by Nora Ephron
We all know that Mrs. Bridges and Hudson are going to get married at the end of the next batch of episodes, which have already been shown in England. The reason we all know this is that the information was mentioned in the obituary of the actress who played Mrs. Bridges, who died of the flu in real life in Essex a couple of weeks before Hazel died of the flu on television in America. Was this planned too? Did they say to her, “Well, Mrs. Bridges, we’ll give you a nice fat part for the entire series and marry you off to the butler in the end, but shortly thereafter you’ll have to die”? I wonder. I also wonder how I’m going to feel about Mrs. Bridges and Hudson getting married. There’s something a little too neat about it. Besides, Mrs. Bridges is a much better person than Hudson, who has become a mealy-mouthed hypocrite as well as a staunch defender of the British class system. All this would probably be all right and deliciously in character except that it is beginning to look as if Hudson is going to personify, in microcosm, the entire rise of Fascism in Europe. Ann is more concerned on this point than I am.
As for Edward and Daisy, they talk a lot about leaving the Bellamy household, but it is Kenny’s theory that they are beginning to sound more and more like the three sisters and Moscow. Which is a shame, because I wish they would leave.
Here are some things we all agree on:
We are all terribly worried that Rose will never find a man.
We all miss Lady Marjorie a lot more than the Bellamys do, and are extremely apprehensive about meeting the Scottish widow’s children.
We all think the best show of the year was the one with the scene in the train station with the dying and wounded soldiers. The second-best show was the one in which Gregory and the ace died.
We would all like to know some of the technical details of the show—how the writers are picked, how much of the plot is planned ahead of time—but it is too dangerous to find out. Someone, in the course of giving out the information, might let slip a crucial turn of the plot. We would all rather die than know what is going to happen.
Mostly, we all wish Upstairs, Downstairs would last forever.
July, 1976
Porter Goes to the Convention
Porter checked into his hotel on Sunday night and went to Madison Square Garden to pick up his credentials. He wasn’t sure what he was going to need them for, since his story had fallen through. Porter was a reporter for the Tulark Morning Herald of Tulark, Idaho, and his editor had sent him to the Democratic convention to cover the mayor of Tulark, J. Neal Dudley, who was a delegate. “Just follow him around,” said the editor. Porter had had big plans. He would follow Dudley to the Empire State Building and the Statue of Liberty. He would follow him into a taxi and they would have a funny experience with a New York cabdriver. He would follow him to Eighth Avenue, where J. Neal Dudley would be mugged while Porter looked on helplessly, taking notes. He would follow him to dinner at Windows on the World, where with any luck Dudley would be thrown out for wearing a leisure suit.
Porter had begun by following Dudley to the Boise airport and onto the plane to New York. After a couple of drinks, he asked Dudley what he planned to do at the convention.
“Fuck my eyes out,” said Dudley, “and if I catch you within twenty feet of my room I’ll kill you.”
“I’m supposed to follow you around,” said Porter.
“Make it up,” said J. Neal Dudley.
Dudley got into a cab at Kennedy airport and vanished. Porter got onto the bus and rode to his hotel. It occurred to him that if he could just find J. Neal Dudley fucking his eyes out, he could bring down the administration of Tulark, Idaho, such as it was.
On the other hand, Porter had read enough articles in journalism reviews to realize that he would have to find J. Neal Dudley in flagrante with a secretary who could not take shorthand and who had been flown into town on a ticket paid for with the proceeds from a secret sale of Tulark municipal bonds. Otherwise, his editor would refuse to print the story on the grounds that it was an invasion of J. Neal Dudley’s privacy and a surefire way for the paper to lose the advertising from J. Neal Dudley’s appliance dealership.
Porter decided to forget it. He would make the story up. He could always talk to enough delegates to put something together about what J. Neal Dudley would have done at the convention had he actually attended it.
So after getting his credentials, Porter set out to find a delegate. He went to the Statler Hilton lobby and spotted a large man wearing a ridiculous hat. Porter approached him.
“Porter of the Tulark Morning Herald,” he said.
“Ken Franklin of Newsday,” said the man in the hat. “Can I interview you?”
“I beg your pardon?” said Porter.
Franklin explained that he was the media reporter for Newsday and he just wanted to ask Porter the questions he’d been asking other reporters.
“Sure,” said Porter. “Shoot.”
“What are you planning to write about?” asked Franklin.
“I don’t know,” said Porter.
“That’s what they all say,” said Franklin. “There are twice as many media people here as delegates, and there’s no story.”
“There’s no story?” said Porter.
“That’s what they all say,” said Franklin.
“What else do they all say?” said Porter.
“They all say that because there’s no news story, there are no feature stories either.”
“What about the hookers?” said Porter.
“All the hookers are taken,” said Franklin. “The New York Post signed them all to exclusive contracts last week.”
Porter bought himself a beer in the bar and looked around. He spotted a man wearing delegate’s credentials and went over to him.
“Porter of the Tulark Morning Herald,” he said.
“Suzanne Cox of the Chicago Tribune,” said the woman sitting next to the delegate. “Get lost. This one’s mine for the week.”
“Could I ask you a question?” Porter said to Suzanne Cox.
“No, you can’t,” said a small boy next to Miss Cox.
“Who are you?” asked Porter.
“Brian Finley,” said the boy. “I’m a reporter from Children’s Express, and I’m covering her.”
“Who’s covering you?” asked Porter.
“Scotty Reston,” said Brian Finley, “but he’s gone to the men’s room.”
“I see,” said Porter and went back to the bar.
“Jarvis of Time magazine,” said a voice behind him. He turned around. Jarvis of Time magazine was very pretty. She was also a media reporter.
“Porter of the Tulark Morning Herald,” Porter said. “I don’t know what I’m writing about. There’s no story. Because there’s no news story, there are no feature stories either.”
“What about the hookers?” said Jarvis.
“The hookers are taken,” said Porter.
“Oh, God,” said Jarvis. “I wonder if my writer knows that.”
“Your writer?” said Porter, but Jarvis had rushed out of the bar.
Monday night Porter got a floor pass and watched Sally Quinn and Ben Bradlee being photographed. Then he joined a large crowd that was watching in disbelief as Evans and Novak had a conversation with each other. In the distance, Porter could hear Barbara Jordan speaking, but just barely. He wished he had stayed in his room and watched the convention on television. When the session ended, he bumped into Ken Franklin from Newsday.
“What are you writing about?” asked Franklin.
“I don’t know,” said Porter.
“Nobody’s saying that today,” said Franklin. “Today people have figured out what they’re doing.”
“Not me,” said Porter.
Franklin took Porter to the Rolling Stone party that night. When they arrived, several hundred people on the street were pushing up against the door to the party, and several dozen police were trying to hold them back.
“Who’s that with Seymour Hersh?” someone asked.
; “Paul Newman,” someone answered.
Porter managed to push his way up to the front door, but it was locked. Every so often, a man would appear at the door and point out someone in the crowd and the police would scoop up the someone and get him through the door. Porter squeezed in with Walter Cronkite’s entourage, but once inside he found that the only topic of conversation was what was going on outside. A large group of people upstairs were watching a television monitor showing pictures of the scene on the street, and another large group of people were watching themselves on a public-access television channel.
“Porter of the Tulark Morning Herald!” a voice shouted.
Porter looked around. It was Jarvis of Time magazine.
“What are you doing?” she said.
“Leaving,” he said. “Do you want to come?”
“Yes,” said Jarvis.
Later, in Porter’s hotel room, Jarvis began to undress. “I hope this is off the record,” she said.
“Likewise,” said Porter.
At that moment, the phone rang.
“Porter of the Tulark Morning Herald,” said Porter.
“This is the New York City police,” said a man on the phone. “We picked up a naked man dancing on Thirty-sixth Street. He says he’s the mayor of Tulark, Idaho. Your name was in his pocket.”
“Is he with his secretary?” asked Porter.
“Yes,” said the policeman.
“Was she flown here on city money?” asked Porter.
“Yes,” said the policeman.
“Can she take shorthand?”
“No,” said the policeman.
“I’ll be right there,” said Porter. He put down the phone and started to dress. “I’m sorry, Jarvis,” he said. “I have to go out to become a media star.”
“That’s all right,” said Jarvis. “I can wait.”
October, 1976
Gentlemen’s Agreement
Esquire refused to run this column. It was printed in [MORE], the journalism review.
In November, 1975, Esquire magazine published an article by a young writer named Bo Burlingham. It was called “The Other Tricky Dick,” and it was a long reporting piece, ten thousand words or so, on Richard Goodwin, author, speechwriter to Presidents, and then-fiancé of Lyndon Johnson’s biographer Doris Kearns. I was the editor on the piece. Burlingham portrayed Goodwin as an ambitious, crafty manipulator, a brilliant man who loved to outsmart his friends and associates to further his career. The article was carefully reported, the facts in it checked by the magazine’s research department, and Esquire’s lawyer and managing editor grilled Burlingham on his sources for the article. All of us on the editorial side of the magazine believe that Burlingham’s article was solid. Which does not explain how it came to pass that a few weeks ago, Esquire, Inc., decided to pay Goodwin $12,500 and to print the apologetic column about the article which appears in the November issue.
Magazines settle libel suits out of court all the time, of course. Not all magazines—The New Yorker has a strict policy against it; but many other magazines believe that it is cheaper to settle than to pay the high costs of litigation. At Playboy, I’m told, they say that they have never lost a libel case; the reason is that the magazine settles before it gets to court. All of this is a fairly well-kept secret in the magazine business; in fact, one of the arguments put to me against my writing this column was that if it becomes known that Esquire settles out of court, every joker whose name is mentioned in the magazine might end up suing. I rather doubt that will happen—but in any case, my concern is not with future nuisance suits, merely with this one.
The trouble with Goodwin began in August, 1975, before Burlingham’s article even appeared in the magazine. Doris Kearns, who is now Goodwin’s wife, came to New York to see me and Don Erickson, editor of Esquire. She asked us to kill the article. She said that Goodwin had become so nervous about what it might contain that he had taken to his bed on Cape Cod and had been there for two weeks. At that point, the article was on the presses and could not have been killed if Richard Goodwin dropped dead. We told her this. Then, a few days before publication, a telegram arrived—I can’t remember whether it was from Goodwin or from a friend of Goodwin—putting the magazine on some sort of legal notice. A rumor came floating through that Goodwin had hired President Nixon’s former lawyer James St. Clair and was planning to sue Esquire for libel. Then nothing for a while.
In the early months of 1976—I’m sorry to be so fuzzy about dates, but I didn’t know what was going on—a man named Arnold Hyatt telephoned the president of Esquire, Inc., A. L. Blinder. Hyatt, a Boston shoe manufacturer and contributor to Democratic campaigns, knew both Blinder and Goodwin, and he apparently suggested the two men get together and work this thing out like gentlemen. A couple of points about Abe Blinder. The first is that a few years ago, he and the rest of the magazine’s management were slightly traumatized by the result of a lawsuit William F. Buckley filed against Esquire over an article by Gore Vidal. Esquire’s lawyers wanted to fight the suit; they were certain it would be dismissed in a summary judgment. But it wasn’t, and the ultimate cost to the company, including the eventual out-of-court settlement, was in the neighborhood of $350,000. A second point is that Blinder takes pride in the fact that he rarely interferes in the magazine’s editorial matters. When I interviewed him about the Goodwin matter, he told me that he probably would not allow this column to be printed in the magazine—but he added that he had vetoed only one other article in his thirty-three-year history at Esquire. “It was about Morris Lapidus, the architect of the Fontainebleau Hotel,” he said, “and it was very negative, very uncomplimentary. The Tisch brothers are good friends of mine, and they called and told me it would be bad for the hotel business if we printed it.”
After Hyatt’s call, Blinder spoke to Goodwin and arranged a lunch for himself, Goodwin, Kearns and Arnold Gingrich, the editor in chief and founder of Esquire. Goodwin arrived at the lunch with a set of papers containing a legal complaint and an itemization of grievances against the article. Blinder told Goodwin he had three alternatives: he could write a letter to the editor, he could sue, or he could forget it. Goodwin said that a letter to the editor would simply be his word against Burlingham’s. But he indicated that he would be willing to work something out short of a lawsuit. At this point, Arnold Gingrich made a suggestion. He wrote a monthly column in which he often commented on articles in the magazine, and he might be able to write something that would reflect Goodwin’s version of events. A token payment of one thousand dollars was mentioned, and everyone went home. A few weeks later, Goodwin met with Gingrich to draft the column. The next day, Gingrich was hospitalized with lung cancer; he died in July.
While Gingrich was ill, the column that appears in this issue was written by Don Erickson, now editor in chief of the magazine. In it, Gingrich relates that after reading Burlingham’s article, which portrayed Goodwin as a Sammy Glick, he was surprised to meet Goodwin and find no trace at all of the ruthlessness Burlingham alluded to. Burlingham’s portrait, said Gingrich, “is sufficiently at odds with the man himself that an appraisal is in order.… The piece made him out to be a guy who didn’t pay his debts. But what we didn’t say was that he had never had his credit withdrawn anywhere and that, with his holdings in Maine, he has assets several times his liabilities. And we made him out to be a man who goes around scaring people, including women, with guns. We didn’t report that his gun hobby has never gone further than shooting at small birds and clay pigeons. He never owned a handgun, he told me. The one we reported on turned out to be a toy belonging to his son, he said. We implied that he had a streak of kleptomania and produced an incident that didn’t prove it.”
As it continues, the column is extremely clever. It is framed as one man’s opinion, not as a formal apology, so there was no need for the magazine to show it to the author or editor involved. It is full of “he said” and “he told me,” so that nothing is actually denied; still, the impression is that
there was somehow faulty, incomplete or inaccurate reporting. Gingrich claims to be speaking as an editor in disagreement with the other editors of the magazine, but this is not really accurate. Gingrich was not just the founder of the magazine but its guiding spirit, and a reappraisal from him is considerably more loaded than a simple difference of opinion among equals.
But there’s more to the story. Erickson’s draft was sent to Goodwin for approval. Then, in June, Esquire received a letter from James St. Clair, who turned out to be Goodwin’s lawyer after all, demanding sixteen thousand dollars for Goodwin to pay the legal fees entailed in reaching the settlement. This came as a surprise to the management. Blinder was under the impression that the token payment of one thousand dollars was agreed upon; he also believed that this was to have been a transaction among gentlemen, not lawyers. Esquire’s house counsel, Ron Diana, replied to St. Clair on July 7. He said the magazine was completely unwilling to pay such a high fee, particularly because it continued to believe in the accuracy of Burlingham’s article; Diana instead offered five thousand dollars. Arnold Hyatt, the shoe man, then resurfaced. He called Blinder to say that Goodwin was shocked at the belligerent tone of Diana’s letter; Goodwin, all injured innocence, could not understand how things had gotten so unpleasant. Blinder was apparently persuaded by the call, and the $12,500 fee was arrived at. Blinder then sent Hyatt a case of champagne.
Out-of-court settlements are extremely complicated, or so I have found from talking to lawyers in the past couple of weeks. They’re reached as a result of a combination of practical and ethical considerations. Generally speaking, though, if a magazine is willing to settle, the rule is this: if the magazine believes its article was right, it may settle for practical considerations and pay a token amount to avoid court costs. If the magazine is wrong, it may settle not only by paying off but also by printing a retraction, correction or apology. What is extremely rare—so rare that none of the lawyers I interviewed could recall a similar case—is for a magazine that believes it is right to pay off and print a retraction of sorts.