast, the things that aren't
important they seem to put on pedestals." Her radio show, which she
started this year, is a nationally syndicated five-minute interview spot
called _Tune In With Lucie_.
>From 1967 to 1972 she was a regular on her mother's TV show, _Here's
Lucy_. She has made countless guest appearances on other shows, and
performed lead roles in numerous musicals. Her parents, Lucille Ball and
Desi Arnaz Sr., were divorced more than a decade ago and have both
remarried.
"My mother was here for opening night, then she stayed a couple of days
in New York. But she gets too lonely when my brother Desi and I go
away for too long. He was here for most of the summer. He was doing
a movie called _How To Pick Up Girls_. He played the guy who
supposedly knew all about it -- one of the two stars. He said, "It's funny,
I meet girls on the street, and New York has the most beautiful girls in
the world, and when they ask me what I'm doing here and I tell them the
name of the movie, they walk away and say, 'You dirty toad!'" Desi also
plays the groom in the new Robert Altman film, _A Wedding_.
"My father is now putting an album together of the music that was
recorded for the old _Lucy Show_. Salsa music is coming back now, so
he's been asked to make an album of those tapes."
Speaking of her hobbies, Lucie noted that "recently I started to build a
darkroom in my house. The key word is started. It's hard to get the time.
... And I have been writing songs for the last couple of years. I'm a
lyricist. I've sung them on things like _Mike Douglas_ and _Dinah_."
She enjoys all of New York, though at one time "the East Side gave me
the ooga boogas. Then I found a couple of places there that were nice."
On the West Side, she likes to dine at La Cantina, Victor's Cafe, and
Ying, all on Columbus Avenue near 71st and 72nd Streets.
When the five-minute warning sounded in her dressing room, Lucie had
to turn me out, but not before she divulged her philosophy about show
business. "Am I ambitious?" she echoed. "I don't know. There are people
who are willing to really knock the doors down and do just about anything
to get there. I'm not like that. Even now, when I go to the market, people
come up to me and say, 'Aren't you. ... ?' So I can imagine what it
would be like to be a superstar. No, I'm not really looking forward to
that."
********
EASTSIDER ADRIEN ARPEL
America's best-selling beauty author
3-29-80
As a young girl in Englewood, New Jersey, Adrien Arpel was determined
that one day she would transform herself into a beautiful woman. After
having her nose bobbed, she began to pester the ladies behind every
cosmetic counter she could reach, and by the time she graduated from
high school at 17, she knew more than they did. That same year she
opened a small cosmetics shop in her hometown with $400 earned from
baby-sitting. Today, at 38, she is the president of a $12 million-a-year
company selling more than 100 beauty products throughout the U.S. and
Europe.
Not content with mere business success, she recently turned her talent to
writing her first book, Adrien Arpel's Three-Week Crash
Makeover/Shapeover Beauty Program (1977). It was on the _New York
Times'_ best-seller list for six months, and is still selling briskly in
paperback. Miss Arpel received $275,000 from Pocket Books for the
reprint rights -- the most ever for a beauty book.
"I have always been a rebel," she proclaims regally, dressed in a stylish
Edwardian outfit with padded shoulders at her midtown office. Quite
heavily made up, with hot pink lipstick and a Cleopatra hairdo, she looks
considerably younger than her age. The strident quality of her voice is
reminiscent of a Broadway chorus girl's, yet is delivered in a crisp,
businesslike manner. During the interview she rarely smiles or strays from
the question being asked. For some reason, she declines to say much
about her new book, _How to Look 10 Years Younger_, which is
scheduled for publication in April. Instead, she stresses the simple,
common-sense rules about beauty that have guided her career from the
beginning.
Probably her two most important innovations are her exclusive use of
nature-based, chemical-free products (chosen from leading European
health spas) and her policy of try-before-you-buy makeup. Complimentary
makeup is offered every time a customer gets a facial at one of the
hundreds of Adrien Arpel salons, such as those on the first floor of
Bloomingdale's and Saks Fifth Avenue.
Whenever she opens a new salon, Adrien spends the entire day on her
feet, doing upwards of 35 facials with her own pale, delicate hands.
Upon being complimented for her attire, Miss Arpel gasps, "Thank you!"
with schoolgirlish delight. There is something almost surreal in her
creamy white complexion. "I think sunbathing is absolutely deadly, and
that there is no reason in the world for a woman to sunbathe," she says.
Moments later, she admits that "high heel shoes are not very good for
you," but that she wears them anyway, "because they're very fashionable.
They are something that really can be a problem -- if they're pitched
wrong. If you have a good shoe and it's pitched well, you shouldn't have
a problem"
Does she think it would be a good idea for women to give up high heels
altogether? "No, no. I don't think you'll ever get women to give up
fashion. So we can tell what's problems, what's really hazardous, what's
going to be injurious to your health, and what's going to just hurt a little
bit."
She never thought of writing a book until about four years ago, says
Arpel, because "every second when I was away from my business, I spent
with my daughter. Now my daughter's 16 and a half, and has a boyfriend,
and goes out, and doesn't want to spend every minute with me. This all
started when she was about 13." Adrien and her husband, manufacturer
Ronald Newman, moved to the New York metropolitan area right after
they were married in 1961, and acquired an Upper East Side apartment
last summer.
For her own health and beauty regimen, Adrien begins her typical day
with jumping rope. She thinks weight training for women is "terrific," but
considers jogging the best all-around exercise. "Now, jogging has its
negatives. I get up very early in the morning, and if you jog while it's still
dark out, it can be dangerous. I also have long hair, and you have to wash
your hair after you jog. So for someone that works, I find that I can only
do it three days a week."
She has a facial twice weekly. "Facials are not luxuries. They are
necessities to peel off dead surface skin. ... Air pollution is the reason. If
it wears away stone on buildings, think what it can do to the skin." A
facial, she explains, consists of "all different sorts of hand massages to
deep-cleanse the skin with coconut-like milk, or some sort of sea kelp
cleanser. Then there's a skin vacuum which takes blackheads out --
electric brushes with honey and almond scrubs which clean out the pores.
And at the end, a mask. Nature-based again -- orange jelly, sea mud, or
spearmint."
Arpel believes that a woman's makeup should be largely determined by
her profession. She reveals a humorous side when asked whether a woman
stockbroker, for example, should always dress conservatively. "Well, if
she was wearing a see-through blouse and no bra in her office, I'd
certainly think she had poor taste," she laughs.
A nonsmoker who consumes little alcohol, she confesses to at least one
vice: "I drink two cups of coffee in the morning, sometimes more. Also
not wonderfully good for you -- but I never said I was a hundred percent
good."
********
WESTSIDER ISAAC ASIMOV
Author of 188 books
10-29-77
In 1965, when the Science Fiction Writers of America held a national
convention to vote on the best science fiction ever published in this
country, they sifted through hundreds of nominations dating back to the
1920s before coming up with the winners. _Nightfall_ (1941) received the
most votes for a short story and the _Foundation_ trilogy won for the best
series of novels. The author of both works: Westsider Isaac Asimov.
Had Asimov died 25 years ago, his fame would still be secure. But he
remains more active than ever. He is, among other things, one of the most
prolific authors in the world, publishing an average of one book and three
or four magazine articles per month.
He is sitting at an electric typewriter in his West 66th Street penthouse
when the doorman informs him that two visitors have arrived. Asimov is
expecting a single reporter; but he says OK, so my roommate John
Cimino and I get on the elevator. We stop at the 33rd floor. Asimov, clad
in his undershirt, meets us at the door, hangs up our coats, and takes us
into the living room adjacent to his working area. Along one wall is a
glass-enclosed bookcase containing the 188 books Asimov has written in
his 40-year literary career.
"This is my section of the apartment," he says. "The blinds are down
because I always work by artificial light." I tell him that John has come
along to ask questions about science -- Asimov is an expert in more than
20 scientific disciplines -- while I will be asking about science fiction
Asimov complies, and after about 10 minutes, he opens us completely and
gives each answer with enthusiasm.
He has lost a little weight recently, and in fact had a mild heart attack
earlier this year, but Dr. Asimov is as creative as ever -- perhaps more
so. One of his latest projects is _Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction
Magazine_. It first appeared on the newsstands early in 1977 and has
since built up a broad readership throughout the U.S., Canada and Great
Britain.
"It was the idea of Joel Davis of Davis Publications," says Asimov. "He
publishes _Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine_, _Alfred Hitchcock's
Mystery Magazine_, and many others. He decided that science fiction was
doing well and that he wanted a science fiction magazine -- something
with the name of someone, like Ellery Queen. ... He asked me if I was
interested. ... I wasn't really, because I had neither the time nor the
inclination to edit the magazine."
Asimov found the time. He and Davis worked out a formula for the
author to lend his name and picture to the magazine cover and to become
the editorial director. Asimov writes the editorials and some of the fiction,
answers readers' letters and helps with the story selection. George
Scithers, the editor, has a major role in deciding the magazine's contents.
_Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine_ began as a quarterly and if all
goes well, will soon become a monthly. Some of its contributors are
writers in their 20s who are publishing their first stories. Containing many
illustrations and almost no advertising, the 200-page magazine is available
at numerous Westside newsstands for $1.
Born in Russia and raised in Brooklyn, Asimov graduated from college
and published his first short story while in his teens. For many years, he
taught biochemistry at Boston University. In 1970, he returned to New
York and settled on the West Side. He is married to a psychiatrist and
psychoanalyst who practices under her maiden name of Dr. Janet Jeppson;
her office is on the opposite end of the apartment. She too is a writer,
having published a science fiction novel and some stories.
"The West Side, as far as I'm concerned, has more good restaurants than
any other place on earth, though I have not been to Paris," says Asimov,
who hates flying. He made a trip to Europe last year on the Queen
Elizabeth II -- and came back on the return voyage. "It wasn't a
vacation," he says. "I gave two talks each way and I wrote a book."
The IRS, he says, cannot believe that he doesn't take vacations. "In the
last seven years," he testifies, there has been only one time -- two days in
June of 1975 -- that I went on a trip and didn't do a talk. And even then,
I took some paper with me and worked on a murder mystery. You see,
a vacation is doing what you want to do and to stop doing what you have
to do. .. But I like what I, so I'm on vacation 365 days a year."
Asimov's biggest writing project these days is his massive autobiography,
which he expects to finish by the end of the year. "It will probably be in
two volumes," says Asimov, grinning, "which is unreasonable,
considering that I have led a very quiet life and not much has happened
to me."
* * *