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| Sweltering sun over the Hudson. 7:45 PM. Photo: JH. |
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| Wednesday, July 9, 2014. Hot, yesterday in New York. Very, with a small breeze late evening with maybe thunderstorms; still waiting for the maybe part at this late hour (midnight). JH and I were entertained at lunch by our Washington Social Diary correspondent Carol Joynt. We met Carol about eight years ago. I was sitting at this desk one night about two a.m. finishing up, waiting for JH to send me the final layout when I got an email from Carol. I hadn’t heard of her at that moment, (New York)-provincial guy that I am, who knew little to nothing about Washington life. At the time Carol was the (inherited) proprietress of a popular meeting spot/brasserie-ish burger joint in Georgetown called Nathans. (Innocent Spouse, Broadway Paperbacks, Random House, 2011). She started out life writing the news for Walter Cronkite and later on in her career produced for Charlie Rose back in the days when he had a very late night show on NBC, and later than that, for Larry King when he was broadcasting from our nation’s capital. |
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| At the time of that email, Carol was conducting a vid-interview weekly from Nathans. It was a merchandising effort (bringing in business: a special lunch price plus interview) and she’d interview a wide variety of Washington players, relatives, Hollywood stars, New York authors and anybody else she could get for an hour or an hour and a half. Her email was an invitation to be a guest on the show. Now, you may already know this about me but given the opportunity to talk, I am habitually compelled (just this side of addicted) to answering questions about whatever I can. I tell myself that I’m one of those people who likes to hear himself talk. I can be unabashed because I know I’m not alone in this habit. Especially in Washington with all those politicians and politcos and their carbon dioxide. So about two minutes after receiving Carol’s email, at 2:03 am, on that fateful morn, I responded that I’d like that. She was shocked to get such a quick response. We set a date, and I later wrote about the experience somewhere back there in our archives. JH and I grabbed that Metroliner out of Penn Station one weekday morning. We made it to Nathans in Georgetown about 11:30 a.m. And were back in New York by six or seven. |
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| It was a fascinating interview. I say that because Carol does her homework. Unlike me who tends to wing it based on particular interests of mine, Carol really finds out as much as she can about her interview and his or her subject. Mine was Society in the Big Apple, is-there-isn’t there and what’s the latest skinny. The interview was set up in a section of restaurant with thirty to forty luncheon guests, with video cameras recording it. Carol is an intrepid interviewer, honestly, truly interested but always with her audience in mind. She asks what she thinks you might like to know. And like any good interview, she can be any man, any woman. I liked it. Who wouldn’t? I escaped making a fool of myself, no small thanks to her tone and direction. And I learned a lot from it, including that Carol is a great journalist. I mean: she tells you what she sees, her eyes, not yours, maybe, but through those eyes. Again the audience, the reader, is her foremost objective. And there is a major paucity out there in media-land of that un-ego-adorned technique. |
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| After the interview that day, JH and I asked if she’d like to write a weekly Washington Social Diary for us. At first she seemed uncertain that she was up to it (modesty/uncertainty). But it was a win-win situation. It led to a revival of her journalistic career (she had been a recent widow and was mother of a young son), and today she is Editor-at-large for The Washingtonian magazine, prolifically covering that monumental waterfront and its denizens and high muckymucks. Every week she gives us another view of life in our nation’s capital. A couple of times a year Carol graces us with her presence. She came up yesterday morning on the Metroliner, and met us at Michael’s for lunch. She loves Michael’s for the rose champagne and the fries. A bowl of them that everyone obsessively helped himself too while consuming the rest of lunch. In other words, we had fun as these pictures attest ... |
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| Michael’s was pretty busy for a quiet Tuesday in New York in summer. At the table next door, Jason Binn, publisher of DuJour magazine, was lunching with singer John Legend and another friend. Peter Brown was next door at his table entertaining two guests. Carol was surprised to see Washington people there like Politico’s Mike Allen who was lunching with Steve Rattner. According to Carol, "The first thing everyone in Washington does when they get up in the morning — the first thing, before anything else — is read Playbook." He’s the first word and the last as to what the weather is like behind the Grecian columns and under the Roman domes. Carol made clear that she wasn’t exaggerating: everyone — they can’t help it. |
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| Mr. Allen stopped by the table to say hello to Carol on his way out. He’s a tall thin fellow, younger than you might think, with a modest, unassuming bearing. Young professorial. His manner is diffident and polite but sincere. You know by the looks of him, by those apparent qualities, that the chances are what he’s writing, is what is so. After he left I was wondering what it must feel like for this modest, unassuming fellow to be commanding such journalistic power of attention of Washington politics and its vast subsidiaries. He works even later hours than we do here at the NYSD according to Carol — after three and onwards. It’s a very isolating life in a way, but delicious in terms of what you learn — about the world, life and men and mice; rich in the literary sense, like a novel. And yet, ponderous like those great marble monuments that reside nearby. |
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Among the Michael’s lunch tables: Mitch Rosenthal and Linda Janklow, Prince Dimitri with Basila Bokoko and Judith Agisim; Simon & Schuster editor — including the “A Life of Barbara Stanwyck” which I finished reading much to my disappointment (wanting more) after 860 pages — Alice Mayhew.
ThenSusan Zirinsky, the exec producer of 48 Hours stopped by the table with her lunch partner, the beautiful Norah O’Donnell,to say hello to Carol. Norah was an anchor in Washington before coming to do the CBS Morning show with Charlie Rose. Small world all around. Also at table around the room:Nick Verbitsky; Larry Burstein, publisher of New York magazine; Cathie Black; Boatie Boatright; Luke Janklow;Robert Marston with Martin Puris; Gordon Davis; Diane Sokolow. And it wasn’t even Wednesday. But cool inside Michael’s. |
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