Gore Vidal - classic or dud?

Doug Ireland reviews a new book on Veedle's erotic life... quite a list of conquests (Charles Laughton AND Brad Davis).

http://gaycitynews.com/love-sex-gore-vidal-dared-speak/

But Vidal undoubtedly bedded Woodward’s husband, Paul Newman, when they and Vidal shared a Hollywood house together.

As film director and Vanity Fair writer Matt Tyrnauer, one of Vidal’s closest friends, put it, “Howard’s death ended the main chapter of Gore’s existence pretty much. Gore was in perpetual mourning after Howard died.” His drinking, he said, “became epic. He drank after he finished work…he didn’t stop until he collapsed… and grieved very openly. He talked about how sweet Howard was, how much he missed him. He wore a ring of Howard’s. He talked about how wonderful and talented he was. He’d listen to recordings of him singing on CD, which he’d listen to again and again.”

I must say, my admiration's wilted a bit.

grief isn't very pretty

the inheritance thing seems like the more unforgivable blot imho

I wish he was as cold as he pretended – we need more people that cold.

But Teeman shows how Vidal mythologized this relationship, in which the sex amounted to little more than the Princeton rub.

THERE'S a bit of slang I didn't know.

"The Yale hoist"

"The Harvard grunt"

The watusie

The twist.

The Difficult Brown

the Cornell cornhole

The Dartmouth dunk

The RISD ruffle

The tootsie roll

the Penn pump

it doesn't surprise me much that vidal privately was something other than the roman consul/mr spock image he affected in public. his mental decline towards the end was visible even in interviews and tbh i'm not sure it's something anyone outside his family needed to know about.

remember Hitch's column?

http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/features/2010/02/hitchens-201002

haha, i remember that! it's largely and sadly otm, though vidal would have been entitled to write a response hatchet job, since hitch's decline was even uglier than vidal's dabbling in pearl harbor/911 truthism. vidal's polanski remark was undeniably appalling but hitch said comparably awful things on a regular basis at the height of his deranged neocon phase -- calling the dixie chicks "fat fucking slags," some pretty awful stuff about cindy sheehan.

:( at Vidal slagging off Idries Shah, altho I suppose I shouldn't be surprised

Bitchiness was an essential part of his public style. When he directed it properly, he made it a virtue, but he wasn't always wise in his use of it.

also, FRED ASTAIRE???? ewwwww

Yeah that I was wondering about.

Flying Down to Eeeeyeeeew

on the new documentary

http://www.salon.com/2014/05/22/how_one_sexy_gay_novel_derailed_gore_vidals_literary_career/

The new doc, available on demand, is a hagiography. Any hour spent watching YouTube clips is more entertaining.

yeah i'm certainly not gonna spend $13 to see it

https://twitter.com/JamesWolcott/status/558683822729232386

is he dead yet

lol @ "America's most controversial writer"

Alfred: he lives in the very cigarette ash you ignore.

michael mewshaw abt him on charlie rose --

i remember he was very kind to guests that we had invited to meet him at our house for dinner and he talked to these ppl uh most patiently put up with all their questions about lincoln and they were a business couple and then when we sat down to dinner he said id like to ask you a question now, and they perked up and said yes gore, "What do women think about anal intercourse?"

:D

I always want to know!

Not long ago Alice Longworth managed to startle even me by announcing, at a dinner party: "Daisy Harriman told me that every time she was alone with Senator Gore he would pounce on her. I could never understand why he liked her. After all, he was blind. But then Daisy always smelled nice."

Netflix to shoot this in Gore's villa! What would he say about Spacey?

http://variety.com/2017/film/news/kevin-spacey-to-play-gore-vidal-in-netflix-original-biopic-exclusive-1202502213/

how is it that spacey is still in the closet

I should've been cast. I've been honing my Vee-dal for months.

If Spacey goes Method in the villa, what will the budget be for teenage boy 'day labor'?

ughhh why does it have to be Spacey :(

No matter how hard Kevin Spacey (or the script) tries, I don't think he (or it) could ever faithfully capture Gore's caustic personality or the degree of contempt in which he held 'the opposition'.

Spacey is about 58, I wonder what ages he'll be playing GV? He was 43 at the big TV tiff with Buckley.

Obv the Young Vidal years would require someone handsomer.

If Spacey goes Method in the villa, what will the budget be for teenage boy 'day labor'?

― Supercreditor (Dr Morbius), Friday, July 21, 2017

The film is in the can, and Netflix will not release it. Gore wins!

Obv the Young Vidal years would require someone handsomer.

― Supercreditor (Dr Morbius),

uh wrong. Young Vee-dal was gorgeous.

i know! i meant handsomer than K.S.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=2&v=QwflYHGtZuk