John Updike, novelist: Hey handsome!
Mailer, as much shorter than I expected as [Robert] Lowell was taller, danced about me on a darkened street corner (44th and Second Avenue, if memory serves, taunting me with my supposed handsomeness, with being the handsomest guy he had ever seen. I took it to be Maileresque hyperbole, absurd yet nevertheless with something profound in it -- perhaps my secret wish to be handsome, which only he, and that by dim streetlight, at a drunken hour, has ever perceived. (New York, c. 1970)
From "Picked-Up Pieces," by John Updike (Alfred A. Knopf, 1975)
Germaine Greer, feminist and author: Positively blowsy
When at last I met the great man he was sitting in a snot-green dressing-room at the New York Hall, lit like a matinée idol, being photographed by a very apologetic (and rather plain) professional. Mailer feigned butch embarrassment, while I wondered if the star treatment was altogether normal, for Mailer does not strike one as a great photogenic. I was asked to pose beside him. 'You're better looking than I thought,' he said. 'I know,' said I, remembering his descriptions of women's liberationists...My convent education prevented me from saying how disappointed I was. I expected a hard, sort of nuggety man, and Mailer was positively blowsy. I contented myself with saying that his eyes were less blue than certain retouched colour photos had led me to believe. (New York, 1971)
From "The Madwoman's Underclothes: Essays & Occasional Writings 1968-1985," by Germaine Greer (Picador/Pan, 1986)
Jill Johnston, journalist and dance critic: Rude to me
...I was seated next to Mailer himself on the stage at Town Hall for the scandalous public forum on feminism that he moderated....Though I never liked Mailer or his writing, his outrageousness was an example that entered my own gestalt during the sixties. Moreover, the very vehicle of my fame, the Village Voice, was partially owned by Mailer, who had founded the paper in 1955 along with Dan Wolf and Ed Fancher....Mailer, who I could only suppose abhorred me personally (if not because of his attack on feminism, then because he was rude to me whenever I saw him), introduced me as "the master of free association of the Village Voice." (New York, 1971)
From "Paper Daughter: Autobiography in Search of a Daughter, Volume II," by Jill Johnson (Alfred A. Knopf, 1985)
Henry Grunwald, editor of Time magazine: Left-conservative
A long feud between Mailer and Time began, as he later explained to me, with a savage review of his second novel, "Barbary Shore" [1951]... So after I took over as managing editor [in 1970], I decided it was time for a truce, and I wrote to him suggesting a meeting. To my surprise, he agreed. Mailer walked into the Brussels Restaurant with that strange rolling gate suggesting a wary prizefighter, a diffident and engaging smile on the ruddy face beneath the Brillo hair. We realized quickly that we would like each other much better than we had anticipated. He thought me less of a hawk than he had expected, and I found him less radical than I expected. In fact, I thought him deeply conservative—left-conservative, as he put it. He declared himself bored by Marxism, but his conservatism was not so much political as instinctive and atavistic.
.....
Much later Mailer and I reminisced about the sixties. We were both drinking mineral water, not martinis. He had grown stouter, grizzled and patriarchal and in many ways even more conservative. … (New York)
From "One Man's America: A Journalist's Search for the Heart of His Country," by Henry Grunwald (Doubleday, 1997)
Sally Quinn, print and broadcast journalist: "Poison Quinn"
...Norman Mailer and Norman Rosten. They both had books on Marilyn Monroe coming out that month. August 6, the day we were to go on the air [CBS Morning News], was the eleventh anniversary of Monroe's death. That sounded jazzy, and Mailer is always entertaining, if not a little dangerous, to take on live. Earlier that year I had covered his fiftieth birthday party for the Post and afterward he had referred to me in The New York Times Book Review as "Poison Quinn," which of course gave me a modest cachet. I didn't know whether Mailer was annoyed with me or not, though we had maintained a sparse and arch correspondence since.
He was to have a press conference that afternoon at the Algonquin Hotel. I waited around through the conference and, as I tried to approach him, his female secretary pushed me away, telling me that Mailer refused to speak to me because he was so furious. I tried crawling behind a curtain and inching my way toward him, but the same secretary, dressed from head to toe in a leather motorcycle outfit, threatened to crush me personally if I didn't leave Mailer alone.
So much for Norman Mailer. (New York, 1973)
From "We're Going to Make You a Star," by Sally Quinn (Simon and Schuster, 1975)
Andy Warhol, pop artist: Looking Irish
...to Norman Mailer's in Brooklyn Heights. He used to live in a whole house but now he lives on just the top and rents the bottom out and he's had the front part made all glass looking out over Manhattan and it's beautiful.
Wall to wall, it was an intellectual party like from the sixties...Norman looks good now, white hair, looks Irish. His little mother was there.... (1976)
From "Diaries," by Andy Warhol (Warner Books, 1989)
Liz Smith, gossip columnist: Liked my column
I had been bylining the Liz Smith column [in the New York Daily News] for a year when I first met Norman Mailer at a cocktail party on the Upper West Side. I can't remember the host and would like to bless his name, but I had been watching the Aquarian closely before he turned and came my way. He introduced himself. I made some gushing remarks. "You are one of my heroes!"...
He seemed genuinely amused by this outpouring, said something nice about liking my column, finding it fresh and engaging. This turned my head all the way around. (New York, mid-1970s)
From "Natural Blonde: A Memoir," by Liz Smith (Hyperion, 2000)
< Edward Robb Ellis, journalist, author: Short and fat
...the B. Dalton book store at 666 Fifth Avenue had announced that Normal Mailer would appear there today to autograph copies of his latest book, The Executioner's Song...
.......
...I saw him and instantly had two impressions: Short...Fat. Although I knew Mailer had put on weight, I was unprepared for the sight of a man with such a thick body. I would have known his face had I passed him on a street -- which, in fact, happened to me many years ago.
Stepping down into the pit, Mailer held out his arms, flashed a smile and said: "This is the first time in my life I ever signed books, but I'm glad to do it for such a worthy cause." Meaning, of course, that the proceeds would go to the Public Library.
Mailer is perhaps five feet eight inches tall. He wore a dark jacket, a maroon turtleneck sweater, tan slacks and black Oxfords. I sat 15 feet from him. His rumpled hair is now not just gray but rather the color of silver. It is thinning out a the top of his head. He has grizzly eyebrows, a rutted forehead, electric blue eyes and a ruddy complexion. This morning he must have cut himself shaving, because there was a tiny bandage on the left side of his chin.
A sunburst of laugh wrinkles radiates from his eyes. Mailer is 56 years old. He smiled often and spoke in a soft voice, which somewhat surprised me, for I've seen him ever so boisterous on television. His hands are square, fingernails clean....
...Many folks carried not only "The Executioner's Song," but also copies of his previous books which they wanted autographed, and Mailer obliged them....
I began to think I'd better get in line myself, but when I arose and walked back along it, I discovered it consisted of more than a hundred people, so I decided to leave without an autograph because I had been privileged to sit near him, to observe him. (1979)
From "A Diary of the Century: Tales from America's Greatest Diarist," by Edward Robb Ellis (Kodansha International, 1995)
Milos Forman, film director: Film role
A number of the characters in "Ragtime" were based on real people. Studying their portraits in old magazines and books, I noticed that one of them, the famous architect Stanford White, looked remarkably like Norman Mailer. There was additional symmetry to their lives because both men had unleashed famous tabloid furors, so I asked Mailer, whom I'd met socially, if he'd be interested in reading for the small role. Mailer did a fine audition, and I cast him as Stanford White.
When it came time for him to act, I was as jittery at the prospect of directing the great and notorious author as he was about acting, though he didn't react the way a nervous actor typically does. He didn't snarl at me or launch into an abrupt monologue about some long-winded abstraction as my actors sometimes do when they're at a loss over something in the scene. He struggled bravely with the role. I like him a lot in the film. (New York, 1980)
From "Turnaround: A Memoir," by Miloš Forman with Jan Novak (Villard, 1994)
Martin Amis, novelist: Missing booze
In his three-storey brownstone apartment in Brooklyn Heights, overlooking New York Harbor and the Dunhill lighters of Manhattan, Mailer perched on a stiff-backed chair, and told me to sit on the old velvet sofa. "I can't sit on a soft chair. I writhe around a lot. Hurts my back," he said with an apologetic wince.
Mailer's sixth wife, the dark-eyed model and actress Norris Church...sat imposingly near by, reading a buxom magazine.
His face is more delicate and less pugnacious than you would expect, the body more rounded, dapper and diminutive. The tangled hair is white but plentiful, the frequent smile knowing but unreserved. Despite his long history of exhibitionism, he no longer enjoys giving interviews. You can sense him wondering how much of his charm he will need to disclose.
Mailer watched wistfully as I feasted on my drink. "It's the terrible price you have to pay," he said, referring to his own eight-month abstinence. "The day just wasn't long enough, and I have to work so hard now, to make the money. My nerves have been pretty well encrusted by booze, thank God. It's okay. It just means there's nothing to look forward to at the end of the day."
"Thanks a lot," said Norris. "What about me?"
"No, the sex is great. The fucking's great. I just miss it, that's all." (1981)
From "The Moronic Inferno, and Other Visits to America," by Martin Amis (Jonathan Cape, 1986)
Peter Whitmer, author: Friendly gentleman
...As the show [Open Mind on WPIX] was ending and the credits were running, somebody switched camera angles and came straight at Mailer from the front. His ears stuck out like satellite dishes.
The director of the show, Jan Weledman, turned on the lights and said, "I'll take you in to see Mr. Mailer." She led me through the door into the studio. This was it! Was there a real Norman Mailer? I almost expected to find an out-of-work, off-Broadway actor, madly gasping for air while struggling to pull off a rubber Norman Mailer mask....
What I found was an elegantly dressed, impeccably mannered, thoroughly cooperative, open, and friendly gentleman. He was seated on the dais at the round interview table, dutifully autographing a pile of books for the WPIX personnel. Finished, he buttoned his double-breasted blazer, stepped down from the dais, and shook hands politely; he was not only real, but a lot taller than I had expected. (New York, early 1980s)
From "Acquarius Revisited: Seven Who Created the Sixties Counterculture That Changed America," by Peter O. Whitmer with Bruce VanWyngarden (Macmillan, 1987)
Francis King, novelist: Slurping beer
Although I was International President elect, Mailer totally ignored me, as did the rest of American PEN...
After my election, I thought that I had better introduce myself to Mailer. I approached him as, in jeans, T-shirt and sneakers, he lolled in a chair, slurping at a can of beer. "Oh, Mr Mailer, I don't think that you know me. I'm Francis King. I've just been elected International President." He slurped once more at the can. He looked me over. "Yeah. They wanted me to stand for International President, but I decided that I wanted that like a hole in the head." He said nothing more. I said nothing more. (New York, 1986)
From "Yesterday Came Suddenly," by Francis King (Constable, 1993)
Roger Ebert, film critic: Movie director, tightly wrapped
With "Tough Guys Don't Dance," he was determined to make a "real" movie, a commercial feature film that could play anywhere and draw the crowds on Saturday night…the location shoot in Provincetown …I visited the set in November 1986… ....
He was all bundled up in a goose-down jacket too small for him, so that he seemed tightly wrapped, leaning up against the wall at an angle, his tennis shoes braced against the floor. He had not spoken more tan six words before I recognized that he was in a good mood; he had been shooting nights and sleeping days, keeping a punishing schedule for the first three weeks of the first big-budget Hollywood movie he had ever directed, and he was not tired; the experience seemed to exhilarate him. He told me the happiest time of his life was when he directed his underground film Maidstone, and that he believed film directing satisfies a side of his personality that's never been touched by writing....
Mailer had been fighting for years for the title of America's foremost man of letters, and now he wanted to be a movie director, too.
From "Two Weeks in the Midday Sun: A Cannes Notebook," by Roger Ebert (Andrews and McMeel, 1987)
About the writer
Dana Cook is a Toronto editor and collector of encounters with the famous. His compilations have appeared in a wide range of newspapers, magazines and journals, both print and electronic. He has been an obituary columnist for Salon since 2004, his most recent subject having been Luciano Pavarotti. He may be reached at: danacook@istar.ca
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