Pink Triangle: The Feuds and Private Lives of Tennessee Williams, Gore Vidal, Truman Capote, and Famous Members of Their Entourages (Blood Moon's Babylon Series) (146 page)

With the success of
In Cold Blood
,
Truman Capote had joined the ranks of the nouveau riche, and he was ready to celebrate his good fortune.

He decided to throw a costume ball evoking the famous black-and-white scene supposedly set at the Ascot Races in
My Fair Lady
, whose sets and costumes had been designed by Cecil Beaton. Since Beaton was practically his best friend, Truman called him for advice. Beaton thought it was a bad idea.

He later told Noël Coward, “What is Truman trying to prove? The foolishness of spending so much time organizing such a party is something a younger man or a worthless woman indulges in if they have social ambitions.”

Another friend, Leo Lerman, advised Truman, “You can’t throw a ball in honor of yourself. Select one of your beautiful ladies—your ‘swans,’ as you call them—and toss the ball in her honor.”

After thinking it over, Truman decided he’d make the swans jealous if he focused on just one of them, so he decided to designate Katharine Graham, the publisher of
The Washington Post
and
Newsweek
, as the event’s guest of honor. He knew her only slightly, having been introduced to her by Babe Paley.

He’d heard that she’d been in the doldrums ever since her womanizing husband, Philip Graham, had committed suicide in 1963.

Truman called her, reaching her at her office in Washington, where she had just put down the phone after a dialogue with President Lyndon B. Johnson.

“I think you need cheering up, my dear, and I’m going to give you a ball at the Plaza Hotel in Manhattan.”

“I was baffled,” she later said. “I knew Truman, but not that well. I felt a little bit like Truman was going to give the ball anyway, and that I was just the major prop.”

Truman made a wise choice in his selection of Graham as the party’s honoree. With her media empire, she’d arguably become the most powerful woman in America. This was Truman’s chance to introduce her to international society. Although she was familiar with the names and status of dozens of his guests, she had not met most of them personally.

Graham and Capote, in the short time they’d known each other, had confided secrets. She told him that nearly every senator or even a president who visited her office wanted to go to bed with her, including Lyndon Johnson. “It’s not that they’re attracted to a middle aged woman like me, but they like to get intimate with the seat of power.”

A famous party giver and social arbiter, Babe Paley, wife of CBS’s Executive Director William Paley, could be relied on for advice. Truman made repeated calls to her, explaining that he chose the black-and-white theme because he wanted his guests to provide the color. He was on the verge of ordering The Plaza to drape all the walls of their ballroom in red velvet. Instead, she advised that he decorate each table with flowers and with gold candelabra wound with smilax
[a thin-stemmed South African vine with glossy foliage that’s popular as a floral decoration]
and bearing white candles.

To his amazement, Truman learned that the entire party would cost only $16,000
[in 1966 currency]
, and subsequently, he decided that he could afford it, having already made $2 million from
In Cold Blood
, with more to come.

As he told Paley, “To my Croesus-like friends such as you and Bill, or the Agnellis, that is not a lot of money. When you average it out over the six years I worked on the book, and take away a huge hunk for taxes, plus other fees, that’s what any small Wall Street broker might have made over the same period.”

“Working on
In Cold Blood
has scraped me right down to the marrow of my bones,” he claimed.

He also discussed the guest list with her, deciding that the ballroom at the Plaza could accommodate only five hundred comfortably. He told Babe that he planned to make his costume ball the biggest
cause célèbre
since Ward McAllister in 1892 drew up the list of “The 400”
[i.e., the only people in New York “worthy of fitting into Mrs. Astor’s Fifth Avenue ballroom.”]

Truman leaked news of his coming event—scheduled for November 28, 1966, the Monday after Thanksgiving—to the press.

As he made his rounds of the Manhattan watering holes, and as news spread of his ball, he was besieged with requests for invitations. “Am I going to be invited?” was a question he heard often.

He taunted these people. “Well, maybe you’ll be invited.” He paused. “But then again, maybe not.”

He spent months revising his guest list, crossing off names and adding new ones. He consulted frequently with Cecil Beaton: “I’m going to have only a few Hollywood stars. I’m thinking of the times I was
fêted
on the West Coast during my last visit. Joan Crawford invited me to her home, but I don’t think I’ll invite her. I had lunch with Greta Garbo, and I will invite her. Marlene Dietrichprepared a supper for me, so I’ll invite her. Oh, and Errol Flynn fucked me. But he’s dead.”

As it turned out, Dietrich was in Paris and cabled that she could not make it, and Garbo never responded to the invitation.

He decided to invite Carson McCullers, “against my better judgment.” He really did not want her to come because of all her nasty comments about how he’d plagiarized her writing style. Nonetheless, he invited her anyway.

He had decided to leave Tallulah Bankhead off the list, because she was known for getting drunk and creating scenes. He’d heard stories about how, when she was younger in the 1920s and appearing on the stage in London’s West End, she’d often attend parties in Mayfair, where she’d scandalously turn cartwheels wearing no bloomers.

When she found out she wasn’t going to be invited, Tallulah called Truman six times, beseeching him to let her be a guest. “If you don’t, I won’t be able to show my face in this town again.”

He finally acquiesced to her demands, although he said he’d have to call Carson McCullers and cancel her invitation to make room for Tallulah.

“Carson has got her heart set on coming,” Truman said. “It’ll break her heart.”

“Well,
dahling,”
Tallulah answered. “All of us can’t be Cinderella at the ball. The important thing is that I’ll be there. Everyone there will know who Tallulah Bankhead is. Only a few people know who Carson McCullers is.”

Impish Truman took a bit of glee in calling Carson to disinvite her. She was furious. An enraged Carson phoned Tennessee Williams and protested Truman’s act of
triage
. “He was just a nobody, and I lent a helping hand. And this is his gratitude. In retaliation, I’m going to throw a party of my own and invite far more important guests. At the top of my list will be Miss Jackie Kennedy.”

“Do you know Mrs. Kennedy?” Tennessee asked.

“I don’t, but I know this: If I invite her, she’ll come!”

In preparation for the event, Truman called the catering department at The Plaza until he made a nuisance of himself. He ordered 450 bottles of Taittinger champagne as refreshments for his party. He also commissioned a supper menu
[scrambled eggs, sausages, biscuits, French pastries, spaghetti and meatballs, and the Plaza’s famous high-cholesterol chicken hash with Hollandaise sauce]
for presentation at midnight.

Many wealthy people tried to buy their way in, some offering to donate $10,000 to charity, even if that “charity” were Truman himself, but he steadfastly refused. The beauty magnate, Charles Revson, owner of Revlon, even offered to provide very upscale door prizes and table favors in exchange for an invitation. As tempting as that offer was, Truman turned him down.

Even though an invitation to his ball had evolved into the most coveted in America, Truman was nonetheless stunned by the number of people who declined. Of course, he was inviting some of the most sought-after and busiest celebrities in America, many of whom had other commitments. He was “seriously pissed off” when Tennessee Williams turned him down.
[Actually, Tennessee might have attended, but Truman refused his request about bringing an escort, a young man he was dating at the time.]

Although they had developed a reputation for attending parties almost anywhere, the Duke and Duchess of Windsor cabled their regrets.

Since the party was scheduled so close to the third anniversary of JFK’s assassination in Dallas
[November 22, 1966]
, Jackie said no. So did her brothers-in-law, Bobby and Teddy.

In contrast, Lee Radziwill, Jackie’s sister, accepted. At the time, Truman, in vain, was attempting to transform her into an actress.

With the country in upheaval over the Vietnam War, Robert McNamara, Secretary of State, told Truman, “It would be unseemly for me to be seen doing the Frug with our soldiers in Vietnam dying.”

Filming Carson McCullers’
Reflections in a Golden Eye
at the time with Marlon Brando, Elizabeth Taylor refused the invitation. So did Richard Burton, as well as Audrey Hepburn and her husband, Mel Ferrer.

Ginger Rogers declined, sending Truman a note—“I don’t go to parties.”

Lena Horne was invited, although warned that an escort would not be allowed because of space considerations.

“
I DO NOT ATTEND PARTIES ALONE!”
she said, before slamming down the phone on Truman.

Mike Nichols claimed he was involved in a show; and Walter Cronkite was on assignment in England.

Truman by this time had forgiven Katherine Anne Porter for referring to him publicly as “The pimple on the face of American literature,” and consequently, he invited her and she accepted.
[As it turned out, she became ill before the party and couldn’t make it.]

More rejections poured in, including from Governor Nelson Rockefeller, Robert Penn Warren, James Michener, Paul Mellon, Mary Martin, Samuel Goldwyn, Leonard Bernstein, and Harry Belafonte.

But for several weeks in a row, at least twenty requests a day came in, some of them almost demanding invitations. The word was out—if you didn’t get invited, leave town. One didn’t want to be seen in Manhattan on the night of the ball if you were not at The Plaza.

Truman had to hire extra secretarial help to deal with the mail.