I'm finding the new Capote Swans show so dull

[quote]And I think Hollander's performance is actually a bit too over the top.

With all due respect, you most likely think this performance is over the top because you are not familiar with just how "over the top" Truman was. I'ts a level of queening that has fallen, sadly, out of favor.

Again, with all due respect, you've probably been brainwashed into believing the bland underplaying of everything that passes itself off as "acting" is really representative of life.

GOOGLE : Over The Top

Do you mean TRUMAN CAPOTE ?

Hollander is excellent. But the show is indeed dull, even when overwrought.

Well smell OP. Just had to start a new thread to brink us ALL up to date on his take.

I actually think his performance is understated

Watch “Murder by Death” to get a rare glimpse of how Capote acted

I hung out with Truman a bit- he was more affected than Hollander’s portrayal if anything. Seymour Hoffman bailed him some years ago.

Google the swans to get a better idea of each. CZ is the least “accurate” in my opinion.

Chloe Sevigny reminds me of George Washington. Can't explain it.

Capote seemed truly exhausting and mean-spirited. Did this man have any redeeming qualities?

watched this yesterday doc from 2020 / much better way to spend 90 minutes i imagine

I worked for a Rockefeller non profit through those years and believe me, those women were dull.

R8 Did this man have any redeeming qualities?

As many as his Swans. Well matched.

Here's what I don't get - Capote was said to have an amazingly high IQ; he discussed this in interviews. But he comes off as bumbling and inarticulate in so many TV interviews. Yes, I know he was likely drunk, but many people back in the day were -- think Dick Cavett -- but were still sharp and witty (Vidal, Mailer).

Growing up it always seemed Capote & Tennessee Williams were the twin sisters of gay literary icons. Now Capote is remembered for being Capote & TN is remembered more for his writing. Surprising given that Capote was the more versatile writer, to go from In Cold Blood to Breakfast in a Jewelry Store.

Fuck you all for attacking OP. He can have an opinion.

r13 He can express his opinion in the show's thread like everyone else, rather than creating a new one like a special nepo baby snowflake.

R14 bite your tongue, let those who want to piss on their own heads while calling for rain to stay in their lane.

No one has posted a link to another thread. I don’t mean to defend thread-splitting (a heinous crime in my book).. if you’re going to call out a thread-splitter, it’s helpful to link to the existing thread

The true test for an actor portraying Capote is this; would my dead mother scream, “Get that faggot off my TV!” When she heard his voice.

So far, Hollander is doing an ok job.

[quote] Here's what I don't get - Capote was said to have an amazingly high IQ; he discussed this in interviews.

Did anyone other than Capote say he had an “amazingly high IQ”?

The man was known to lie occasionally

Harper Lee certainly didn't give any sign of it in her portrait of him as Dill.

Still no torrents. What the actual fuck?

I would love to see a faithful adaptation of his novella Breakfast at Tiffany's minus a sugary Holly and fake hereto romance. But who could play Holly? A young Viola Davis?

It's quite underwhelming so far -- everything's being presented as if it's obvious why we should care about these people. The whole thing is overcrowded with repellent people whose names would be unknown were they not wealthy.

Tom Hollander offers quite a good Truman impression -- but is it any better than Hoffman's or Jones' in the recent-ish movies? And at least those drilled down on compelling circumstances, characters and dynamics. This is heavy sledding.

And I don't ever need to be that close to Jessica Lange's current face.

Yes, R8. He was an incredible writer.

I'm an idiot. I found torrents under Feud. I kept looking for "Capote".

R21 Timmy Golightly

r7 someone else said she looked like Bar Bush aka the Quaker Oats guy. I think Gwyneth would have been a good choice for CZ Guest. She knows how to wasp.

R21 I’d love to see that. I’ve always seen my acquaintance Sierra Plowden as Holly. She basically is an LA Holly, but not from Okie background.

Oh good r24, you get to steal what the rest of us pay for. How special for you.

Lots of tragic plastic surgery on display. I'm enjoying Hollander, though. He's always fun to watch.

[quote] Here's what I don't get - Capote was said to have an amazingly high IQ; he discussed this in interviews.

Never trust egomaniacs when they try to tell you they've been tested to have "amazingly high IQs." That was a shtick James Woods used to try to pull on talk shows.

Mary Beth Pape as Phyllis Diller at the Thanksgiving party in episode 2 was worth the entire hour. That they put that poor woman between the gay George & Martha was hilarious. Other guests included Jim Backus, Peter Sellers & Roddy McDowall and Robert Moore, not that you'd know it. Not quite as easy to impersonate as Phyllis Diller, who seemed to leave Fang at home.

R29 that’s another thing that brings me out of it. Lee would not be happy with chipmunk cheeked Flockhart portraying her.

OP is an idiot. And worse, he’s an idiot who thought his own singular opinion was worthy of its own thread.

Shame on you, OP.

Great, R7.

Now I can never unsee that.

R32 The one thing Princess Radziwell would've approved about this iteration of this story is Calistas size 00 arse cast to play her bobble headed self. Especially given they were both naturally preternaturally thin with tiny frames.

Another round of Emmys dears.

I haven’t seen this yet, but based on the trailer, I agree the contemporary plastic surgery on some of these woman is a major distraction.

It’s like when Paramount+ kept running commercials for some Yellowstone spin-off set in the 1800s. Faith Hill looked hilariously out of place.

Great show so far. I love it!!

Sevigny is fug and can’t act for shit. And she may be from Connecticut money but she always reads as poor white trash.

[quote]Not quite as easy to impersonate as Phyllis Diller

Another example of how facile the production is is that the Diller at the dinner was Diller in her stage character. I don't know whether the contrast between this and her RL persona was as marked as it is in Mrs Maisel, but I'm dead sure Phyllis at what by Hollywood standards was a society party would look a good deal more sophisticated than she did onstage. Amirite, Americans?

Read and learn^

[quote] Did this man have any redeeming qualities?

Yes. He was capable of great writing. Better than Gore Vidal's (zzzz), IMO.

I don't know how high Capote's IQ was, but it's VERY unlikely to have been at the Mensa level. We're a rare breed.

Sevigny’s visage has coarsened a great deal.

Dud Capote get any hot ass? Dis they all keep their eyes closed and imagine some other celebrity of that era? All that pasty fat and that voice! Creepy!

As I have watched the latest iteration of Feud, I can't help feeling sad about Treat Williams. This was his last performance. I also was astonished at how wealthy Bill Paley was. Imagine being able to give your wife a Picasso as an "I'm sorry" gift.

Paley minted money for CBS and its shareholders.

It was #1 from the advent of television until 1976-77.

I'm enjoying it and enjoying checking in on the other threads on here.

Number one:

...and here's another.

[quote]Yes. He was capable of great writing. Better than Gore Vidal's (zzzz), IMO.

I hope he’s not still alive ( I stopped checking years ago) or he’ll run you over with his wheelchair.

Vidal has been dead for about a decade.

Vidal’s nonfiction was always better than his fiction, which probably ate at him.

Vidal Sassoon died?

[quote]Another example of how facile the production is

Remember it’s Ryan Murphy. You have to adjust your expectations accordingly.

With the exception of a few scenes here and there—the handjob scene was nauseating—I am thoroughly enjoying this series.

I don’t know if it’s the script or the direction, but all the Swans (I think Hollander is terrific) sound like they are reciting lines from a play. Which they ARE, of course, but it shouldn’t sound that way.

There's a handjob in this?!!! Babe gives it to Truman? Yuck.

I guess with a gay director that's what they think of as a bit of business. Oh for the days of Cukor(pre Rich and Famous) and Minnelli.

No, r55. It’s a gay handjob, with Capote and his bathhouse trick played by Russell Tovey.

I watched Infamous in preparation for this show. Big mistake.

Toby Jones is a hugely charismatic performer and Tom Hollander suffers in his shadow.

People people people

Ryan Murphy only produced this

GUS VAN SANT IS DIRECTING

That’s why it feels “off”. Bad marriage of director and material.

Oh and John Robin Baitz wrote this. He wrote Brothers and Sisters.

I dislike Murphy generally but he would not make a series this dry. The series is dry because they hired dry people.

“Two big union guys picked them off a table where they were marked ‘white eldergay’, showed them to Ryan Murphy and said, ‘Sorry, this was all they had.’”

[quote]The series is dry because they hired dry people.

Well, these women are over 70, what did you expect?

R40, excellent point. I read Diller’s memoir. Very discerning woman. Smart. Intentional. Knew her schtick but left it on stage. The documentary about her last stand up shows is also excellent.

I’m finding you making a new thread for every thought you have dull. 62 comments but the majority from the same person? I mean when does the crazy behavior end? Be normal. This is the 3rd (at least) thread on this show you’ve made.

R40, you're absolutely right. Joan Rivers (among many others) frequently pointed out that Phyllis Diller in person was chic, not remotely like her stage persona.

R63 Neurotic ole queens who actual monitor and tally others posts. Hardly " normal " dear. Meds are in the fridge.

I don't think it's possible to overplay Truman Capote.

Back when we were teenagers my middle sister and I were OBSESSED with [italic]The David Susskind Show,"[/italic] and would watch it in the wee hours on WGN (IIRC. We had it from cable tv).

Can you believe there was a huge market for this type of program on television in the 60s-mid 80s? It was GLORIOUS watching these shows with erudite hosts covering the entire spectrum of...of BEING. Joe Pyne. Tom Snyder. David Susskind. Tony Brown. David Frost. Dick Cavett.

Growing up in our middling-backwater city in the Deep South, we practically INHALED these shows that gave us such a broad perspective of life and of humanity we never encountered in our quotidian world.

And it's all gone now. Utterly.

THE Truman Capote

Watch The Capote Tapes. Much better all around than this dull series.

[quote] Here's what I don't get - Capote was said to have an amazingly high IQ; he discussed this in interviews. But he comes off as bumbling and inarticulate in so many TV interviews. Yes, I know he was likely drunk, but many people back in the day were -- think Dick Cavett -- but were still sharp and witty (Vidal, Mailer).

He had ASPERGERS SYNDROME, you peabrain! Why do you think these two were so close? Or Harper Lee?

The depiction of Ann Woodward’s funeral was a farce . The son would never have delivered a eulogy like that . Those swans would not have been in attendance.

R70 True and going even further I don’t think the Swans were really the gal pals the series tries to make us believe. Adore Diane Lane but she’s all wrong for Slim, who has best been described as “a big peppy broad” in Gerald Clarke’s excellent biography of Capote. Calista’s performance seems clueless and why the silly hats? Obviously their paths crossed and Slim and Babe were friends but the rest is invention. Agree that Hollander is the best part, very watchable.

8 hours of this?

[quote]Vidal has been dead for about a decade.

God, time flies. I remember being on DL the night he died.

broken int segments / full show

"American Playhouse" Tru (TV Episode 1992) American Playhouse (TV Series) Tru (1992) Robert Morse: Truman Capote

Hollander is playing Capote as if he’s channeling Bette Davis playing Capote.

Imagine a time when a famous writer was a celebrity like the Kardashians today. And had a huge party inviting famous and celebrated people but no pop stars. Today the Met Ball is full of rappers. It's a whole new world.

Aspie Troll believes all 8 billion of us have what she has.

Chloe Sevigny is too mannish in the face to play C.Z. Guest.

I used to work for an old queen who was friends with CZ. He called her Corny. At the time, I had no idea who she was except that she had written a book on gardening.

People are so stuipid.

Hi I’m r77! I don’t believe this man was on the autism spectrum!

Sadly-all of the real life swans were more beautiful than the hags portraying them in this series

Zack Snyder wouldn’t shock me either.

I like my autism dry with a twist.

Truman Capote: A Psychological Portrait

Several years ago, there was a Broadway play about Jackie Kennedy. There was a short scene with Truman Capote. Were Jackie and Truman pals in the 1970s?

Ignoring for the fact that Truman Capote is best known for his constructed persona which involved a costume in which he purposely obscured himself beneath a fedora, scarf and sunglasses;

This is how autistic people sit and talk. He goes very long periods without making eye contact, often looking and talking at nothing in particular, even when being asked a question. His posture is slouched, in one direction; he keeps his hands clasped together in the classic Aspie configuration. He has coordinated both his outfit and the flowers behind him with chairs he has chosen for the interview, bright orange and yellow; a preference for sameness is the hallmark of autism, with a partiality to a vivid color being a typical outlet (Chris Pine, saffron yellow: Henry Cavill, royal blue). And at the forefront, despite his immense intellect which some would claim approaches genius, he comes off as kind of slow. This is the inherent contradiction at the heart of high-functioning autism, one part of the brain (public facing) is struggling to play Chopsticks; while the other half (internal facing) is playing the Goldberg Variations. From memory. Blindfolded.

For me, it’s that most of these women were really only interesting to a small group. Who really talks about them now or has in decades? It was all superficial nonsense. Seeing in onscreen just makes it more inane.

Why can’t Ryan Murphy do Gore Vidal vs William F. Buckley like we suggested?

Not sexy enough for FX.

[quote]It was all superficial nonsense.

The key to Capote was that he loved superficial nonsense above all else, but was too superior to admit it. Had to keep looking down his nose at his companions.

He spent his entire career demolishing people with whom he had spent years building close relationships. A very bizarre pathology. This was also true of In Cold Blood, of course, and of Harper Lee, with his absurd claims that he had a big role in writing Mockingbird. (He had no heart, whereas that novel is full of heart, and he had zero understanding of the importance of personal ethics, which is the entire foundation of the character of Atticus Finch.) Actually, this series would have been much more interesting if it had been Feud: Capote v Lee, since Lee herself was interesting.

I guess France still has public intellectuals.

Who are America’s public intellectuals today? If there are any, they are all making stupid podcasts.

Diane Lane is the best part in all of this.

Harper Lee and Truman Capote were childhood friends. She based the character of Dill in To Kill a Mockingbird on him. As they got older their friendship ended, primarily because of his jealousy.

Yes, we know. As mentioned sbove, more than once.

[quote] As they got older their friendship ended, primarily because of his jealousy.

Was it jealousy? Truman stayed in NYC to live the high life and Harper went back to the small Alabama town she was from and became a recluse. I just think they had different priorities.

Agree with the OP. There is definitely something dry and sluggish in it. I can’t put my finger on it but I can see myself losing complete interest after another episode or so.

Capote of course is played as a stereotype. He was an out (and proud?) gay man but not necessarily as flouncy as they portray. He must be made a caricature of course. Ryan Murphy isn’t known for his allegiance to the gay community. And unlike the rabid, old-school camp, queens, who are inundating these threads, most people like myself know nothing about who these “swans” were. Who the fuck cares if one of the actresses isn’t a doppelgänger of one of them? Who were they? Why hasn’t there been any character development? It’s pretty much too late to do that now. I also would like to see a bit more about Capote and what made him tick But we’re relegated to only seeing him in the company of the rich ladies or his long suffering partner. wouldn’t it have been interesting to see him portrayed while writing La Cote Basque? Did he ever pause and think aloud about what he was doing or was he unapologetic during the process? Is it true that he possibly did not anticipate the backlash and actually thought that it would be appreciated? Did he labor over it at all? It’s the most pivotal piece of the series and yet we don’t even see him contemplating writing it. It just seems to happen and we’re watching the fallout.

So far it’s just a dry, dull series and I’m struggling to stay interested .

I think Diane Lane is really good, but her character bears absolutely no resemblance personality-wise to Slim from what I have read about her.

r96 Why are you talking as though we're already on episode 7?

I directed my husband in two productions of TRU a couple years ago. He was so great in it. Very impressive performance.

I think that Naomi Watts is absolutely perfect in this.

Did John O’Shea really beat Capote up at a Thanksgiving dinner? And in front of Phyllis Diller, no less?

R95 she had a Pulitzer, an Oscar winning adaptation, and Greg Peck as a lifelong friend. He didn’t.

"Chloe Sevigny reminds me of George Washington."

It's that stiff wig they put on her head. Disaster.

R92 Diane Lane is the worst. She won't stop mugging which is an old trick for any actor to call attention to themselves. She ruins every take.

His performance is not OTT. That was Truman Capote. Now, the show itself is another Ryan Murphy bomb.

Chloe! Your agent is on line one

He says you have an offer for a miniseries bio he thinks you'lll find interesting...

R106 😂 😂 😂

Why isn’t Gloria Vanderbilt featured in this? She was one of Copote’s best known Swans, and he famously called her stupid, superficial and vain in Answered Prayers. “A dimwit who failed to recognize her first husband when he was standing right in front of her.” Gloria, like Babe Paley, never forgave him.

Did Anderson Cooper convince Ryan Murphy to leave Mummy out of his little show?

[quote] He wrote Brothers and Sisters.

If you must discuss this series, please use its true name, The Sally Field Programme. Thank you.

Sally *Fields*

OP has terrible taste.

R108 I wondered this too. We’re treated to boorish Sevigny as CZ Guest (who?), but no Gloria Vanderbilt - a household name? Seems bizarre.

The hair and makeup on Calista is serviceable but she doesn’t evoke Lee whatsoever. Lee had an instantly recognizable speaking voice, much like her sister. Calista doesn’t even attempt the mid-Atlantic, finishing school pronunciation. Natalie Portman did a decent job with it.

All of the Swans sound way too modern. Only Naomi Watts is doing more than the absolute bare minimum.

Historical inaccuracy already in the first five minutes. The opening scene is set in 1968. Babe Paley(Naomi Watts) says she just got off the Concorde, which only started flying in 1976. #fail

Eh R114, I’m not impressed with Watts thus far. I would have cast Rose Byrne in the role of Babe Paley; she looks so much like her and has those same sad, beautiful eyes.

Agreed r114 I’m on episode two, and so far it’s entertaining…but some of this dialogue is just allll wrong. One of the women said “Don’t get it twisted” and another said, “He did me dirty, too,” and I’m pretty damn sure those expressions were not used back then. It’s jarring and pulls me right out of the story.

R112. If you don’t know who CZ Guest is, you have business watching this series.

NO business watching this show.

R118 I know who she is (mostly thanks to Slim Aarons), but the average viewer does not. And believe it or not, this show isn’t just for fusspot geriatric queens who know the name of every obscure dead debutante. Gloria Vanderbilt is a much more recognizable name.

R118 How DARE he not know Zz Guest!? *gay gasp* why, I’ll bet he doesn’t even know who Doris Duke is! And don’t even get me started on Marjorie Merriweather Post.

Should have just been a movie. Not enough material to stretch out into multiple episodes.

Demi Moore is all wrong for blonde good time gal Ann Woodward. The flashback scenes are especially egregious. Cameron Diaz would have been an interesting choice.

I don't think interesting choices are in either Murphy or Van Sant's wheelhouses. Just be grateful that Sarah Paulson wasn't cast for once, or that the Russell Tovey character isn't being played by Evan Peters.

I caught that too, r115. Very annoying fuck up.

[quote]One of the women said “Don’t get it twisted” and another said, “He did me dirty, too,” and I’m pretty damn sure those expressions were not used back then. It’s jarring and pulls me right out of the story.

Which of the Swans will yell "prostitution whore" while daintily flipping a table?

It's C.Z. Guest reimagined as a Gun Moll. Bizarre.

R117, both those idioms sound like something you'd hear in gangster films or fast-talking 1940s films. The OED cites a "to do someone dirty" passage from 1914.

R128 I just remarked the same, in so many words, at R127, 20 minutes ago.

R86 THE ENTIRE WORLD IS ASPIE !!!! BUT ME BUT ME BUT ME BUT ME BUT ME BUT ME BUT ME BUT ME BUT ME BUT ME BUT ME BUT ME BUT ME BUT ME BUT ME BUT ME BUT ME BUT ME BUT ME BUT ME BUT ME BUT ME BUT ME BUT ME !!!!

It should be noted that writer Jon Robin Baitz was raised in South Africa and Brazil. He didn’t have the same American cultural references as many of us.

Yet we’ve confirm they’ve been part of our culture for over a hundred years…the references are not anachronistic.

Jessica Lange!!!

Big error. Phyllis Diller only dressed that way on stage.

I know everything about this story. I’ve read multiple books on Capote. I’m a fan of both his writing and his drama.

My take after the first 2 episodes:

1. People with Little knowledge of the characters involved will be completely lost. I think Lee Radziwell made her first appearance at a lunch table with no mention that it was Lee Radziwell.

2. For those of us who know the story, the inaccuracies are distracting. Back to Lee Radziwell, she didn’t fall Out with him until years after La Cote Basque. The series has her hanging up with Skim and Babe against her. Plus, these women didn’t necessarily hang out together when Capote wasn’t drawing them together. And John never encouraged him to write La Cote Basque. When he read it, he tried to talk Truman out of it. There’s plenty of real drama — why cook up manufactured stuff?

3. Episode 2 focuses on Truman’s tailspin without giving much context to what he was beside an alcoholic and a gossip.

I’ll keep watching but I’m disappointed.

60 Minutes also came on the air like 20 years after that dinner party in episode 1 took place.

Phyllis Diller was trained as a classic pianist. Girl had class!

One of my favorites of hers: Fang and I never have sex. One night while he was doing his pushups, I slid under him. (She made it sound funnier than that and I think part of the humor was in that it was a bit dirty).

She also had a magazine document her facelift, so I think that people liked her because she was real.

Now back to our regularly scheduled programming.

[quote}Phyllis Diller was trained as a classic pianist. Girl had class!

My best friend in high school went to see her play, r137. He went backstage to get her to sign his program. He told her he played as well and she took time to sit and talk with him, asking about his favorite composers, etc.

R116 Rose Byrne would have been a great choice. What a shame, I can't unsee it now.

IMO Chloe Sevigny is miscast as CZ Guest. CZ was so beautiful and feminine and Chloe has a much harder look. The hair is like a caricature as well.

Who is this Catherine Zeta Guest?

The way the previews made it seem was that it would be much more focused on the women and a bit more dramatic and glamorous. Capotes long drunk ramblings are well done but for sure boring to me.

I love the actresses in general but they did miscast cast a lot of these roles. Babe was a tall, skinny, leggy dark-eyed brunette and they've got short little blue-eyed Naomi Watts? Whose wig is just a touch wrong enough to make me cringe, it's sagging... Not the perfect 60s bouffant whatsoever. And then Slim Keith.. light blue eyes in real life. They give her to dark eyed Diane Lane, who at least has the hairstyle correct. Sevigny does have the correct hair color for CZ but that's really about it. Calista Flockhart does look a little bit like Lee Radziwill, but this black hat after the funeral? Is this Prince's hat from Sign of the Times? They really should have taken whoever did the hair and costuming on Mad Men and had them do this, to get it right.

Nobody given even two shits about the eye color are these actresses relative to the characters they are playing. Are you even hearing yourself with this ridiculousness?

[quote]CZ was so beautiful

Ummm

R143 Then they may as well invent fictional characters, since these actresses are failing so fundamentally to capture the very REAL people they’re portraying. Eye color is one thing, but their personalities, voices AND appearances are all wrong.

We're pretending the Swans had personalities now, are we?

Funny then, given how wrong they apparently got it, that the only criticism you could actually offer was about eye colour

Oh, did you know them personally, R143?

You sound like a striving idiot. You have no idea what these women were actually like in real life because you never laid eyes on them even once, let alone got close enough to understand their personalities.

Get over yourself.

R143 should be R145 above.

Pencil Chloe Sevigny in for the Charles Bronson biopic.

R148 There are dozens of books, audio recordings (some of which are featured in The Copote Tapes), thousands of photos. These women were some of the most photographed and written about people in the world during their heyday. If one is interested in Capote or high society, and has even a cursory amount of knowledge, it’s not hard to see that the anachronisms and inaccuracies are glaring. I can forgive a lack of physical resemblance - Natalie Portman does not resemble Jackie, but yet she managed to capture her. Or at least a part of her. That is not the case here, largely thanks to amateurish writing and broad performances from actresses who clearly don’t know much about their subjects. I’m pleased that you’re enjoying the show, but this is a discussion thread and we are allowed to DISCUSS.

How can anyone watch tight faced, over the hill Demi Moore in those flashbacks and defend the casting in this show? 😂

Poorly researched, amateurish writing, broad performances, and yet you can guarantee r151 will be here for every episode.

[quote]I can forgive a lack of physical resemblance

It was 20 minutes ago that you were whining about eye colour.

[quote] They really should have taken whoever did the hair and costuming on Mad Men and had them do this, to get it right.

That reminds me of Vivian Vance. On I Love Lucy, she had the simplest 1950s hairstyle. Yet every time she’s been portrayed, the hair was always wrong.

Like a poster upthread said, the real history - and real women - were so fascinating, why the need to embellish and invent? It screams lazy writing.

I was really looking forward to it but meh I don’t care enough about any of it except possibly Babe Paley.

For me, they needed to start by delving into Capote’s relationship with each of these “swans”. Because they ostracize and hurt him so early on, I don’t yet care enough to actually care. Except for Babe Paley. I saw at least a glimpse of their friendship so I understand where she’s coming from with wanting to freeze him out.

If they NOW start going into the backstories of the friendships, too late for me. I’ll continue to watch but yeah it didn’t draw me in early enough.

Someone up thread mentioned Chloë Sevigny being miscast as CZ. Couldn’t agree more. Now don’t get me wrong, I usually have no opinion of her but in THIS role, Chloë’s too horse-faced and no where near feminine enough for this role. Very distracting for me in scenes with the other women who are much more delicate and believable. Bad casting (and the wig line is atrocious across her forehead - big distraction for me).

R144 - I'm seeing Drew Barrymore.

Gwyneth Paltrow should have been cast as C. Z. Guest.

Casting rule #1: Never cast uglier than the real person.

CZ wasn’t as “hard” looking as Chloe.

I'm seeing Gena Rowlands.

My grandmother's given name was Genevieve. She went by "Babe" her entire life. She was a ballerina, then taught ballet. She made me love Swan Lake. She was elegant, perfect black hair, itty-bitty waist, smoked and drank. I got her furs and some of her jewelry. The five-strand pearl necklace is my favorite. I can smell the Shalimar, ciggies and sour mood as I write.

[quote] Did John O’Shea really beat Capote up at a Thanksgiving dinner? And in front of Phyllis Diller, no less?

In real life, it was Phyllis Diller who beat up Truman Capote in front of John O'Shea.

The weird thing is that we were supposed to think the LA Thanksgiving was a huge comedown for Truman and John O'Shea because Joanne Carson's house was so rundown and the food was not professionally catered.

But since so many TV and movie stars were there (though the only one they called by name was Roddy McDowell and the only one instantly physically identifiable was Phyllis Diller--but the credits suggest others were there too), they would actually have had a great time, especially since both Capote and O'Shea were such starfuckers.

R130 it should be fairly obvious I am on the spectrum, I’ve said so many times as well. It’s why I am able to recognize these things. That’s how the brain works, it sees patterns.

When did you get diagnosed as retarded?

Word is that Baitz was #meetoo’d and that’s why he parted company with the Sally Field Programme.

I’m hoping we’ll get an episode that features his childhood in Alabama with cousin Sook and young Nelle Harper Lee. But we probably won’t as he already mentioned Sook.

TV GuideNews Jan. 2, 2008 at 5:01 p.m. PT

Jon Robin Baitz has left the show he created, Brothers & Sisters, after repeatedly bumping up against differently thinking ABC decision-makers. "These little rumors floated about for months," Baitz says in a blog at TheHuffingtonPost.com, making reference to a "cutesy blindish item" posted to TVGuide.com's own Ausiello Report. What brought about this breakup between successful show and its sire? As shared in a separate posting, Baitz - who last season blogged for TVGuide.com - cites pressure to steer B&S away from older-skewing characters and dramatic stories and toward the younger set and soapier tales. Now, the always-candid writer says, "I can... only watch as the demographic demands that have turned America into an ageist and youth-obsessed nation drives the storylines younger and younger, whiter and whiter, and with less and less reflection of the real America. I will never again have to do a notes call wherein the fear and seasickness of the creative execs always prevail over taking a risk, resulting more often than not in muddy and flattening or treacly sweet compromises." Now, Baitz writes, "I cannot help but dream about what my version of Brothers & Sisters would have looked like. A show that could simply hold on the aging and real face of Sally Field, and reflect the sorrow and rage there... reflect the cold and funny sexuality of Patty Wettig's Holly, the perfect reconstruction of the L.A. mistress... hold on the eyes of Ron Rifkin, and reflect the wisdom, joyous childishness and the melancholy. A show [that] could have followed the youngest, prodigal son to Iraq [and] shown his fellow soldiers, dying... allowed Calista Flockhart's character to be actually truly political... go even further in dealing with Kevin Walker's internalized homophobia and his fear of contact with others." All the above, Baitz says, "is what I thought I was making." In retrospect, though, he notes, "I was naive, totally naive." What's your take? As a charter B&S fan, I have to say that this development definitely taints my enjoyment of the show.

r151 are there any recordings of them speaking? All I could find was this interview with CZ Guest. Her intonations remind me a lot of Little Edie.

R168 Gawd, this makes it even more glaring what a flop Chloe is. She sounds NOTHING like this. She’s just playing herself.

I like it, but don't love it - at least not yet. It's an interesting vibe and it's fun to look at, but the actual story isn't that interesting - again, at least not yet. Hollander being that queeny is actually part of what's saving it for me. Can it be grating? Sure, but I think that's the point. If Capote was like that, then by all means show it.

Don't forget the talented Mr. Lonergan...

[quote] [R130] it should be fairly obvious I am on the spectrum, I’ve said so many times as well. —Anonymous

You honestly think we're somehow keeping track of you? Hon, you're literally [italic]Anonymous[/italic] on this site. Look at your byline.

I'd recommend upping those meds.

Why would anyone expect historical accuracy from a Ryan Murphy show? They always have a lot of middle-aged actresses and very modern, politically correct themes relevant to the LGBTQ community. I think some of you should lower expectations and enjoy the ride.

R128, thanks for looking that up. I've been so confused by the number of people citing "don't get it twisted" as some kind of ultra-modern expression that would be anachronistic for this show. I've been around a long time, and the idiom is definitely nothing new or remarkable.

Robbie Baitz is not a very good writer. He's had a few good plays but most of what he does is very simple. very formulaic. And seldom very interesting.

Another of those people who keep failing up.

[quote] I think some of you should lower expectations and enjoy the ride.

That's also excellent dating advice!

*

R174 Regarding King Charles, he, atleast, likes to grow 'stuff'. I can only see her using that word in reference to preparing a bird. It's then followed up with him giving her a courgette, which gave everyone a chance to giggle at John for thinking it was a car. If they're going to be pretentious they need to do better than 'stuff', or 'things'.

[Robbie Baitz is not a very good writer. He's had a few good plays but most of what he does is very simple. very formulaic. And seldom very interesting.]

I don't know of anything else he wrote but if this is any indication I agree. I'd be embarrassed to have to say some of the lines in this series.

Personally I find Capote fascinating. Many sides. Like the room I went to in Fairyland (must I include the 'no pun intended' disclaimer?). Who was the reflection in the mirrors and who was 'the real man'? I watch him speaking on various interviews, he seems to be aware of the outward image he was projecting, crafting. Calculated yet comes off as sincere, even heartfelt. I cannot discern if his honesty was real, even to himself. He was intelligent enough about the inner workings of a person to understand his own inner workings but was crafted from a life that put a lot of dents in the clay so to speak. I wonder how many dents were there before his introspection, the desire to become what ever he wished to become began. Before his ability to understand himself, smooth out the dents and craft his own image as he wished the clay had hardened. The faults built in.

Some think he meant to hurt himself with his last book by betraying the confidences of his friends and causing himself to be ostrasized by 'the Swans'. I'm not sure that is it. I wonder if it was he felt more comfortable being the loner he was since childhood. Maybe he was just being true to 'the real man' ,the one he did craft, 'the writer'. Not a visible image, 'the writer'.

It's funny his name was Truman. I wonder if that at all influenced him.

I am a fan of Truman Capote. But honestly, those women. Babe Paley was the most banal insipid, shallow ridiculous person I can imagine. Slim Keith and CZ Guest were not dumb women. T But Babe was so self involved and so consumed with bullshit it was just sad. And she was no beauty. She was pretty. But jeez.

Truman saw the script to this miniseries.

His comment?

That’s not writing. That’s typing.

Truman Capote on the casting of Chloe as CZ Guest - "It looks like she ate CZ".

Based on the R168 video CZ's voice is not distinctive.

They should have included some of his vicious words for Jacqueline Susann but she doesn’t even get a mention in Leamer’s book, not even a side note.

He called her a truck driver in drag and disparaged her books.

(I love her books and think they got better as she went along.)

All of the husbands of the swans were cheating and the swans were ok with it as long as the money kept flowing and hubby didn’t divorce them. I mean…look at Happy Rockefeller. Jesus. She was supposedly known for her fashion sense. I don’t see it, but whatever.

They were all obsessed with fashion, hair and makeup because they had nothing else to define them except their mansions, So e if these women were born dirt poor and reinvented themselves. Some were born into wealth and the extent of their education was Miss Porter’s School for Girls.

They don’t exist as a class of people nowadays because everyone gets divorced. Prenup agreements did away with swan culture.

Didn’t Bill Paley leave the Black & White Ball to go fvck another woman? I thought I had read that.

I have long been a fan of Truman’s writing. As a gay born at the end of the baby boom, I read Vanity Fair cover to cover in the 80s and 90s,, along with all the gossip columns that tracked Truman and the swans. I read every VF column Dominick Dunne ever wrote, and also all of his books.

I like Feud /Swans. It is not historically accurate about minutiae and I don’t care. It gets the essence of that time and those people right.

Lastly, the shittiest, most inept, fucked-up writer VF ever employed is Kevin Fucking Sessums.

There, I said it.

You mean the Pilgrim?

R189

Yes. Here he is forcing some rando to pose with him for his socials.

Magoo and Vag McQuim!

Sorry, back to your regular programming 😀

R184 What? I think her voice/cadence is extremely distinctive. You don’t hear that accent anymore.

R188 "gets" me!

For Truman...

OK. I just reserved the Leamer book about Capote and The Swans. Is it worth buying?

I would just get it from the library. Why would you buy it? I doubt you'd read it a second time.

What strikes me in the second episode is that all of the actresses playing the swans are all too YOUNG. Aren’t they all supposed to be well into their sixties?

Love the Phyllis Diller addition

I hope they show quite a bit of Kay Graham tonight. Capote courted her and so he threw the Black-and-White Ball in her honor, but she never really took to him the way the other women did and she never became a swan.

For one thing she was too busy running the Washington Post, but for another she was shy (she did not care for high society) and she was also quite smart. She went to Vassar and then transferred to graduate from the University of Chicago.

Kay Graham was serious, not decorative.

Kay Graham was no Mrs. Pynchon...

I thought her name was Katharine.

Kay was a diminutive of Katharine

Just as Babe Paley was really Barbara and Slim Keith was really Nancy, Kay Graham was really Katherine.

...and Cyd was really Tula Ellice

[quote]the way the other women did and she never became a swan.

She was a dour bitch, not a “so social maven” like the others

[quote]Just as Babe Paley was really Barbara and Slim Keith was really Nancy, Kay Graham was really Katherine.

Katie. That's what I called her. Katie.

Ben Bradlee called her Katherine and he referred to her as Mrs. Graham. I read his book and her book. I love reading about the world of NEws papers etc. from back in the day when they meant something. of course my romance started with Woodward and Bernstein and Watergate. It was the hearings and then the book and it was all my mother talked about. Everyone at our house hated Nixon and felt sorry for his wife.

Kay Graham's tit is gonna get caught in the wringer!

To R171, Now that story would be "one hell of a mini-series" on Netflix.

God, I miss the old Vanity Fair!!

R208 Same. I remember coming home from work in the 90’s and if VF hit the mailbox that day, all plans were off. I was going to sit there for two or three hours and read every last word. And don’t get me started on Spy, which in my opinion was the greatest American magazine of that era.

I really miss magazines. I know they still exist in some pathetic form, but not like the old days.

Another thing I miss, is that before WiFi was ubiquitous on flights, we would go to the news stand at the airport and buy a stack of trashy magazines for the flight, like Us, People, etc.

The good old days.

OMG yes. When the new Movieline would come out, I'd puck up a copy at Circus of Books and read it at Marco's on Santa Monica Blvd over a bowl of spaghetti bolonese. Now all three are just GONE. Fucking sad.

I should know this, but why was tonight's episode in B&W?

R209, My parents subscribed to "Esquire." As a teen in a small town I felt very sophisticated in reading it. Also "Saturday Evening Post," wherein my father read some poems by John Lennon and, previously rather "Get off my lawn!" about the Beatles, declared Lennon a genius!

And they in turn indulged me with "Mad" and "The National Lampoon."

I had this issue; wish I still did:

[quote] I should know this, but why was tonight's episode in B&W?

because:

1) black and white footage was more common for documentaries in the 1960s

2) they wanted to make the episode set back earlier than the time of most of the rest of the series (which is set in the 70s and early 80s)

3) because it was about the Black and White Ball.

Oh, for the days, r11! The Golden Era of talk-show guests, even, or especially, in the afternoon! Witty, charming, amusing, interesting, revelatory---and usually "just because," with nothing to hawk or promote!

Besides the likes of Capote, Mailer, or Vidal, one could be entertained by raconteurs such as Oscar Levant, Peter Ustinov, Hermione Gingold, Hans Conreid, even Orson Welles!

Thank you, r213. I knew of #1, having lived then. I did not realize #2. And I think #3 is a silly reason, as B&W attire would be more striking amidst a colorful setting.

I am thoroughly enjoying the series despite any faults. I love the show especially Chloe and Demi.

I want moore Demi as Ann Woodward

R196- most were in their late 40s early 50s in the 1960s.

in fact, younger

[quote]most were in their late 40s early 50s in the 1960s.

but not in the late seventies, we see Gerald Ford on the television

Another Vanity Fair fan here. And yes, I was also raised on Mad Magazine, and was also an Esquire subscriber. I remember feeling very cool when I got my first gift subscription to Rolling Stone, too. And does anyone remember The Village Voice? I remember it when it was actually a newspaper. Oh. I read W too.

To R217...I see what you did there with your post, and I caught it right away& laughed.

The dark roast coffee is doing its job!!

If you haven't done it yet, read "This Crazy Thing Called Love" by Susan Braudy, the whole story on the Woodwards.

Rolling Stone magazine: Better than anything hipper and hipper than anything better.

Gloria VanderBilt sounded like Little Edie too. I remember her stiff hair and the way she talked from her jeans commercials.

Glo '41

R221, I remember reading the VV! Jules Feiffer cartoons and Michael Musto's columns. Not to mention the Classifieds.

R7, It's the nose and the hair.

George:

Chloe, same pose:

It is dull. Not a good choice for Feud.. It feels lifeless and who really cares about these women.

[quote]Gloria VanderBilt sounded like Little Edie too. I remember her stiff hair and the way she talked from her jeans commercials.

I remember she had to change her jeans commercial. Early on, she talked about the fit around the derrière (she used that word in the commercial). A few weeks later, it was the same commercial, but the word derrière had been changed to the phrase “back here.”

Village Voice and After Dark were the two must reads for the cosmopolitan New Yorker.

[quote]It is dull. Not a good choice for Feud.. It feels lifeless and who really cares about these women.

I think the number of threads and replies show that many here do care, r229.

I see Ellen Barkin as CZ Guest at r168.

I read that Babe was so self-obsessed and a perfectionist because Bill Paley was hyper critical of her and very cutting. He didn’t think she was pretty and let her know it.

The book goes on and on about how Babe Paley was one of the most beautiful women ever.

But then I see photos and think… attractive yes but hardly Helen of Troy.

[quote]If you haven't done it yet, read "This Crazy Thing Called Love" by Susan Braudy, the whole story on the Woodwards.

I’m not the poster you directed this to but I have that book. I was disappointed with it because it is written in a very dry and blunt way. IIRC the author was a friend of Ann’s sons and I think her intention was to remove the gossipy angle from the story.

r236 I read an excerpt and it the writing was not good

R230 Bravo. The details we remember!

R235, charisma doesn’t communicate itself through photography. Several of the renowned “beauties” of the flapper era look like tire biters in photos.

Glo wasn’t that great of an actress. And that hair. Yikes! She should have let Anderson give her some advice.

R135 "For those of us who know the story, the inaccuracies are distracting!

Keeps one up into the wee hours!

Are there any filmed interviews with these paragons of wit, taste and style? This one with The Princess Lee her voice sounds like Lucy, if Lucy were a dreary pretentious bore.

R242 I didn’t find her dreary or pretentious at all. Her memories are vivid and it’s fun to hear her recollections, especially of the Beales. I wish she’d done more interviews, or even a documentary.

[quote]I wish she’d done more interviews, or even a documentary.

I *was* doing a fucking documentary until those asshole Maysles dropped my documentary to do the one about those two mental patient cousins living in their destitute house! Fvck them all.

[quote]That’s how the brain works, it sees patterns.

Aspie troll, honey, that's how EVERYONE'S brain works.

Yet yours is the only one that sees an autism pattern in every second person, and in an industry where more people are likely to be non-autistic extraverts than the general population.

R243 Sending my Aunt Seal your way. Enjoy.

R212

I read National Lampoon religiously - do you remember the issue where the two teens wake up as the opposite gender? It was hysterical but all I can remember now is that when the boy-who-woke-up-as-a-girl had sex, he thought that doing 100 jumping jacks and shoving two Midol up his vagina would take care if it. Haha!

Meaning, he was worried about pregnancy. I didn’t word it well.^^^

Lee Radziwell was the personification of a Swan

^ Wrong bird dear

I stole the first issue from Big Top, r247.

Actually, Radziwill was definitely a good friend of Capote’s but not at all of the NYC society crowd. Her sister was an all star- all deferred and accommodated Mrs O at her whin practically. Mrs O was a class act. Lee was not a nice woman and not part of the inner circle of those women. At all. It’s one of the few things the Feud does not get right.

Well, they made out the Black and White ball was this awful thing, and the scene where he humiliates the crasher Ann Woodward is not true. This article is very interesting and all true.

Disappointing. Seems the writer of this series followed in Capote's idea of what would be a good 'book'. Well, no.

Some real stories.

Why did she have to change to "back there"?

Murphy Brown says it was a big ole snooze.

I'm hating the third episode. Bored to tears. I think they were going for something like a Grey Gardens documentary but it's a 0/10.

I couldn’t for the life of me stay awake during this week’s episode either, R257.

R257 I hate to say it because I LOVED the first two episodes, but this was not good. They got the Maysels style all wrong. And except for maybe the scrne with the mother at the end, the plot wasn't really advanced at all.

I'm not a student of the Maysles but did they use that roaming camera and zooms-in for their coverage that I see in this show's clips of the Ball?

It starts off strong but gets pretty bad, the AV Club review warns.

R260, yes, but more subtly.

I think a big problem is the structure of going back and forth in time. If it was just linear there would be more engagement. By showing everything in the beginning it quickly became dull.

R260 No.

"The entire third episode of Feud is shot as if using footage from a Maysles documentary (an homage from director Gus Van Sant). But no such documentary was ever commissioned..."

Did the Maysles Brothers Really Make a Documentary About the Black and White Ball? At the height of his fame following the critical and commercial success of In Cold Blood, Truman plans a gala social occasion that will be the talk of the town, with him as the social arbiter. In the show, he hires the noted documentarians Albert and David Maysles to make a film about the planning process and the event itself. The Maysles interview all the Swans (each of whom Truman has led to believe will be the guest of honor) and shoot a planning lunch at La Côte Basque.

The entire third episode of Feud is shot as if using footage from a Maysles documentary (an homage from director Gus Van Sant). But no such documentary was ever commissioned, although Albert Maysles was a friend of Capote’s and did attend the actual ball. And if there had been a documentary in the works, La Côte Basque would no more have allowed cameras to shoot during lunch service than they would have added a Whopper with special sauce to the menu. The Maysles did, however, make a 30-minute documentary about Capote and the impact of In Cold Blood on the development of the nonfiction novel genre, called A Visit With Truman Capote.

R221 The Village Voice is no longer a newspaper?!!!

I've been out West too long :(

Venal vapid vacuous viragos.

I'm really enjoying it. It's not a documentary, and I think that's what the hysterical DL detractors need to be reminded of.

R265 Brace yourself... Look is no longer available.

Ryan Murphy throws a turdburger episode into his best seasons on purpose. Don’t give up hope. Yet.

Ok, some of his seasons do suck.

I loved tonight's episode. It was entertaining. I can also understand all the DL people who are losing their minds over this because it isn't an historically accurate documentary. I mean, I understand they are insane and can't just calm down and be entertained. It ain't that deep. It's a TV show, bitches!

It's hard not to draw comparisons between Truman and Ward McAllister, with both having been excised from society for talking out of school. Were there other gay men who were shunned by the glamorous set for telling their secrets?

Nothing new here, as far as a Ryan Murphy production goes. They get almost every element right apart from the writing. The writing is... always cack, ALWAYS. Scenes are fluffed to try to distract you from this. Tom Hollander's performance is also grating. He can't seem to rein it in with the accent to make it work. Maybe not his fault but it’s the central performance so that is a bit of a problem.

In saying that I love all these actresses, so here for a bit more of a fun time if they can manage that. I'm just not sure how they can wring 8 episodes out of this, when it’s already getting tedious.

Lord the third episode dragged, and the women all feel wildly underutilized.

Capote is awful and insufferable, we get it. His endless monologuing grew very tiresome very quickly, so I'm hoping that we get to actually see more of the women in the coming episodes.

Yeah R273, this is getting less interesting by each episode. And if you're going to do something this glacial the casting needs to be perfect. Demi, Molly and Chloe are playing dress up and are not at Naomi or Diane's level, IMO.

r242 Christ, she manages to make going on a tour bus and backstage with the Stones sound dull.

Ryan Murphy - the man who could make Truman Capote boring.

I usual love Hollander but he doesn’t work here. Capote lacks charm and isn’t fun to watch. The non linear structure really kills any dramatic tension. A real miss.

I'm thoroughly enjoying capote and the Swans even if some of it is invented. The show is capturing the essence of the characters and time period.

Capote is a cunt. I couldn't have lasted hanging around with him.

Love Demi, Chloe, Naomi and Diane.

[quote]Capote lacks charm

That suggests he had any in real life

It’s weird to think of a time when an author was so famous. and not just because they sold a million books. There is no writer today as famous as Truman was in the 60s and 70s. Now people get famous for sex tapes, sports and/or being pop/rap stars. That’s about it.

Beating Nov. '75 Capote Esquire by 3 monthes was July '75 National Lampoon (cover/Stevie Wonder 3D glasses)

with Fag Hag Mag insert / see link with full readable PDF in link below

Something that I thought was odd is Demi Moore keeps saying to him “we were friends” “I’m like your mom” “I was a swan”

But the reality is their characters only met one time, briefly in a hotel setting.

Why make up a friendship that didn’t exist when it doesn’t add to the story that much?

full read in link below / go to the July issue/ see side index on the left (1975.07)

Fag Hag Mag humor article starts on page 67

I don't think anything quite like it in 1975 had ever been printed / still very funny 50 years later

Grandfather of DataLounge!

R280 When it comes to someone like Capote I don't want someone else making up stuff. Capote was fascinating and I want the real story.

R270 you r statement is on the money. "There is no writer today as famous as Truman was in the 60s and 70s".

R276 gets it.

r282: Jon Robin Baitz is pushing a parallel between Ann Woodward and Nina Capote (born Ellie Mae Faulk). They were both older women in Capote's life who tried to make it into society from humble rural beginnings and who each got to a certain height in terms of wealth but then eventually committed suicide. Baitz's point is that by humiliating Woodward to the point where she killed herself Capote was in fact replicating the fact of his mother's suicide. he loves the swans (and Baitz is trying to include Woodward among them) because they reminded him of his society-obsessed mother whose love he craved, and he hates them because they remind him of his mother who abandoned him as a small child and then again when she killed erself when he was an adult.

Zac Posen made this even more clear when he discussed his costuming for the Black and White ball--he said the two most elaborate costumes were Ann Woodward's and Capote's mother's, and the former was the White Swan (Odette) and the latter was the Black Swan (Odile). They are flip sides of the same coin.

I still can’t get over how bad episode 3 was. About 5-10 minutes was the only footage worth keeping from the cutting room floor — which is ironic since this episode was about editing a documentary.

Episode three was my favorite. I’m surprised people are critical. I thought it was compelling from start to finish.

Ep. 3 dragged a bit. The entire Black & White Ball scene wasn't engaging enough because it didn't have an arc. It pepped up when Demi appeared but then it went soft again with more of the same.

May tune in just for this episode.

R282, I agree with this and similar comments about flagrant historical inaccuracies. I don't get the people saying, "It isn't a DOCUMENTARY, frau/prisspot/etc.!" If a real story with real people isn't interesting enough as it really happened, then why are you making a show about it? It's fine to take a little artistic license, but to take real-life people and events about which everything is known and portray them other than the way they happened, then it's dishonest. Better to make a disguised version of a well-known story. That's what romans à clef are for.

It bothers me because ignorant people watch a show like this and think they now know all about Ann Woodward and how she crashed the Black and White Ball with her son, or how Babe Paley took the Concorde in 1967 (or whenever the show said), and they get history garbled.

R290 I was one of those, but my point was more like "you shouldn't expect historical accuracy from Ryan Murphy". It's not like it's a Ken Burns documentary. Besides, we're not watching a story of the founding fathers, it's a bitchy gay guy and a bunch of rich bitches.

"It's a level of queening that has fallen, sadly, out of favor."

Thankfully.

The shows’s approach to the truth is very similar to that of The Crown. Based on real characters and situations then embellished for dramatic intent. But presented in such a way that many people treat it as the truth.

It's not like Baitz and Murphy are denying the facts of the Armenian genocide. They're saying one socialite tried to gate-crash a party she never gate-crashed, and that another socialite claimed to take one mode of transportation from Europe to the US years before it was available.

Big deal.

“But presented in such a way that many people treat it as the truth.”

NOT on this thread!

[quote] “But presented in such a way that many people treat it as the truth.”

They show a disclaimer at the end of every episode that makes it clear they've altered the facts.

THEY'RE GARBLING HISTORY!

Since when does DL care about the the truth or factual accuracy?

Every straight, married guy is a closet gay.

Kate Middleton is bald and a coke fiend.

Russians are invading this site.

An Italian twink nearly died escaping George Clooney's clutches.

Etc etc ad nauseum

To R292, you are correct in that. 20 yrs. ago, this mini-series would have been "Must see GAY TV". If I was in Philly, it would have been running in the Westbury bar at 13th & Spruce St. Harry and Billy would be behind the bar insulting me, saying the most horrible things to me, me laughing at them. The older gays always had the best stories about people. The best comments are always from the older gay guys!! I was in my early 30's, married at the time.

I understand dramatic license. I also understand eliminating characters for the narrative flow or consolidating certain characters. And usually they will say so. They will say some characters are fictional or composites. But what I hate is when they gratuitously invent bullshit and deliberately mislead. I Remember watching TROY, the movie by Wolfgang Peterson, about the Trojan War. And first off, he makes Achilles the older protective cousin of Patroclus. Then he has Hector killing Menelaus. Briseis becomes Achilles' lover.

I think when you are presenting something based on real events you have an obligation to either stay as close to the truth as possible or say you have altered the facts and this is a different version, fiction based on, etc.

[quote]But what I hate is when they gratuitously invent bullshit and deliberately mislead.

I don't.

This was my least liked episode, so far. It's probably going to be the episode with the most polarized viewer response, if this thread is indicative of its broader reception. Hopefully the show will right itself now that they've essentially laid out Capotes inner/outer conflicts with these women and his mother, with the Woodward character acting as surrogate.

It was obvious she'd crashed much earlier as she was veiled in chainmail. The lunch scene was ridiculous with Lee seeking out the camera and CZ trying to hide from it, these women would never have been friends, is really quite clear through these depictions. All of the labored 'look how much these women need and love me' posturing is getting annoying.

[quote] [...] what I hate is when they gratuitously invent bullshit and deliberately mislead. I Remember watching TROY, the movie by Wolfgang Peterson, about the Trojan War. And first off, he makes Achilles the older protective cousin of Patroclus. Then he has Hector killing Menelaus. Briseis becomes Achilles' lover.

[quote]I think when you are presenting something based on real events you have an obligation to either stay as close to the truth as possible or say you have altered the facts and this is a different version, fiction based on, etc.

[italic]Troy[/italic] wasabsolutely not "based on real events." It was based on a legend of historical events, the legend of the Trojan War. There may have been a war at the site of Troy, but it is extremely unlikely that characters such as Achilles, Patroklos, Menelaos, and Helen ever existed (I cant think of a single ancient historian who would argue they were real people).

Our most famous source for the Trojan War were the epics of Homer, the [italic]Iliad[/italic] and the [italic]Odyssey,[/italic] but they are both imaginative works of poetry. In fact, the ancient Greek authors often disagreed on the events of the Trojan War, since of course it was just a legend.

"I think when you are presenting something based on real events you have an obligation to either stay as close to the truth as possible or say you have altered the facts and this is a different version, fiction based on, etc."

Indeed.

This production manages to make the Black and White Ball look like a third-rate wedding. Absolutely nothing like the social event of the 20th Century, which it was. Dull, inaccurate, poorly acted (except by Hollander), and poorly written. No plot, no action, no intrigue. Capote is rolling in his grave.

R305 I'm reading the book the series is based on, Capote's Women. Apart from the glamorous guests, it does sound like a third-rate wedding. Here are some excerpts:

"Truman put together the Black and White Ball for surprisingly little money. For decorations, he settled on bunches of balloons."

"When the Italians got up to leave, Gianni [Agnelli] announced that he was going to play poker at Elaine's, an East Side restaurant popular among celebrities. As the Italians walked out, a photographer heard them speaking in the Plaza lobby. "They were expecting something absolutely over the top," he said. "What they got were a bunch of of balloons . . . hung off the chandeliers. And I heard them saying, 'Is this what we flew over for?'"

"The following year, the Agnelli ball in Paris was decidedly different. The guests were overwhelmingly members of the European aristocracy. There was no need to garnish the evening with celebrities. The event took place on an island in the middle of one of the lakes in the Bois de Boulogne. Gondoliers ferried the formally dressed guests to the spectacular venue in brightly lit, covered boats."

I thought the crepe paper streamers and construction paper chains were lovely.

I loved this episode. And it showed how he was becoming disillusioned with his Swans after he saw the interview his documentarians did with Lee Radziwill at the hair salon, and watching them all like specimens in a petri dish at his ball. Watching them drink. Being "vulgar." There was nothing of grace or refinement about them. I think his infatuation with them was over. He was already formulating the beginnings of his novel in his mind and then the filmmaker he was dancing with gave him his title.

The problem is they were graceful and refined.

The problem was he was a pet - a mean half-breed pug who couldn’t memorialize them like Warhol.

[quote] "When the Italians got up to leave, Gianni [Agnelli] announced that he was going to play poker at Elaine's, an East Side restaurant popular among celebrities. As the Italians walked out, a photographer heard them speaking in the Plaza lobby. "They were expecting something absolutely over the top," he said. "What they got were a bunch of of balloons . . . hung off the chandeliers. And I heard them saying, 'Is this what we flew over for?'"

[quote]"The following year, the Agnelli ball in Paris was decidedly different. The guests were overwhelmingly members of the European aristocracy. There was no need to garnish the evening with celebrities. The event took place on an island in the middle of one of the lakes in the Bois de Boulogne. Gondoliers ferried the formally dressed guests to the spectacular venue in brightly lit, covered boats."

And yet, who remembers that ball today?

Meanwhile Capote's ball is the subject of books and documentaries and is remembered as the Party of the Century, even though far less money was spent on it.

Ain't it the way!

R268

Well, at least LIFE is still around.

[quote] The problem is they were graceful and refined.

I disagree. His tragedy is learning that his mother’s yearned for high society ladies were as petty and sad and grasping as everyone else he despised.

[quote] Capote is rolling in his grave.

Then maybe it HAS all been worthwhile.

I think Episode 3 was critical. It was the turning point. Watch him watching them. Watch him as he keeps his distance from them all. He was observing not participating. Oh, he did his host thing greeting people, etc. As the their pretensions dropped away, their inhibitions relaxed, they weren't so different from his own mother. And that was the end for them."Here, mother, is this who you wanted to be like?" Maybe this was the moment he began to hate them, to resent them for not knowing what to do with all their wealth and power. He was beginning to find them ridiculous and small. I'm recalling a line from Breakfast at Tiffany's. When his Holly Golightly said something like, "If I had her money, I'd be richer than her."

Was Capote jealous because he had to earn his money and the swans didn’t? He did pretty well money wise.

I think one of the books mentioned (and maybe this was just fiction) that he got more glee out of who he didn’t invite, and imagining their waiting for an invitation that never arrived, than he did with those he did invite.

[quote]Maybe this was the moment he began to hate them, to resent them for not knowing what to do with all their wealth and power.

What power did they have? Their husbands did, but the wives were just fixtures in their lovely homes, like the marble in their bathrooms. They could, and did, make philanthropic gestures, but if they'd been women of real substance they wouldn't have been married to men who only wanted...well, it's more arm jewelry than arm candy when you get to that level.

Also, if they'd been women of real substance Capote would have run a mile from them.

What was he doing with his own fame and power, anyway?

Anyone know the name of the song Truman and his mother danced to at the Ball? I think it's from Swan Lake?

[quote] What was he doing with his own fame and power, anyway?

Exploiting it.

In Cold Blood was a double edged sword. It made popular a new form of literature (true crime fiction) but the attention that it brought to the people of that town was not something they wanted.

R318, Swan Lake, Op. 20, Act 1: No. 2, Waltz

R317, I was thinking of the comments he made about Katherine Graham. Of curse her husband was dead, but I think he considered her the exemplar. Those women had no substance to speak of. ANd Capote himself was awful. The fame and the notoriety ruined him. He at least could point to his literary achievements. But he was a vicious man. When he threw Woodward out of his party, she spoke the truth to him. As he watched it later he wanted them to re-run the scene. She held up a mirror for him.

R321, but he never through her out of the party- didn’t happen. Yes he was a mean man. But there are many mean men and women who don’t self destruct. In fact they do great work. He was an addict/alcoholic. It destroyed his artistic talent and turned him from just a mean man into a monster. Then it killed him.

If Truman was an attractive man, he wouldn't be living vicariously through a bunch of fag hags. They gave him the attention that hot men wouldn't, unless he was paying.

See also, Andy Warhol. Gossipy queens thinking they've been accepted into the orbit of the prom queen and her high school clique.

By contrast, someone who never let a lack of looks stop him getting action with hot young guys was David Hockney.

R274 I think Molly is fine in her role. She's playing Joanna Carson, West Coast gal, not an uppity Upper East Side socialite. She makes it work.

I do, however, think Chloe Sevigny is horribly miscast.

This show feels like a one-page script treatment that Ryan Murphy is trying to stretch into 12 hours.

I do love the opening credits sequence, though.

^. agree. This story can’t fill 12 hours. Too much filler.

Is it true that Capote actually wrote To Kill a Mockingbird, or at least large parts of it?

Yes, there's no way a woman could write a novel of that quality. Harper Lee must have had help from a man, even if he was a big ole 'mo.

R327 There have been rumors for years that Capote wrote large portions of To Kill a Mockingbird, but there's no substantiation.

I wonder if Harper Lee will make an appearance in Feud.

I can see Elliot Page in the role.

Lies! I wrote the whole thing myself!

Rumours probably started by him.

It is suspicious that Harper Lee never wrote anything substantive ever again. Captoe even mentions in the show that Tennessee Williams based the character of Blanche DuBois on him, so he was influential and friendly with many of the top writers of the day.

[quote] It is suspicious that Harper Lee never wrote anything substantive ever again.

[quote]Captoe even mentions in the show that Tennessee Williams based the character of Blanche DuBois on him, so he was influential and friendly with many of the top writers of the day.

How can you possibly take that as accurate?

"Capote even mentions in the show that Tennessee Williams based the character of Blanche DuBois on him, so he was influential and friendly with many of the top writers of the day."

How sensible of R333 to take every word from a notoriously self-promoting liar as gospel truth.

There are plenty of examples of someone who wrote/directed/composed one wonderful thing, then nothing else. Charles Laughton's THE NIGHT OF THE HUNTER. More to the point, Margaret Edson's WIT.

The whole point of Feud-Capote, is that he just couldn't keep his mouth shut and thrived on gossip and dropping his truth bombs. If Capote had written any of To Kill....he would not have remained silent on the matter.

I watched the first ep last night. It’s fabulous! Not boring at all.

You know, OP, at no point during this show will cars and trucks turn into talking robots. You might as well tune out.

I’m glad you like it, r338, and I’m not OP, but accusing people who don’t share your tastes in TV of being Michael Bay fans does you no credit.

I think they will pad it out with other moments of Capote's colorful life. The late period of his life is full of bizarre situations.

I hope they include more Lee Radziwill scenes like her hilarious failed acting career. I'm sure we'll get Jackie O blips in future eps and their legendary rivalry (which was mostly going on inside Lee's head). I love reading about this period of NYC history, this show is gay heroin.

R334 She actually wrote that before she wrote To Kill a Mockingbird, but it wasn't published until after Mockingbird.

[quote]There have been rumors for years that Capote wrote large portions of To Kill a Mockingbird, but there's no substantiation.

I believe it because Harper Lee never really wrote another book. Go Set A Watchman remained unpublished until after her death. It is not as good as To Kill A Mockingbird.

Watchman was submitted and the publisher told her to rework it. I believe Capote stepped in, wrote large chunks of Mockingbird and let Harper take all the credit (possibly because she was nice to him as children).

I just finished the book this is based on and that was my thought when I finished reading it - how are they going to make a mini series out of relatively little? I enjoyed the book and learning about these women, but that is the entire book: learning about the back stories. The actual feud? He published the article, they stopped talking to him. The End. With Bette and Joan there's the promotion of Baby Jane and the ill fated attempt Hush Hush Sweet Charlotte. There was real, in person conflict. With this... they just iced him out and moved on. There's not a lot of material there. Might have made more sense ultimately to just do a limited series called The Swans and give each woman an episode.

[quote]at no point during this show will cars and trucks turn into talking robots

Spoiler alert!

[quote] I hope they include more Lee Radziwill scenes like her hilarious failed acting career

Calista Flockhart is very funny and pretty much looks the part but any time she has extended dialogue, all I can see is Ally McBeal as a bitchy society matron.

[quote][R334] She actually wrote that before she wrote To Kill a Mockingbird, but it wasn't published until after Mockingbird.

Does it matter? The point is she wrote something else substantive. TKAM wasn't a one-off.

R322, The fact that it never happened in real life at the party, is irrelevant. For purposes of this telling, Woodward/Demi Moore represented a kind of Greek Chorus in that moment. And Truman must have heard something like it at some point. At least I hope so.

There was something so desperate and so adolescent about the responses and reactions to that party. Scrambling for invitations, trying to figure out who would be the honoree, etc,

"There was something so desperate and so adolescent about the responses and reactions to that party."

That's because these people have arrested development. They are forever of the mindset that it's still high school and they need to be the most popular. If any of them actually did a day's work, they wouldn't have time to dwell upon trivial shit.

[quote]Does it matter? The point is she wrote something else substantive. TKAM wasn't a one-off.

The publisher didn’t think it good enough to publish.

She goes home, takes an unpublishable novel and turns it into a brilliant masterpiece and then never writes again?

[quote] She goes home, takes an unpublishable novel and turns it into a brilliant masterpiece and then never writes again?

This is not unusual. It’s the norm (especially in the music industry.) It’s just that most books aren’t To Kill A Mockingbird - neither are most films.

Imagine Terrence Malick’s reputation had only directed his first three films and not the ever diminishing returns thereafter.

If only M. Night Shyamalan had quit after Opus No.1

*

[quote]When he threw Woodward out of his party, she spoke the truth to him. As he watched it later he wanted them to re-run the scene. She held up a mirror for him.

That and Lee Radziwill's pointed commentary about friendship and sisterhood. Truman asked to rewatch both, then decided that perhaps a visual medium to document his swans wasn't such a good idea after all, and opted for a literary work in which he could control the narrative.

R353, are you serious with that list?

Margaret Mitchell was hit by a car and died. So we don’t know what she would have produced had she lived.

Sylvia Plath had mental problems and killed herself, so another case of we don’t know.

John Kennedy Toole killed himself and his book was published posthumously (11 years after his death.)

Salinger did write a second book which has been put on high school reading lists, if only to compare it to his more popular book.

Harper Lee died at 89, her only book was published when she was 33. She had the time to attempt another book.

I know it didn't actually happen, but I found the documentary's line referring to Truman as a "gay man" inappropriate for the time period (mid-'60s?)

Andy Cohen thinks he’s the modern day Capote but he lacks the wit and talent. His Swans are all rubber ducklings.

[quote]Andy Cohen thinks he’s the modern day Capote but he lacks the wit and talent.

But when it comes to drug use, however...

[quote] Andy Cohen thinks he’s the modern day Capote

Whatever bad things can be said about Capote, he at least was able to attract a life partner. What say you, Andy?

[quote] Meanwhile Capote's ball is the subject of books and documentaries and is remembered as the Party of the Century, even though far less money was spent on it.

yeah, it does seem like it was all about the marketing. A huge buildup, followed by a rather dreary reality. The story of these people's lives, probably.

R356 Yes, that was a big ol' anachronism.

Naomi Watts' character also used an expression in that episode that wasn't around in the 1960s. I can't remember what it was right now, but it was noticeable.

[quote] yeah, it does seem like it was all about the marketing. A huge buildup, followed by a rather dreary reality. The story of these people's lives, probably.

Capote did not spend a penny on marketing it.

I don't mean literal advertising r362. The whole thing within that society world of who is in and who is out and what it all means. That is what I am talking about. In the end, it kind of means very little, but for awhile it was an obsession with large numbers of people who just absolutely HAD to be invited.

And I agree with whoever upthread posted it might have been interesting to see a few little vignettes of the people devastated when they realized they weren't ON THE LIST.

Likewise there are also rumors that Lee wrote much of In Cold Blood

The ball was very important socially. Even Frank Sinatra attended and he didn’t like fags.

[quote] Likewise there are also rumors that Lee wrote much of In Cold Blood

I think she did all the secretarial and organizing work (note taking, trimming down the interviews and putting structure to the book) but I think Truman actually wrote the prose.

I wonder how many attendees of the Black and White ball also attended Liza’s wedding to David Gest.

Speaking of Liza's marriage to David Gest. Equally odd was Liz Taylor and Larry Fortensky. She didn't give a damn.

[quote]She didn't give a damn.

And why the hell should she?

R368 Liz was a well known size queen. Fortensky was hung. Nuff said.

R364 not likewise at all.

She was the researcher, on the record. That’s a fact: she made a material contribution. Literally, he had nothing to do with Mockingbird other than being a source material for Dill.

"Go Set a Watchman" was the first draft of "To Kill a Mockingbird." It is not a sequel, and it is not a separate work. Her editor worked with Harper Lee over two years to hone the flashback sequences of "Go Set a Watchman," which dealt with Jean Louise's (Scout's) memories of her childhood in Maycomb, Alabama, into a much better work.

It's only because of greed and desire to make a splash that the publishers billed the virtually unedited "Watchman" as a sequel to "Mockingbird."

Does someone really thing J.D. Salinger wrote only one book?

!

R367, we know at least three: Betty Bacall, Marisa Berenson, and Mia Farrow.

*think ^

[quote] he at least was able to attract a life partner.

Attracting a life partner is an indication of absolutely nothing.

Capote heavily edited To Kill a Mockingbird and turned it into a great work. He could have claimed a co-writing credit, but didn't.

[quote]I hung out with Truman a bit

I'm sure I believe that, "charlie." Was your good buddy Katharine Hepburn there too?

Bullshit R377– we’ve seen the drafts that say otherwise. You type like Jon R Baitz writes…

Harper Lee did write a second book. It was a kind of what happened to Atticus Finch story. How he changed or something. Go Set A Watchman was published in 2015.

See R372.

[quote] Likewise there are also rumors that Lee wrote much of In Cold Blood

[quote] [R327] There have been rumors for years that Capote wrote large portions of To Kill a Mockingbird,

So they wrote each others’ masterworks, what a clever trick they played on us all. How droll!

I love Chloe, Naomi and Demi. Molly seems like she doesn't belong in this series at all.

That last episode was really boring. I don’t know if I’m gonna be able to finish or not. Kind of disappointed.

Was Liz Taylor an attendee at the Black and White Ball?

[quote]I'm finding the new Capote Swans show so dull

I'm sure I would've found you quite dull, OP.

Have a look, R385

r387, thanks, but that's only a partial list.

I guess watch the old one…

Funny how there's no sportspeople amongst the guests. Capote the ole mo wouldn't know one.

I was Truman all along, bitches!

[quote]Funny how there's no sportspeople amongst the guests. Capote the ole mo wouldn't know one.

Capote didn’t need to leverage sports people. He invited everyone on the list because he wanted them indebted to him.

Norman Mailer was a guest. Have his thoughts on Capote every been revealed?

Laughing my ass off at this little tidbit "TV chef Ina Garten recreated a scaled-down version of the event for a themed dinner party on her daytime cookery show Barefoot Contessa. She served chicken hash followed by French toast and truffles for dessert, in keeping with the black and white theme of Capote's party."

R394, she did that because Truman is rumored to have let a small fart slip during one of his bon mots and she felt indebted

R393 From the book Capote's Women:

"One of Truman's neighbors [in Brooklyn Heights] was Norman Mailer who had inherited from Ernest Hemingway the mantle as America's leading macho author. Mailer thought that writing was like fighting a boxing match; in order to "win," you had to knock your opponent out. That was not the way Truman saw it, and by rights the two men should not have been friends. But above everything else, both of them appreciated literary accomplishment, and they grew to admire each other.

One day chancing into each other in the neighborhood they decided to have a drink. Truman was wearing what Mailer described as "a little gabardine cape . . . looking like a beautiful little faggot prince." Truman could have dressed in a manner that did not advertise his sexuality, but then he would not have been Truman. The two authors entered the first drinking establishment they came to on Montague Street, an Irish pub. It was 3:30 in the afternoon, when hard drinkers were already hard at work.

In those days before gentrification, an Irish pub was a decidedly working-class affair. Most good Irish Catholics did not want gays in their churches or their schools--and they sure as hell did not want them in their pubs. Mailer feared he might have they might have to fight their way out. But Truman was the mark of coolness. He walked straight through to the back of the bar and sat down.

Mailer thought if he had to live like this, he would be pulsating adrenaline from morning to night and would "die of adrenaline overflow." But this was Truman's life."

I hate macho authors.

It's pretty well known that Mailer was bisexual and that he was both terrified of gay men and professed to loathe them, but in actuality he was obsessed with them. He wrote constantly about homosexuality, bisexuality, and anal sex.

About this series, a quote from doctor samuel Johnson, a man who could out cunt Truman on any day: -

“He was (in this case the series) was not only dull, but a cause of dullness in others”

I liked Episode Three and thought it was very successful in its attempt to capture the Ball and all the players, using a documentary format while explaining the question, Why Did Truman Throw The Ball To Begin With? Was there an actual documentary that was never released? Did Truman have an affair or a one-timer with the director?

Gloria Vanderbilt was written about in La Cote Basque and depicted as being insufferably vacuous. I would love to hear anything Anderson Cooper had to say on this or Capote.

R374 here. I missed Phyllis Newman. That's four.

Was it Gore Vidal and Buckley who feuded or Vidal and Mailer?

Vidal and Buckley

[quote[ I liked Episode Three and thought it was very successful in its attempt to capture the Ball and all the players, using a documentary format while explaining the question, Why Did Truman Throw The Ball To Begin With? Was there an actual documentary that was never released? Did Truman have an affair or a one-timer with the director?

The Maysles Brothers were always co-directors, and then did not make a film about the Black-and White ball. That was the series's invention. they did make a short documentary film with him at about this time about In Cold Blood, which is where the showsunners got the idea.

Neither of the Maysles brothers had an affair with Capote.

R403, Vidal feuded with both Buckler and Mailer. Here's Vidal and a totally drunk Mailer on Dick Cavett at the height of their feud. They'd later (years later) bury the hatchet. I think Vidal also had Mailer thrown out of some party they were both at.

The Buckley-Vidal feud is more famous.

Vidal feuded with Buckley AND Mailer. Mailer hit him once and also headbutted him.

Vidal also feuded with Capote.

I, for one, am enjoying it. Tom Holland is amazing. Of course, it’s a very grateful role.

[quote] I would love to hear anything Anderson Cooper had to say on this or Capote.

Cooper has said he met Capote as a child and pointedly did not like him, calling his demeanor "snide."

[quote] I, for one, am enjoying it. Tom Holland is amazing.

What's even more amazing is that he's not even in this. You meant Tom Hollander.

Here's Ina's recipe for the chicken hash that Capote served at the Black & White Ball. I bet Babe Paley shoveled it down.

R411 I would eat Ina’s version. The original recipe sounds like vomitous plop.

Thanks R410. That explains it. I thought “How how did he go from Spider-Man to that?”

r413 Being British would help

Vidal didn't exactly feud with Mailer, just kind of had a big annoying event on the Dick Cavett show once. I think deep down he and Buckley hated each other, but with Mailer it seems to have been a blowout one night.

No, R415, Mailer and Vidal were on bad terms until the mid-1980s. It wasn't a one-time thing.

To add: Vidal clearly hated Buckley a lot more than Mailer, but who wouldn't.

[He called her a truck driver in drag and disparaged her books.]

Right, and Jackie Susann was dying of cancer when she heard that and fell out of her chair. Capote loved to tell that story.

Ina's chicken hash had some kick to it. Lots of garlic and basil and thyme, and olive oil r ubbed over it. That mess of Trumans was gross.Bechamel AND Hollandaise sauce? Meh.

Gloria Guinness wasn't in Feud: Capote and the Swans, was she?

No, R420, Gloria and Marella Agnelli are noticeably missing.

[quote] Capote heavily edited To Kill a Mockingbird and turned it into a great work. He could have claimed a co-writing credit, but didn't.

The gospel according to Truman. 🙄

[quote] Cooper has said he met Capote as a child and pointedly did not like him, calling his demeanor "snide."

Anderson Cooper is so staid it’s mildly startling to recall his odd childhood and parentage. Suddenly he’ll say something like “I was at Studio 54 when I was 7 and…”

[quote]Suddenly he’ll say something like “I was at Studio 54 when I was 7 and…”

That statement needs context. Studio 54 also hosted movie premieres and benefit dinners.

Gawd, Gwynnie was totally unremarkable looking as a teen and her looks never improved.

So, Capote is responsible for not only Harper Lees success, and he also was an influential muse to Tennessee Williams in Streetcar...is he really secretly also the inspiration for Baby Doll?

The entire third episode was tough to get through, especially after the first two that I rather enjoyed. The black and white, hand held camera was intrusive and cliched. And how many of the characters had a shocked "are you filming this" moment during that hour.

The scene in the second episode where Truman flubs his lines while filming because he sees apparitions of the swans was INCREDIBLE. Go back and watch it again. The way it cuts in and out of fantasy. Chloe Sevigny’s death glare. The gowns and the camera work. Everyone needs to stop criticizing and just enjoy this show because we are probably never gonna see anything like this again.

Threw, not through!

I didn’t know that the Swans weren’t friends in real life. They ran in the same insular circle yet none were close?

Babe, Slim, C.Z., Gloria Guinness, and Marella Agnelli were all good friends. Lee Radziwill was a later addition to the swans, so she probably wasn't as close to the others.

Enough. Lee Radziwill is the Tyra Banks of this group.

R426 Actually I wrote Baby Doll but Gary wouldn't let me publish.

Of course Mailer and Vidal had a proper feud. They even both referred to it as such, and it actually got physical more than once.

Here's the scuttlebutt:

**********

Vidal and Norman Mailer first met at a mutual friend’s Manhattan apartment in 1952. Mailer had made a huge splash with The Naked and the Dead, his bestselling novel of the Pacific war, frustrating Vidal, whose own war novel, Williwaw, had barely registered. The two young writers circled each other warily, and a complicated friendship began that would play out over the next five decades. The two had little in common. “Norman imagined himself by nature a kind of boxer – though he wasn’t, not really,” says Gay Talese, a friend to both men. “In reality, Norman was soft. But he put on this aggressive mask. Vidal had another kind of mask: cool, suave, worldly-wise. It was a good contrast with Norman. They played well together, but it was always a kind of act. They both understood the publicity value of this contest, and they let it play out in different ways.”

The real trouble started in 1971, when Vidal chose to review Mailer’s incendiary book about the feminist movement, The Prisoner of Sex. He dismissed Mailer, combining him with two other macho men, Henry Miller and the murderer Charles Manson, to create a single male aggressor and sexist pig he called “M3”. Vidal wrote: “Women are not going to make it until M3 is reformed, and that is going to take a long time.”

Needless to say, Mailer didn’t enjoy being compared to the likes of Manson. Never, by his own admission, one to pass up the opportunity to be on television, Vidal accepted an offer from Dick Cavett to appear on his talk show with Mailer. In the green room, according to Mailer, Vidal put a warm hand on the back of his neck, a gesture that he interpreted as veiled aggression. Mailer answered with a not-so playful swipe on the cheek. Much to Mailer’s surprise, Vidal slapped him back. Then Mailer leaned forward like a boxer and, in a move that suggested to Vidal he had been drinking, winked before headbutting his cheek.

On the show, Mailer expressed his disapproval of Vidal, saying he was intellectually shameless. Somewhat clumsily, he described Vidal’s writing as “no more interesting than the stomach of an intellectual cow”. Vidal ignored him, offering an innocent smile. But Mailer attacked again, asking him why he didn’t, for once, speak to him directly instead of talking to the audience. Then he attacked Vidal for alluding to the fact that Mailer had stabbed his wife in 1960, calling him “a liar and a hypocrite”. Vidal didn’t flinch. Instead, he remained eerily calm when Mailer asked him to apologise for comparing him to Manson. “I would apologise if – if it hurts your feelings, of course I would,” said Vidal. Mailer replied: “No, it hurts my sense of intellectual pollution.” Vidal smiled serenely. “Well,” he said, “I must say that as an expert, you should know about such things.” The conversation grew ever more hostile, but – as anyone who watches a clip of this broadcast will notice – Vidal never lost control of himself. On the other hand, Mailer came off as a bully.

The two avoided each other for some years, but their rivalry came to a head in 1977, when Vidal and his partner, Howard Austen, were passing through New York. “Howard adored New York,” said Vidal. “I never did. It has all of the filth and confusion of Calcutta without the cultural amenities.”

One night they attended a party for Princess Margaret, before going on to an expansive apartment owned by Lally Weymouth, a journalist and daughter of Katherine Graham, publisher of the Washington Post. More than 100 guests crammed together. “You could hardly breathe,” Austen recalled, “everyone standing shoulder to shoulder.” It was a glittering affair, with Mailer, Jackie Kennedy Onassis, JK Galbraith, Gay Talese, William Styron and Jerry Brown – Vidal’s future rival for a senate seat in California – among the guests. (cont.)

(cont.) What happened next varies according to the teller, but Austen’s version accords with that of others:

[Mailer] saw Gore surrounded by friends, everyone talking and laughing. Gore was in a good mood as Mailer moved right up to him, got in his face, and everybody around them fell pretty silent. It looked like trouble. Norman told Gore that he looked like an old Jew, and Gore shook his head. He didn’t want to get into anything with Norman. Then Mailer threw his drink in Gore’s face, right in his eyes, then hit him in the mouth with a punch, a kind of glancing uppercut. Gore was stunned, and he stepped back. He wiped a dribble of blood from his mouth with a handkerchief. Then Gore said, ‘Norman, once again words have failed you.’

This confrontation at Weymouth’s apartment became emblematic of an age when literary lions roared at each other. “It was all very tedious,” said Vidal, referring to the encounter as “the night of the small fists”. For his part, Mailer had another version, as he wrote to a friend: “I butted him, threw the gin and tonic in his face, and bounced the glass off his head. It was just enough to prime you or me for a half-hour war, but Vidal must have thought it was the second battle of Stalingrad for he never made a move when I invited him downstairs. Twenty-four hours later he was telling everybody he had pushed me across the room.”

In 1984, Mailer decided to call a truce, inviting Vidal to participate with him in a fundraising event in New York. “Our feud, whatever its roots for each of us,” he wrote to Vidal, “has become a luxury. It’s possible in years to come that we’ll both have to be manning the same sinking boat at the same time. Apart from that, I’d still like to make up. An element in me, absolutely immune to weather and tides, runs independently fond of you.”

Vidal said, “I never actually disliked Norman, not really. So now the feud – for what it was worth – was officially over. This was fine with me, as long as I didn’t have to read another of his books.” The pair would do several fundraising events in their last decade, and the truce held.

[quote] That statement needs context. Studio 54 also hosted movie premieres and benefit dinners.

He was watching Michael Jackson on the dance floor in the 70s which is weirder still!

R425 and that Holly Hobby dress didn't do her any favors.

In the second one where the show is flipping back and forth between Thanksgiving gatherings they show the Swans all coming down a staircase together. In slow motion if I remember right, maybe not but I wonder that was influenced by a scene from Casino, at the end of the movie, where they show how the casinos have changed and these people coming down en masse to gamble. There are a few other scenes in Capote vs the Swans I get the sense of inspirations from other movies. The camerawork when the Swans are together dining is reminiscent of the use of the camera moving around the table to capture each actress in Hannah and her sisters.

Slightly off-topic, but "Slim" was Johnny Depp's nickname for Amber Heard, who he likened to Slim Keith. He even had it tattooed on his hand. Once they broke up, he had it changed to "Scum."

What's kind of amazing is how violently those writers feuded and yet they've been mostly forgotten today except as colorful personalities.

Other than "In Cold Blood," Capote's novels and short stories are rarely taught at the college or graduate level level, and practically none of Mailer's works or Vidal's works are.

Did anyone else notice that they eliminated Estelle Winwood from the Murder by Death scene? She's supposed to be seated next to Elsa Lanchester, per the original movie. Maybe the actress they hired to play her got sick at the last minute, so they decided to eliminate her completely.

She wasn't a stock detective character, r441. She was dispensable.

As a huge fan of Murder by Death, she certainly isn't disposable to me.

[quote]Other than "In Cold Blood," Capote's novels and short stories are rarely taught at the college or graduate level level, and practically none of Mailer's works or Vidal's works are.

They had to make room in the curriculum for non-white men.

A Black and White Ball sequence was shot by Spielberg for the film The Post, also at the Plaza Hotel. Jefferson Mays apparently played Capite literally on his knees with a lit of camera trickery. A friend who worked as crew told me Ann Roth could have been nominated for an Oscar for her incredible costume designs for it. That sequence was supposed to intercut with a Vietnam sequence but Spielberg thought it slowed down the “flow” of the first ten minutes of the film. The bastard wouldn’t even include it in the special features on the DVD.

R444 Why do you constantly feel compelled to reverify you are a senile racist POS ?

“Murder by Death” is a really stupid title for a Film. Not very witty. Surprised Truman did not object.

[quote]“Murder by Death” is a really stupid title for a Film.

It was the perfect title, r447.

R444, you're a complete fucking idiot. If only white men were included in the American canon, America wouldn't have a literary heritage at all.

Did you even go to college?

Nevermind. You're likely a high school dropout like most (white) Trumptards.

Enjoy your benefits, loser.

[quote]Why can’t Ryan Murphy do Gore Vidal vs William F. Buckley like we suggested?

Because it would dull as shit.

^^Because FEUD is better with women.

On the other hand, maybe Vidal and Buckley would do just fine.

Anyone k ow why Baitz was let go from Brothers & Sisters?

[quote]Why can’t Ryan Murphy do Gore Vidal vs William F. Buckley like we suggested?

That would sure bring in the viewers for F/X!

[quote]There have been rumors for years that Capote wrote large portions of To Kill a Mockingbird, but there's no substantiation.

Yes, there is. The language in Mockingbird and Watchman was analysed by the kind of experts who do that kind of thing, and they affirmed that the two books were definitely written by the same person. If Capote had come in and "made a masterpiece" out of the unedited Watchman different linguistics would certainly have shown up, but they didn't. He probably made one or two verbal suggestions, which Lee may or may not have run with, and that was enough for him to tell everyone he was responsible.

Does anyone seriously believe Capote could get his head around a character like Mockingbird's Atticus Finch, who stands for everything Capote doesn't? The difference between the Atticus of Mockingbird and Watchman is that Mockingbird takes place from the POV of Scout the child, so Atticus in Mockingbird is a far more morally elevated character than he is in Watchman because Scout idealises him. (Whereas the adult Scout of Watchman has to come to terms with being more woke than her idolized father.) Capote would have made the opposite change.

There is a simpler explanation for why Lee never wrote another book. I am not the Aspie Troll, but I do think she was neurodivergent or had a major anxiety disorder, and the sudden fame terrified her. I've said this before on here, but she told Oprah, "People think I'm Scout, but I'm really Boo."

Why Capote never wrote another book as good as In Cold Blood could also be a matter for speculation.

R453 I think James Baldwin vs. William F. Buckley would be more relevant right now. Gore and WFB were just two massively privileged white assholes, one of whom happened to be gay. JB was an actual intellectual.

"Does anyone seriously believe Capote could get his head around a character like Mockingbird's Atticus Finch, who stands for everything Capote doesn't?"

Likewise, does anyone seriously believe Capote could write (or co-write) a widely beloved and enduring American novel and let someone else take credit for it? Beyond preposterous.

[quote]I think James Baldwin vs. William F. Buckley would be more relevant right now. Gore and WFB were just two massively privileged white assholes, one of whom happened to be gay. JB was an actual intellectual.

Well, if there's anything we can count on about today's media landscape, it's that intellectualism sells!

Just announced: Feud Lindsay Lohan Vs Hilary Duff!

You wanna know what would get viewers?? Do the Duke and DUchess of Windsor with her BFF Jimmy Donahue, one of the heirs to the Woolworth fortune. He was Gay most of the time... They became "friends" in the early 50's and they were together constantly. She wanted to party and go clubbing and have fun and the Duke would either sit there all morose watching them or go home early so they could carry on. It was very humiliating for him, and eventually Jimmy went too far with her in public and became very vicious. Quite a story.

Bill Buckley was just what Vidal called him to his face a Nazi. An elitist self loathing closeted homo Nazi. Truly one of the creepiest most repulsive reptilian Repugs of all time (that's saying a lot).Mad doctor to the Reagan Frankenstein monster.

I'm really enjoying this show. All performances are great imho.

R460 is right about Vidal and Buckley; so many people gave Buckley a pass because he had that ridiculous accent, chewed with his mouth closed, affected that gentlemanly debating posture on Firing Lane, and said that the Birchers were terrible people. But he was a repellent human being.

Buckley's opposition to desegregation and civil rights was so sustained and abhorrent that even he had to admit, finally in 2004, that he had been wrong.

The performed Best Of Enemies, a play about Vidal and Buckley with a black man playing Buckley. In the history of fucking stupid ideas in the theater, that may take the cake for utterly fucking stupid.

Buckley and Vidal would not make a good mini series. Jimmy Donahue and the Duchess of Windsor would.

[quote]Jimmy Donahue and the Duchess of Windsor would

I'd prefer Jimmy Durante and Marie Windsor

R463 you're wrong about this. Yes, early on Buckley had some ridiculous ideas about race. But by 1966 he'd changed his mind and was, in fact, a champion of civil rights and affirmative action.

This latest episode was like a black and white episode of The Office. Kind of Meh-I'll give this one more episode and if it doesn't pick up, I'll move on.

Tomorrow, and tomorrow and tomorrow.

So. This 4th episode was pretty good. Slim Keith is a terrible person. I had no idea she was having an affair with Bill while Babe was dying. And it sort of explains her one woman campaign to destroy Truman. What a truly ugly vicious woman. She did a lot of damage. And there was sadness too with Truman and his old boyfriend. The John O Shea character was evil.Of course so was Truman. he sure had an ugly side.

4th episode definitely redeemed everything for me. Although I can’t believe there are FOUR MORE.

Look forward to 5th episode where a drunken Truman presents hole at La Côte Basque.

I can't imagine how they can milk this series for 4 more episodes. I actually thought they'd wrap it tonight. I guess Babe is going to have a long good bye. What is left to happen? We already know what happens with his book. And really are we going to have four more episodes dominated by these bitches arguing about him?

In episode 7 one of the Swans is able to move her face in way which almost resembles a human expression. A must see.

Episode 6: Slim gets into scat

Will there be a Very Special Episode where CZ smokes pot, starting a downward spiral into hard drugs and prostitution, resulting in Truman and the other Swans having an intervention?

Tonight's episode (#4) was good. We learn more about duplicitous Slim, and Babe Paley and Truman have a lovely moment together as the episode ends.

Episode 4 was excellent.

I'm crying as I type this even!

Don’t be sleazy, C.Z.

Ha, a good episode prevents DLers from bitching about it, so instead they start bitching about future episodes instead. Never change, DL.

I'm old enough to remember Truman Capote when he appeared on talk shows. I've seen Toby Jones and Phillip Seymour Hoffman, and honestly this version of Truman is absolutely the very best one I have ever seen. Tom Hollander deserves recognition for this role.

[quote]Never change, DL.

Don't worry, we won't.

The first "Feud" featuring Bette and Joan was much more interesting.

R482, me too. I was a precocious kid and obsessed with him. Tom Hollander is amazing. Even more amazing is that motherfucker is British and played Saffy's asshole boyfriend on AbFab

[quote]Never change, DL. Don't worry, we won't.

Well, apart from the dying off part.

I cannot get over Diane LAdd's interpretation of Slim Keith! Was she really that conniving and overbearing in real life? She acts like a case of arrested adolescence. Like a grown up mean girl. Vicious.

The last scene should have been the ending of the series. It was a perfect moment (even if not real) why did they do it now instead of the end?

The problem I'm having with the show is that except for Truman and Babe (and maybe Jack), the characters are so thin . Why are Slim and Lee such bitches? Why does CZ usually put up with Slim telling her what to do? Does Joanne have any personality at all?

Say WHAT, r487?

Oops! Sorrreeee! I meant Diane Lane. I know the difference but my fingers have a mind of their own. Thanks for pointing it out. I wonder if the story tellers meant for it to happen in real life or in Truman's imagination. He and Babe sure did miss one another. But it could have been a hallucination.

I'm rooting for Babe Paley's cancer.

Yes, r492, we heard you the first time.

Wow. That final scene knocked me out. Very special. Kudos to Gus Van Sant.

R493 Bears repeating after every episode .

No it doesn't.

Amazing what merde old queens and fat fraus will gleefully masticate.

R497 Please, for the love of God, take your meds BEFORE you start posting on here.

Mental illness is such a sad thing. And clearly being a repulsive freak only makes it worse.

FF R497

r497, you're blocked for good.

F&F

R499-R500 Harpies my work here is done. Off to the beach .

R497 is singularly repulsive. Fucking mirthless loser.

The scene for those who missed it. If only Naomi had more to do in this episode, this might have gotten her the Emmy.

^^^I think she will probably get an Emmy of one kind or another for that. That was absolutely extraordinary.

Remember that Day in the Life essay of Tom Hollander's that was so hilariously honest? I fell in love with him then

I spent a month in Milledgeville with a group of Flanatics (Flannery O'Connor scholars) and we chuckled over the line about "being sent to Milledgeville" as a euphemism for being institutionalized (the haunted, decrepit Central State Hospital, at one time the largest "insane asylum" is located there). The question of whether Capote actually wrote TKAM came up and the agreement of all the scholars was that he did not, even though Dill is fashioned after him. I think the sentiment was, as one of the above posters suggested, Capote was such a bigmouth that, if he had, when it became a huge success he would not have been able to resist claiming he wrote it, if he had anything substantial to do with it. It also was simply more about moral judgment than anything else he wrote, including "In Cold Blood."

I think Harper Lee had the one story to tell--my guess is it first took form in "Go Set A Watchman," and then was edited (with her revisions) into Mockingbird. "Watchman" probably represents something closer to the life she experienced and an editor guided her to turn it into something that readers would buy. My sense is that many scholars of Southern literature hate TKAM--Flannery O'Connor (never one not to be a bitch when the occasion offered it) clearly resented its success, saying it was all right as a "book for children." I think those folk who spend their lives writing about O'Connor, Faulkner, Porter, Welty and their descendants find Lee's book sentimental and puerile--even in its sacrifice of Tom Robinson, they see the "kill your Black savior" trope. They aren't wrong, but it's not nothing that the book remains a perennial favorite, even among young people who don't like to read. There's time enough for the brighter ones to enter O'Connor's unforgiving world of the grotesque and violent or Faulkner's world of the Compsons.

I’m moving on. Boring as shit. Can’t get into it at all.

Things in this last episode I wonder about.

Did Slim really have an affair with Bill Paley? Because I've read: "While the series posits that Keith and Bill Paley had an affair, there's no evidence that it happened in real life".

Did Babe and Truman ever really meet again? Because I've read: "It was reported that she cut off all communication with Capote following the publication of the article, with no reconciliation before her death from cancer in 1978".

Did Capote really dismiss Jack Dunphy when he was caught with the despicable John O'Shea in his bed? Because I've read: "Though they drifted more and more apart in the later years, the couple stayed together until Capote's death".

R482 Me too :) Truman on a talk show was all a talk show needed. He was so entertaining if not with his talk, with his WAY of talking. At first I couldn't get past Hollander not looking just like Capote but he's so good at playing him I feel like I'm just watching Capote. He has down those mannerisms, the ones one never forgets, like the waving of the arms when he walks away making a parting remark is one in particular.

I think Diane Lane is the worst here. Afterschool Special acting. Naomi is much better, and Chloe is serviceable.

R503 that scene kills me. My God. Beautiful and sad. Perfect.

Me too R508 ! I almost missed my 2nd dinner pondering if Truman was really a midget or were the Swans all Maassi warriors?

I loved how when Babe was lying on the sofa in her shrink's office, she had what appeared to be an Hermès silk scarf laid out over the pillow under her head.

I loved how when Princess Lee Radziwell was having anal sex in the back of her Cartier blue Daimler she kept screaming:

FUCK YOU JACKIE!

I find it hard to believe that an uptight WASP like Babe Paley would be fine knowing about her husband fucking one of her close friends, cancer or no cancer. This show is total made up BS, I'm just hate watching it now.

R514 first according to this narrative, Babe knew Bill was always cheating. She was resigned to it. Then she gets diagnosed with Cancer and is told her time is limited. She seemed resigned to it, and in a way "understood" how he could get with Slim. This characterization of Babe,portrays her as someone who strives for perfection because she feels so inadequate. This characterization of Slim is someone who is assertive to the point of being overbearing towards Babe,and pushy, with a BIG personality. Self assured, too. Lots of drama in Slim's life, where as in Babe's life, the drama was provided by her husband and by Truman.

I hope Che Diaz makes an appearance on a future episode!

I assumed that when Babe was dancing with Bill in that scene, she smelled Slim's perfume and immediately figured out what was happening. Of course, I'm sure none of this happened in real life, but for this dramatization, that's how imagined Babe knew.

[quote] I assumed that when Babe was dancing with Bill in that scene, she smelled Slim's perfume and immediately figured out what was happening.

At least it wasn't that dreadful CAL-ah-SHAY Happy Rockefeller wears!

SPOILERS for EPISODE 5

*

*

*

The next episode will involve James Baldwin (Chris Chalk) spending the day with Capote the day after the "La Cote Basque, 1965" story is published in Esquire in 1975. He will criticize Capote's involvement with the wealthy white Establishment.

I wish shows would stop with the non-linear time jumps. Its difficult to follow without some context, especially when most viewers don't know a common history of who these people are. It worked well with Lost and a few other shows, but it doesn't work here. It didn't work in Maestro, either. And no, I'm not going to go read some long biography before watching the show so that I have context.

Loving the show. I'm hooked.

Loving the show. I'm a hooker.

[quote] And no, I'm not going to go read some long biography before watching the show so that I have context.

You tell them, Mary!

Madonna and Janet Jackson

honestly, i enjoy these threads MUCH more than the actual show

You know what would make Babe Paley more of a real woman& less dull?

If hot, sweaty men's working men would jerk off& shoot their loads inside her Bouffant hairstyle. Babe would get a good scalp treatment for her teased out hair. Lee Ross needs the same treatment too.

It's weird to me Babe was such a style setter, and yet she retained that bouffant hairdo so long after it had fallen out of fashion.

The bouffant was so popular with wealthy Establishment women because it made them seem more important and powerful.

Babe's shellacked 1960s bouffant evolved into more naturalistic 1970s blowout.

Babe had a couple of affairs too, so she was not as advertised in this show.

Naomi is by far giving the best performance of the show. Hollander is okay, but you feel no sympathy for his Capote and don't care what happens to him. It's hard to understand why these socialites would want to be friends with him.

Chloe is not that good of an actress, but you can't take your eyes off her. She steals every scene she's in.

Diane Lane's acting is terrible. I thought she was a better actress than this. Calista is just as bad. They are only capable of playing themselves. Any part that requires them doing more than that is beyond their talents.

It might be time for Jessica to retire. She was like a gargoyle in her scenes. I don't understand how she's aging so poorly compared to Meryl, Glenn and Diane. She acts and appears 10 years older than all of them.

It is painfully dull. Depressing even. Tragic ,too. All that money and homes to decorate and still it wasn't enough.

R518 Does some character pronounce Hermès Calèche that way in this series??

[quote]I don't understand how she's aging so poorly compared to Meryl, Glenn and Diane.

Lange smokes and drinks and spends half a year in the North Woods of Minnesota, where the cold winters age the skin. She no longer seems to give a rat's ass about defying the aging process.

[quote] Hollander is okay, but you feel no sympathy for his Capote and don't care what happens to him. It's hard to understand why these socialites would want to be friends with him.

Well that's a writing problem not an acting one. Though it's hard to see why anyone should feel sympathy, given he brought it all on himself.

The show should have ended with the goodbye scene from the last episode and quite frankly, the show should have ended now. The show is called feud, so why spend more time on the feud if they already show them having a final, touching moment?

I can deal with a bitch but not a boring bitch.

This show needed Lana Turner as CZ Guest, Constance Bennett as Babe Paley, and John Forsythe as Bill Paley. Now that would be entertainment!

Oh, hell no. Lana Turner would have made a great Babe Paley and Constance Tower was made to play Slim Keith. Ruthless.

"Constance Tower"? Oh, dear.

Meet Ann Woodward. Common and deadly.

[quote] [R518] Does some character pronounce Hermès Calèche that way in this series??

Yes, Naomi Watts as Babe Paley pronounces it that way in the first episode when complaining about Happy Rockefeller's perfume.

I love the name Mrs. Bang Bang.

Get this murderess out of here!

The fourth episode was excellent.

Truman: Do you have enough for three?

or more?

[quote]In episode 7 one of the Swans is able to move her face in way which almost resembles a human expression. A must see.

I smell Emmy!

I smell Lynn Stairmaster!

Then, R541, we'll have to assume Babe was parodying Happy's own mispronunciation, as she surely would have known the right way to say it herself.

The correct pronunciation is Cal-esh or Cal-ash. (The accent on the "e" means it is a mix of what we would pronounce as 'e'and 'a'. The same sound we make on the 'e' when we say Riviera.)

In r535 ‘s opinion the show should have been several episodes of people beating each other over the head with handbags

by coincidence i wore kelly caleche yesterday. its lovely but like many hermes these days, very light

r548, thanks for the free French lesson, but I know how it is actually pronounced or else I would have not commented on it in the first place.

As for it being intentional: I don't think so. This has been a regular problem on this show. In episode 3 Calista Flockhart mispronounced "guillotined," using a hard "L" sound.

Because these women were oh-so-well educated.

r550=Matt Damon

Demi Moore certainly doesn't have much to do. She wasn't even in Ep. 4, yet she gets star billing along with everyone else. I think Babe's maid has more lines than Demi.

My guess is there may be later episodes that give more attention to Ann Woodward and to Lee Radziwill.

I'm finding a lack of a clear thread for those who aren't just bitching about the show confusing. Even more so with a Swans and Sean's thread now in the mix.

R550, Kelly Caleche (can't bother with the accent) is one of their very best. I was surprised to find how toxic the original Caleche is. Yuck.

To R549, now that would be "must see TV". The Hermes purses would never damage their Helmut Hair or makeup.

Calèche

I’m greenlighting that r558! Have your girl call my girl!

To Op, is that a real perfume in 2024 or back in the 1960's that the Swans used.

r561 see r559

I thought that was an old ad from the 1960's, that is what it looked like to me.

Henry VIII ate a complete Swan for his celebratory dinner the day Ann Boleyn was beheaded. ...It's been on my mind...

They should have dropped all eight episodes at once. This drip, drip, drip of episodes is deadly.

Calèche is reputedly Princess Anne's favorite perfume.

[quote]Calèche is reputedly Princess Anne's favorite perfume.

Does it have notes of saddle leather and horse poop? I never thought Princess Anne would be one to wear perfume.

R544, “Hung like a Pegasus”

R567, no, no. She does wear perfume because it hides the scent of horse poop. It's moisturizer where she is deficient. Her face needs to be greased generously.

Kelly Caleche has a lot of leather notes. I love that perfume. I never smelled the other version

[quote]Because these women were oh-so-well educated.

They were bloody well-educated in make-up, clothes and fragrances.

R541, I wasn't trying to lecture you. I was making the issue under discussion clear for readers of the thread who may not have studied French, or the fragrance counter at Bloomingdales.

It's not like Capote was that well educated himself. He also didn't go to college.

It is significant that Princess Anne should wear perfume from Hermès given that that luxury-goods company started as a harness workshop, and which uses as its emblem a horse-drawn carriage (i.e. a calèche).

Neigh!

When someone starts part 2, please, post a link! She search function sucks!

Thanks!

R521 Reading a book?

[quote]They were bloody well-educated in make-up, clothes and fragrances.

In wearing them and putting them on, perhaps. That's it.

The pedestal some of you queens put these vapid women on, just because Vanity Fair told you to decades ago...

Well, smell r577.

R578 It's all the sandalwood

Is Derek Blasberg the modern day Capote? Southern gay boy who moves to NYC and becomes besties with all of NY's A-list.

I feel sorry for Capote.

But for all the talk of racism in this you can’t get more racist than the blacks. They see themselves in terms of color.

Was Truman really that close with James Baldwin?

Who knew Babe Paley was into role playing?

Derek Blasberg is a fashion journalist. Truman Capote was a novelist and "New Journalism" writer.

I wonder how true that last part was, about eating a swan from Central Park.

The Swans writer Jon Robin Baitz knew as much, framing episode five as “a play, really—an imagined encounter,” Baitz told Vanity Fair. “They knew each other, but there was no real love lost between them in actuality.”

“I left America because I doubted my ability to survive the fury of the color problem here. (Sometimes I still do.),” wrote Baldwin in his essay The Discovery of What It Means to be an American, in 1959. “I wanted to prevent myself from becoming merely a Negro; or, even, merely a Negro writer…Still, the breakthrough is important, and the point is that an American writer, in order to achieve it, very often has to leave this country.” ~ James Baldwin

R277, See r264, for "lacks charm."

The real Truman has a softness about him, especially in his eyes. Tom, whom I adore [See: "Rev"], shows a steely hardness.

R582, "[T]he blacks"? Is that like you're probably one of "the whites"?

Gee, if one's entire history in a country is based solely on one's race and color [See: Slavery] [See: Constitution, Original U S.] [See: Civil War, U S.] [See: Laws, Jim Crow] [See: Education, Brown vs. Board of] [See: A Book or Three], one might possibly be forgiven for thinking of one's self in that manner.

Unless you're a feckin' moron like r582.

Which "slutty swan" was called a "Slattern"?

LOVE dat word!

Just watching the new episode now, and it seems to be delivering, I'm only 20 minutes in, seems like the train is back on the track with delivering salacious gossip and great aesthetics.

Why do these writers have to inject fiction when the material they're working with is already fantastic? It's when they go off story with new 'takes' that's really detrimental to the narrative, making a muddy mess.

There are lots of anachronisms in this weeks show: when they discuss the other gay major writers around who might provide Truman community, James Baldwin mentioned Frank O'Hara, who had been dead for nine years when the episode happened; Truman uses the phrase "privileged white women" to refer to the swans, when no one would have used that phrase then; etc.

Chris Chalk was excellent as James Baldwin. He got the affected voice down perfectly, but was very good at being compassionate.

Aren't those two paragraphs entirely contradictory? You don't like the writers making stuff up and yet you love the most recent episode?

Here's a new thread, since this one is about to max out.

---_

.....

&&&&&

*****

^^^^^

+++++

Swans

Don't do that, it's tedious