Once Upon a Time in Yorkville: From New York City to Hollywood - a Memoir

By Thomas Douglas Adelman

Thomas Douglas Adelman looks back at an eventful life in this engaging memoir about growing up in a Jewish family and becoming a successful producer and director.

Born in 1954, he grew up on the Upper East Side of New York City in an upper-middle-class family with the normal dysfunction that you find in all families. Notably, his family was Jewish but celebrated Christmas—although he never could figure out why.

His father was a businessman passionate about politics, and his mother was an actress in the forties. When they met, it was love at first sight.

The author looks back at his adventures growing up, including being thrown out of private schools as a boy and rubbing elbows with notable people. He also looks back at how he made his way into the entertainment industry, producing, directing, and working on numerous films and projects and ultimately launching his own company.

Join the author as he looks back at his childhood, adult life, and his rise to the top of the entertainment industry.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Apr 21, 2022
• ISBN: 9781663236388

Thomas Douglas Adelman

Adelman began as the senior producer and director for New York’s Group W Cable. During his tenure at GWC, Adelman won ten ACE Awards and numerous medals at international film festivals such as the (Houston International Film Festival). He was also nominated for an Emmy Award for directing a classical music performance series in collaboration with the Juilliard School. Off that success, Adelman became a senior line producer and director for Delilah Films, working on such illustrious music films as Taylor Hackford’s HAIL HAIL ROCK N ROLL WITH KEITH RICHARDS, A ROCKABILLY SESSION STARRING GEORGE HARRISON, ERIC CLAPTON, CARL PERKINS AND RINGO STAR and Roy Orbison’s BLACK & WHITE NIGHT STARRING ROY ORBISON, BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN, ELVIS COSTELLO AND TOM WAITS. He also directed A REGGAE SESSION for Cinemax and HBO, which was filmed entirely on the island of Jamaica. In the mid 90s, Adelman stepped into the role of President of Production for Cineville, overseeing the development and production of over ten award-winning independent films. Proving himself as a film producer, Adelman left Cineville in the late 90s to work as an independent producer in Film and TV. Adelman worked on films such as MURDER IN THE FIRST and THE USUAL SUSPECTS. He worked on other numerous projects throughout the years, championing quality storytelling at studios and networks such as Paramount, ABC, Spyglass Entertainment, USA Network, Cinemax, and many others. Among his achievements was FOCUS for Paramount Classics, which Adelman helped develop alongside Arthur Miller to bring his classic novel to the silver screen. In 2002, Adelman settled down as senior vice president of feature production at Handmade Films. He oversaw the development and production of their entire slate, which included the award-winning films ELOISE AT THE PLAZA and ELOISE AT CHRISTMASTIME starring Dame Julie Andrews. AND, PLANET 51 WHICH STARRED DWAYNE JOHNSON, GARY OLDMAN, JESSICA BIEL AND OTHERS. Most recently, Adelman launched his own development, packaging and financing company called TDA Pictures. Adelman has also produced two original comic books and is currently working on a coffee table original graphic novel, based on his original screenplay, “Georgia and Nathan”, which takes a contemporary look at the Holocaust through the eyes of a southern family who have secret skeletons in the closet. In the fall of 2016 Mr. Adelman joined Cineville International as President of Motion Picture Production. A graduate of New York University’s School of the Arts. Mr. Adelman has co-authored a book about the making of the Taylor Hackford film “Hail Hail Rock ‘N Roll: Chuck Berry” which was published in March of 2019. Adelman is a member of the Producer’s Guild of America and resides in Los Angeles, CA, with his golden doodle, Beau Jessie Winston.

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Foreword

I first came to know Tom Adelman from my experience directing Chuck Berry: Hail, Hail, Rock & Roll. Tom was the Line-Producer of this feature documentary, which meant that he was the clean-up man for Producer Stephanie Bennett - anything she didn’t want to do, Tom took care of, which meant that he had myriad duties, from coordinating talent, to lugging equipment, to putting out emotional brush fires. This project featured some of the world’s most celebrated musicians who had come to St Louis in 1986 to pay homage to their idol, Chuck Berry, the virtual creator of Rock & Roll - that certainly was my motivation. Everyone knew that Chuck was a handful, his reputation as the Bad Boy of R&R preceded him, but none of us understood how diabolical his behavior would be on this film – he literally did everything he could to sabotage the production, his own production, - he was Executive Producer. For some reason, the one person that Chuck did not torture was Tom Adelman – he loved Tom – probably because Tom did everything Chuck asked him to do, regardless of how outrageous the request. At one precarious moment, Chuck backed his huge Winnebago into the grill of a woman’s car in East St Louis, Illinois, one of the toughest black neighborhoods in the country. This woman stood on the sidewalk shouting into the Winnebago: I know you’re in there, Chuck Berry – you better come out here – you damaged my car and it’s gonna cost ya. Chuck did not want to confront this ‘fire-breathing’ female tiger, so he turned to Tom: You go out there and deal with her, Tom – but don’t pay her a lot of money!!! Tom dutifully got out of the Winnebego and negotiated with this irate woman. I think they settled for $150. These kinds of adventures occurred almost daily during our shoot in St Louis, and I found Tom to be resourceful, courageous, stalwart and always good humored – in other words he was a total mensch.

Imagine my surprise when I read Tom’s memoir and discovered that he was an obstreperous renegade as a child, driving his poor parents mad with misbehavior and destructiveness. Evidently, he came from an Upper Eastside family of means, who favored his older sister, so maybe Tom’s acting-out was his attempt to gain equal attention from his parents. His totally irresponsible behavior – he was thrown out of many schools - continued through his teenage years and right into his first year in college. It appears that he didn’t wake-up to become a responsible adult until his father became ill when he was 20. I’m certainly happy that I met Tom in his adult years. The Tom Adelman I know is a major mensch.

Taylor Hackford

Director/Producer

2022

Preface

W hen I first sat down to write my memoir, it was basically a spontaneous decision. I’d never even considered or thought about such an effort. I mean, why would anyone care to read a memoir about my life journey, anyway? I wasn’t famous, I’d never painted a masterpiece, I’d never written a symphony or a great American novel. What about my story might be interesting and entertaining to a reading audience? And then it hit me. This was not just about me, but about all the fascinating and unique people whom I’ve known, played with, loved with, worked with, grown up with, laughed and cried with, and some of them I’ve lost. It really takes a village to tell one’s story. And so, I started to write, and it was kind of a stream-of-consciousness experience. The memories and snapshots just came flying up to the surface, and some found their way onto the page. As I wrote, a self-examination of who I was and where I came from started to formulate and crystalize in my mind as to what some of the answers were to a myriad of questions that I had dodged my entire life. Answers that had been buried in my safe house of insecurity. But now that veil was being lifted and some of those insecurities within were exposed for me to confront. And I did and learned how to leave some of them behind. Still, it remains a work in progress.

As I wrote, I laughed and cried as I looked back at a childhood that was somewhat dysfunctional. I was a problem child searching for attention, right up until my late teens. I grew up in a privileged Jewish family that celebrated Christmas. A mother and a father and an older sister and a couple of dogs and cats. My sister was a normal girl and my parents focused on sculpting her into what they envisioned she should be. Me, on the other hand, they left alone because they concluded that I was unfixable.

But the hands of time moved on and I exorcised my need for attention and started to carve out a path for myself that hopefully might lead me towards a fruitful, meaningful, and productive life.

This book is about my journey and those who came along for the ride. Like my dear friend Aaron. Aaron was a really interesting guy, although a bit eccentric. But that was part of his charm. Aaron didn’t drive, so we made a deal. Every weekend I would pick him up with my Golden Doodle Beau Jessie Winston in tow and we would drive to Amoeba Records in Hollywood where I would get any vinyl record of my choice for having done the driving.

Then Aaron would take Beau and me to either the Peninsula Hotel, the Hotel Bel-Air or Ivy At The Shore for lunch as his guests. Yes, guests, because Aaron always insisted on buying Beau a Kobe beef cheeseburger which was served at the table. My dog was eating Kobe beef every weekend for over two years thanks to Aaron, so it’s no surprise Beau loved him.

There are many other friends and acquaintances that I talk about in my memoir. And they all make up a part of the fabric that makes up who I am today. My thanks to all of them for having come along.

I think this book is honest and fun, at least it is to me. I hope whoever reads it might find my journey interesting, humorous and entertaining.

Thanks for coming along for the ride.

Thomas Douglas Adelman

2022

Yorkville: A neighborhood in the upper

east side of Manhattan, NYC

image01.jpg

            To my family:

                      Muriel Adelman and Joseph Adelman

                      Cathleen Leslie Adelman

                      George and Pearl Lind

                      Beau Jessie Winston

And to my boyhood and adult friends who helped to carve out this story by having been participants and witnesses. All of them are also family:

Jason Rubenstein

Robyn Malin Rubenstein

Tad Robinson

Ken Lipman

Robyn Lipman

Lois Lipman

Peter Nicholas

Paul Nicholas

Pauline Nicholas

Taylor Hackford

Carol Rosen

Gertrude Rosen

Paul Justman

John Wender

Ann Weiss

William Linden

Ned Hirsch

Fausto Bozza

Paul Cristofoletti

Vicky Herman

Kip Konwiser

Kern Konwiser

Charles Shyer

Joshua Ravetch

Donna Smith

Susan Robinson

Jean Karen Glassner

Dito Montiel

Elizabeth Gast Napolitano

Jan Miller

Laurie Seiberg Patterson

Danielle Estanislao

Joelle Drucker

Doctor Linda Carmine

Doctor Jessica Liao

Doctor Steven Sykes

Doctor Zohra Prasla

Doctor Michael Mazar

Doctor Sam Kashani

Doctor Benjamin F. Nulsen

Zhaoheng Shi

Charis Michelsen

Robyn Knoll

Andrew Troy

Kamil Canale

Michael Canale

Heidi Crane

Sofia Vassilieva

Larissa Vassilieva

Vladimir Vassilieva

Frederic Demey

Carl Colpaert

Eliza Marcus

Charlie Maxwell

Toni D’Antonio

Lyman Michael Williams

Afshin Shane Zakhor

Alen Zakhor

Gilda Zakhor

Lou Martini Jr.

Patrick Meehan

Frances Fisher

Helen Sanders

Contents

Foreword

Preface

Chapter 1     Beginnings

Chapter 2     High School and Beyond

Chapter 3     A Dream Job and a Breakup

Chapter 4     Rock ’n’ Roll Heaven

Chapter 5     Welcome to Hollywood

Chapter 6     Cineville

Chapter 7     1 Love, Arthur Miller, and the Konwiser Brothers

Chapter 8     Handmade Films, Eloise, and Planet 51

Chapter 9     The Keys to the Doors

Chapter 10   Chuck Berry Pulls into Town

Chapter 11   Internet Dating

Chapter 12   Paris, France

Chapter 13   Music

Chapter 14   Mimi

Chapter 15   Obsessions

Chapter 16   American Film Market and Location Expo

Chapter 17   The Holiday Dinners

Chapter 18   Mortality and the Big Burn

Chapter 19   Heidi

Chapter 20   Saying Goodbye to Mimi

Chapter 21   Return to Cineville and Beyond

Chapter 22   Intimacy

Chapter 23   Self Discovery

Chapter 1

BEGINNINGS

I came into this world on March 19, 1954, in New York Hospital on the Upper East Side of New York City. Call me Thomas (my little shout-out to Herman Melville). My mother’s name was Muriel, and my father’s name was Joseph. My sister, Cathy, was two years older than me. We lived at 520 East 90 th Street between York and East End Avenues in Gracie Square Gardens in the neighborhood known as Yorkville. We lived in 5-G, a two-bedroom apartment on the fifth floor, next to an old-maid schoolteacher named Ms. Fields, in apartment 5-F, who constantly complained about our almost-daily loud fights late at night. A really funny event happened involving Ms. Fields and my family, but I’ll get to that later.

I was about eight years old when I first caught sight of nine-year-old Francesca, who lived in the building. It was love at first sight for me and my pal Jason, who lived downstairs on the first floor. More about Jason, who was a huge influence in my life, later on, when we get to the really good stuff. I sometimes wonder whatever became of Francesca.

Now, according to my mother and father, it was clear from the very beginning that there was something not quite right with me. And, of course, this concerned them. By the time I was five or six years old, I had already been thrown out of most private schools in New York City that taught five- or six-year-old kids. Later in life, my mother told me a story of getting a phone call one day from the headmistress of one of the private schools, a nursery school, who asked her to come for a visit. It was in the middle of a school day, and as my mom came in, the headmistress escorted her to a large room with a window. She said, I’d like you to observe your son. I was about five years old at that time.

Kids were playing in groups of five or six. My mother witnessed her young son move through six different games. I’d get involved with one game, destroy the game—leaving the other kids crying and traumatized—and then move on to the next game, until I had destroyed all of the games.

The headmistress turned to my mother and said, We’re a little concerned about Tommy’s socializing pattern of behavior with the other children. These people were great when it came to understatement. Yes, there were problems early on, and it seemed that I always thirsted for attention in those years—maybe even now; nothing has changed.

After I had more or less torn through every private nursery school in Gotham, I spent a few afternoons sitting in a class that was run by a Catholic nun. I didn’t last there very long and never got to the bottom of what a nice Jewish boy, thirsting for attention, was doing in a Catholic nursery school. But this particular issue did come up later in life.

My family was a fairly reasonably well-off upper-middle-class family with the normal dysfunction that you find in all families. We were a Jewish family, but we celebrated Christmas. I’m not quite sure how that happened, but from day one, my earliest recollections are Christmas trees, and stockings hanging. On Christmas day I would wake up at two or three in the morning and tear open all my Christmas presents, in my stocking or under the tree, and then proceeding to open up everybody else’s presents. When my mom, dad, and my sister woke up in the morning, they saw that every present under the tree already had been opened, and some may have even been used and destroyed. No doubt about it; I was always looking for some kind of attention in those early years.

In the garden area behind our fifth-floor window, two maple trees stood as high as, if not higher than, our building. And I loved those trees. When it snowed, they would appear as two towering and magical arms that reached high into the heavens—a sense of wonder for me. I hoped that Santa, Rudolph, and the rest of the team would not run into those trees on the way to my chimney. Oh wait—we didn’t have a fireplace so no chimney. I kept the windows open for the man in red as an alternative point of entry. It occurred to me, years later, that those maples were kind of like that tree that Anne Frank used to look at outside the attic window as she daydreamed of a future life. I used to look at those two trees and daydream as well—until one winter night during a snow blizzard that blanketed New York City—it seemed like eight or nine feet—and the two trees came down from the wind and snowstorm, like the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center a lifetime later. I woke up in the morning to look at the two trees, but they were gone. This was a huge loss to me, as I really loved and found comfort in those two maples.

I also found comfort and escape in the hand-painted and fairy tale–themed wallpaper murals that my mother had mounted on the wall to the left of my bed in the bedroom that I shared with my sister. The colors were impressionistic and pastels—light blues, pinks, beiges, yellows—and displayed all kinds of scenes involving animals and circuses and princes and princesses and castles. It was incredible and probably was my first introduction to paintings and art. As a little child, I lay there for hours, lost in the magic of those wall scenes. I fell into the fantasy that they suggested, which played out right next to my bed, from my unique perspective. Maybe this was the same experience that some ancient little boy had when falling asleep next to cave art that his father or mother had painted on a prehistoric cave?

These days, I have toyed with the idea of going back to Gracie Square Gardens and asking whoever now lives in apartment 5-G if I could take a stroll down memory lane for a few minutes. Maybe the next time I am in New York, I will pursue that item on my ever-growing bucket list.

Life went on at Gracie Square Gardens.

My mother bought her groceries at a little market on the corner of York Avenue and 89th Street, called Jan Syl’s. It was one of those small mom-and-pop stores, and the butcher was an old guy called Nick. He always wore a white straw hat and a white apron with the blood stains from cutting up meat. He chopped steaks, chucks, chickens, and all in front of a large walk-in freezer, where he kept all of the meats under ice. Then one day, he passed away, and the owners of the grocery store, in tribute to Nick the butcher, hung his white straw hat on a hook right above the freezer door. It remained there for decades, until the store finally shut down.

The kids in the neighborhood used to walk over to the Mansion Restaurant on Eighty-Sixth Street and York Avenue to have lunch or an early dinner every weekend. This restaurant is still popular today. They had great food back then, like their veal parmigiana. The son of the owner was a guy named John who used to sell Christmas trees outside of the restaurant, come the holidays.

The main hangouts for us kids were on York Avenue between Eighty-Sixth Street and Ninety-First Street, where there was a little candy store called Bonji’s, owned and operated by Mrs. Bonji. We neighborhood kids would go into Bonji’s almost daily to buy candy—chocolate egg creams in particular, which were a New York City staple for kids back then—and, most importantly, all of the latest comic books. We all loved comic books, especially me. My favorite comic books were Richie Rich, Superman, and Archie, and I had a crush on Veronica, like all kids my age. I was never into the other superhero comics, but boy, did I love reading comic books.

In those days, I did not need a watch to remind me of when to return home for dinner. Every night a six o’clock, my mother would hang out of the living room window, facing Ninetieth Street, and no matter how far down the block I was, I would hear, Tom, Tom, come home right now, please. Dinner’s ready! Sure, it was a bit embarrassing in front of my friends, but we all got used to it and I think it might have served as a living alarm clock for them as well.

I’m not sure why my family, being of Jewish descent, celebrated Christmas, unless they were in denial about being Jews. This may have been substantiated years later when they engineered my sister being accepted as an international debutante to come out at the Waldorf Astoria, which traditionally had been a closed-off event for non-WASPs, but my mom was able to work her magic to get past that issue. Don’t get me wrong; I liked celebrating Christmas. It was fun looking at all those presents and Christmas stockings. The music was great, the decorations were colorful, and it seemed a lot more glamorous than what they were doing at Hanukkah with those bland decorations, and the music was not anywhere near as compelling and seductive as, say, Bing Crosby singing White Christmas.

When my sister and I got older, after my dad had passed, we would get a six- or seven-foot tree every Christmas and put it up in my sister’s living room. And then she would decorate it in the most incredibly tasteful way. We had been collecting ornaments for years and had some amazing ones. And then I discovered a store at the Grove Market on Fairfax in Los Angeles that sold the most beautiful ornaments; they were animal-themed—wildlife paintings from Africa—and they were magnificent. Those, along with many others, made for an incredible kind of Victorian-looking tree. My mom also would place floor decorations around it that we had collected through the years—little scenes of snow-capped mountains surrounding villages and snow globes with holiday themes inside. It was quite a beautiful thing to observe on an evening when we flicked on the tree lights. Somewhere, there are photographs of some of those trees.

Speaking of collecting things, when we were young, my parents had a beautiful Chinese-themed breakfront designed and built, and they filled it with the many items that they had collected over the years on different international trips. And as I grew up and started taking some exotic trips to places like Africa and China and elsewhere, I always brought back things to put into that display case. It is a collection of family heirlooms that tell a family’s story; those things that touched someone enough to pack it up and carry it home—a small piece of art, a keychain, a signature chop from China, some hand fans from Barcelona, small elephant and giraffe figures from Kenya, a piece of the Berlin Wall (purchased from Bloomingdale’s about a month after the wall came down), and many other mementoes. I got this collecting thing in my system that has continued to this day.

I have always been fascinated by Anne Frank and her diary. I have been to Amsterdam twice but, sadly, did not get a chance to visit the house at Prinsengracht 263, which I intend to do someday; it’s on my bucket list. My sister has always been obsessed with this story too—the play, the movie, the miniseries. Several of our childhood friends became actresses and were in the stage version, like Susan Strasberg, or Roberta Wallach, who both played Anne. I started acquiring original collectables that were directly connected to the house and Anne. Usually, I got these as Christmas or birthday presents for my sister. We have an autographed photograph of Anne with Miep Gies, the kind lady who helped to hide the family and keep them supplied with food and supplies for over two years, at the risk of her own life. And there is a commemorative stamped envelope in honor of Miep that she signed. Otto Frank was in charge of the Opekta company, which made jams, and the bottles that contained them were in the house where Anne and her family were hiding up in the annex. One of those bottles was recovered on the grounds after the war, and I was able to acquire it—and in perfect condition. That bottle sits in our display cabinet.

Being obsessed with the Holocaust, I also recently got hold of a unique piece of tile that lay on the streets of Warsaw during the Warsaw Uprising. On this tile is a Star of David, which was designed into the tile when it was first laid by a Jewish tile person during the forced confinement in the Warsaw Ghetto. I have this tile, which reminds me of the suffering that these people endured and their courage in mounting a resistance effort against the Nazi war machine, which had them horrifically outmanned and outgunned. But they fought back anyway. When I touch that tile, it humbles me to think about what people have gone through to stand up for themselves and to protect their families, their friends, their country, and their sense of honor. These things help me see a different perspective and to understand those things that are truly important in this life of comfort that we so often take for granted.

I am a member of the Museum of Tolerance in Los Angeles, and I go there now and then to examine the exhibits and read testimonies from victims of the Shoah. I wrote a screenplay called Georgia and Nathan, which is an original story of mine about a modern family who discover their connection through the grandfather living with them, who was a collaborator with the Nazis in the Warsaw Ghetto. I hope to see it produced, and I want to publish a graphic novel based on the story. We’ll see.

The biggest birthday party that I ever had was when I turned six. My mother threw me a pirate party. All of my friends came, and we all dressed up as pirates with black eye patches and, of course, buccaneer hats. There are a few surviving photographs of that party, and it definitely looked like a good time for all.

As a kid, I went through a stealing phase; now and then, I would let my dark side surface. Like the time at Woolworth’s five- and ten-cent store on East Eighty-Sixth Street. At some point, I was into stamp collecting, and I loved looking at and going to coin and stamp shops for colorful stamps from around the world. The country with the most colorful stamps was Togo in Africa. It seemed I could not get enough stamps for my collection.

I also collected rare coins and had an amazing collection of mint-condition nineteenth-century silver dollars that probably had substantial value. Alas, years later, I sold them at face value so I could buy grass and hashish.

I went solo to Woolworth’s one day, with an orange attaché case in hand; I was nine or ten. I passed by a section that had thousands of collector stamps from all over the world in large bins. You could buy about a hundred or so for five dollars. And then something came over me, and I opened up my attaché case and started stuffing hundreds of stamps inside. I could not stop and must have taken a thousand. I struggled to close the attaché case and was barely able to do it. I started to walk out of the store, and just as I reached the front exit—bang—the entire case blew open, and thousands of stamps went flying everywhere. The next thing I knew, I was in the store manager’s office, and they had my mother on the phone.

I sat there waiting for her to come and bail me out. Being of such a young age and with no past criminal record or rap sheet, they let me go with a polite warning. I don’t think my mother let my father in on that little adventure, or he most certainly would have smacked me around.

Then one day, when my mother was taking me to a movie matinee, we stopped in Sax Fifth Avenue. She was looking for something, and I spotted a boy’s watch on a counter, and—swish—that watch was in my pocket. My mother was none the wiser. As we exited the store, security apprehended us. Yes, us, not just me because they suspected that my mother had put me up to it. In the office, I pled that this was my caper and that my mother had nothing to do with it. Fortunately, my mom was a regular shopper at Sax, and their records showed that she spent a lot of money there. So they let the whole thing go. In fact, I think she may actually have bought me the watch. Off we went to the movies, which was Topkapi, a museum heist film. Probably the wrong choice of a movie that day.

I had a few other childhood run-ins over this stealing issue. I loved the little model cars made by a company called Corgi, and they sold them at FAO Schwartz on Fifth Avenue, across from the Plaza Hotel. I loved the fancy cars, like the little Rolls-Royces. They had the James Bond Aston Martin car and others, and the doors and trunks would open. I used to lift some of those. Fortunately, I didn’t graduate to the real ones later on in life.

I might have even stolen some change out of a cash register at a little bed-and-breakfast in Switzerland on one of those early trips, but eventually, I grew out of this habit, except for a phase I went through more recently when I started taking Splenda from Starbucks, Coffee Bean, and other coffee places. But then I joined Costco, where I could buy Splenda in bulk, and that habit stopped.

Then there was the time that I decided I wanted new vinyl record albums, and I figured I should get them as presents from the store. I did the obvious and tried to steal several, but record albums are not so easily hidden, and I was caught. I was ten or eleven, so there was a good chance I was not headed for Sing Sing.

I got some pretty cool birthday presents, but one birthday they gave me a Lionel train set with thirty feet of track, which I loved. I put it together, and smoke came out of the engine. I had it all set up on the living room carpet and would sit there for hours, watching the wheels go round and round, as John Lennon once sang.

Kathleen Fitzgerald and her daughter Nancy were very close friends of my family when I was a kid. We used to spend Christmas holidays with them at their home, and I have treasured photos of that. Kathleen was a lovely lady who, early on, succumbed to cancer. We remained friends with Nancy for years, until life took us all off into different directions.

Another close friend of mine when I was growing up was Reed Evans, who became a world-famous shoe designer. Reed’s family was from Texas, and I spent a lot of time with him at their Fifth Avenue penthouse. I had an email exchange with Reed a few years ago, but we did not connect in person. Maybe one day.

My sister was very close to a young Vera Wang, before she started designing. In fact, Cathy, Vera, and I all went to see a Broadway performance starring Ted Neeley in Jesus Christ Superstar on Christmas Eve, the first year the show hit the stage.

My mother’s stepbrother was Bob Burger. He was a great guy and really smart. At the age of ten, he was already writing crossword puzzles and selling them to the New York Times. We would visit Bob and his family (he had three sons, one was named Jim) at their country home on some Christmas holidays. We were there once when there was a blizzard, and it was a winter wonderland. Jim and I finally reconnected in late 2021. And that was a nice surprise.

In those days, snowstorms dumped a lot of the white stuff everywhere, especially in Manhattan, and schools would close. It was such a thrill to get out of school and play in the snowdrifts with my friends. There was something clean and peaceful about New York when those storms happened. Then, when they settled down, there was a calmness and a peace in the neighborhood that you could not help but notice. Even today, I fondly recall what that felt like. It was as if time stood still. The streets were quiet, and there was very little traffic, neither cars moving nor pedestrians walking. The buses and taxis were few to be seen. The city was at rest, and it felt wonderful for a kid who loved the snow.

Gertrude was a close friend of