Caveat Emptor (2 page)

Anthony Masaccio didn't have to tell anyone that he was Italian. His sensuous Mediterranean look said it all. His olive complexion was the color of wine at his cheekbones. A thick, lustrous mane of black hair framed a broad face with dark liquid eyes, eyes that seemed to swallow you up if he turned his gaze on you. Everything about him suggested wealth and privilege. When he'd light a cigarette, the matchbook invariably bore the logo of the Plaza Oak Room or Café Carlyle.

Despite his charming mystique, his raw glamour, and the fact that he was a descendant of the fifteenth-century artist Masaccio, Tony, aka Tony “Cha-Cha,” was born and raised in Red Hook, Brooklyn, a neighborhood known as a Mafia spawning ground, and he was right at home in bars where everyone had names like Joey, Tommy, Bobby, and Vinny.

Tony grew up steeped in Mob culture and old Italian traditions. His father, a “made” man and gambler, owned a fleet of cabs in Brooklyn. Neighborhood clubhouses and corner bars run by wise guys were a part of everyday life. His family also had ties to the Mafia through his uncle Salvatore, aka “Sally the Sheik,” Mussachio (they were indeed related, but they spelled their names differently). This background had a profound effect on Tony's personality and manifested itself at times in his speech and mannerisms, which bore the subtle yet unmistakable stamp of the mobster.

Tony explained that the house was a studio for Tom Daly, the artist downstairs. The story was that Tom Daly and Peter Max, the famous poster artist, had met at the Art Students League and were among its brightest talents as commercial artists. They established the Daly & Max Studio and quickly made a hit on Madison Avenue, taking the original art nouveau style, adding a psychedelic twist, and applying it to their illustrations and lettering for the contemporary market.

Tom was first with another brilliant idea, body painting. He painted designs, pictures, and words in beautiful lettering on naked female bodies. He executed a poster of a beautiful blonde with her entire body painted.
Wanda
, as the poster came to be known, lounges on her side in total darkness. A light from above dramatically illuminates her body, revealing the artwork. Not only did Tom win the prestigious Art Directors' Award for it, but
Wanda
became one of the most famous posters in the world.

However, the partnership was short-lived. Peter habitually grabbed all the credit for their success, and it wasn't long before Tom had had enough. There was a horrendous fight, followed by the end of the partnership. After the split, Tom became established on his own and was one of the most successful commercial artists in the business, his talents in demand by Fortune 500 companies.

In the meantime, Peter Max was busy fabricating his fame by paying publicity agents to get his name in society columns, portraying him as the guru of the hippie art scene. Although he was a poster and commercial artist, Peter wanted to be recognized as a
real
artist.

“Like Frank Stella or Larry Rivers,” Tony explained.

“And what do those guys think of Peter?” I naïvely asked.

“Are you kidding?” Tony laughed. “They wouldn't piss on him.”

Tony asked if I spent much time in the city. When I told him I liked to go to Greenwich Village with my friends, he surprised me again by suggesting that
we
go to the Village together the following evening.

Friday night I returned, picked up Tony, and headed for Manhattan. It was a beautiful fall night in the Village. The streets were filled with people going into the restaurants and clubs that lined the narrow streets.

Tony was cool and sophisticated. He knew all about the contemporary art in the galleries we passed. He knew the artists' names and where their studios were. It was impossible for me to hold a conversation with him on these subjects, but I was thrilled to just listen to him. His world was exciting, and I wanted to be part of it.

I was puzzled when Tony eventually led me to a dark, deserted area that bordered the Village and steered me toward a single spotlight above a bar named Max's at Park Avenue South and Seventeenth Street. “Tony!” rang out from people standing at the bar the second we entered. Tony was obviously well known here. I'd been to a few Village joints with school friends before, but nothing that resembled this place!

Max's Kansas City was
the
art bar and restaurant where artists, agents, and dealers mingled and made deals. A magical place where aspiring nobodies flocked to meet the somebodies. It was the place to be and be seen in. A collection of contemporary art was always displayed on the walls above the bar or suspended from the ceiling. On almost any given night, Max's attracted an assortment of celebrities, rock stars, “beautiful people,” and jet-setters, not to mention Andy Warhol and his superstars, who hung out in the back room.

I followed Tony, and we joined his friends at the crowded bar. He knew everybody, from artists with paint all over their jeans to big-shot advertising executives in three-piece suits, and beautiful women, one after the other, came to him for a chat, a whispered secret, or a discreet squeeze of his ass. Everybody loved Tony.

Although I was underage, it was no problem for Tony. He ordered me a drink and we headed toward a booth. Then he leaned over and casually asked me if I had gotten laid lately. Drawing a blank on that score, Tony then asked, “Well, have you turned on yet?” I had to confess that I hadn't. Tony smiled and gazed nonchalantly around the bar. Then he excused himself to make a phone call.

Twenty minutes later, after a string of very strange-looking people made their entrances, passed our booth, and went straight into a room at the back of the restaurant, a beautiful, willowy girl with sandy blonde hair and droopy blue eyes joined us.

Kathy was Tony's girlfriend and often stayed at the Castle. I had only seen girls like this on the glossy pages of fashion magazines and was speechless in her presence. When she took her coat off, she revealed long, graceful limbs extending from a slinky minidress. Kathy worked in a Village boutique, had her own apartment on Perry Street, and did some modeling on the side. In answer to her somewhat puzzled look when she sat down with us, Tony explained that I was a local kid from Jersey.

After a Kansas City steak dinner, we left and headed up the West Side Highway to Fort Lee. Back at the Castle, we relaxed in the living room. Kathy put on a Tim Hardin record and opened a bottle of wine. I was totally dazzled by both of them and by our night at Max's. When Tony suggested that I return the next day for a dinner party to meet Tom Daly and spend the weekend, I could hardly believe my ears. Kathy also insisted that I come and sleep over on the sofa.

I was a silly kid who barely weighed a hundred pounds. I had absolutely no business being with these people. It was inconceivable that sophisticates like Kathy and Tony would be interested in the company of a screwball like me.

When I arrived the next day, Tony welcomed me like a long-lost friend. An Edith Piaf record played as Tony, barefoot and in jeans, showed me to the kitchen, where he was preparing a pot of lasagna. Bottles of wine, wedges of cheese, and a box of pastries were scattered about. The aroma of homemade tomato sauce filled the rooms.

Kathy invited me into the living room. She was wearing one of Tony's shirts and a pair of panties in which her long slender legs were beautifully displayed. Books on art, fashion, and photography were lying on the coffee table. Kathy curled up on the sofa while I made myself comfortable in an easy chair. We chatted, and she showed me the first book on art I had ever looked at in my life, a book about Aubrey Beardsley, who lived in the nineteenth century and was famous for his erotic drawings.

At sunset, the view outside turned shades of blue as lights were coming on across the river. Kathy lit the candles on the table, and it was time to call Tom Daly. Soon there was a knock on the door, and in walked a man with a head of wild red hair that shot out in all directions. He was draped in a full-length black velvet cape and looked more like a rock star than an artist. With him was Jean, a superthin sexy model with a boyish haircut. She was wearing a yellow minidress with large black polka dots and holes cut in it.

Introductions were made, and Tony proceeded to serve one of his superb Italian dinners. I was completely out of my element. Their conversation about the art world and New York City was way over my head. I pretended to understand and smiled a lot. When the evening ended and Tom and Jean went downstairs, Kathy brought me a pillow and a blanket and then opened her robe and flashed me her beautiful naked body before disappearing into the bedroom with Tony.

The next day Tony invited me to come back during the week and stay over again, when he and Tom would turn on with pot. I still hadn't ever smoked grass and couldn't wait to try.

On the appointed night, I was there. Tony and I went down to Tom's floor. The room was lit with candles and I felt as if this was a secret ceremony, my official initiation to the Castle. Daly was splendidly arrayed in a magnificent antique embroidered silk robe, and he lounged back in his old easy chair with the air of an oriental potentate. With him was Joyce, a pretty, blonde art student and poet who worked for Tom in the afternoons, and another girl who was her friend.

Tony officiated by lighting some joints and passing them around. Joyce put on a record and sat next to me. She explained that the idea was to take a long drag and hold it in as long as possible. It wasn't long before a sense of complete and exquisite pleasure like nothing I'd ever experienced pervaded my being. We listened to music, laughed, and passed joints late into the night.

I lay back on the sofa to enjoy the sensation of being high for the first time. I remained awake as long as possible, gazing through the window at the stars, wanting the feeling to never end. I imagined the house was a rocket ship shooting us through the universe.

A whole new world was opening up to me through Tony. He circulated in the downtown art scene. He took me to SoHo, an area of lower Manhattan filled with streets of neglected turn-of-the-century warehouses. Artists had recently discovered it as a new place to live and work. Galleries, cafés, and boutiques were moving into the area. It was very exciting, and one could feel the energy on the streets. Tony knew many of the gallery owners and took me to the studios of his artist friends. I loved spending every minute with Tony, and for the first time I saw creative people making things happen for themselves, the way
they
wanted it and not depending on the Establishment for a career.

Until this time, I barely knew Tom Daly, and I wanted to see some of his artwork. One day, while on my way up the staircase to visit Tony, I heard music and noticed Tom's door ajar. I stuck my head in to say hi. Tom was lying on the sofa, smoking a cigarette and listing to the soundtrack from the movie
A Man and a Woman
. He waved me in and, when I expressed my wish, he began to show me a few of the posters he'd created. Then Tom casually asked if I cared to smoke a joint.

“Sure,” I enthusiastically replied. “Do you turn on a lot?”

“Now and then,” he answered. “And what about you? Was that your first time the other night?”

“Yeah,” I said. “I thought it was great.” At that Tom laughed, went to the breakfront, and produced a brick-shaped, foil-wrapped stash. I watched in astonished delight as he proceeded to break off a chunk and hand it to me as a gift.

“Well, what are your plans after you finish school?” Tom asked. “What are you going to be?”

“Nothing,” I said. “I don't have any plans to be anything. Besides, who needs a job anyway? We're on the verge of a revolution.”

That was fine with Tom, but he suggested I at least learn the rudiments of joint-rolling to be prepared for the future. He got papers from a drawer and demonstrated his method, showing me how much grass to use and how to roll it. After I made my first prototypes, Tom suggested we test them out to see how they worked. Thus began my first insights into one of the most unusual individuals I ever met.

Tom Daly was above all a sensualist. His main goals in life were getting laid and getting stoned. Despite his twenty-seven years, Tom was really a teenager who could masquerade as an adult when the situation demanded. Otherwise he enjoyed going out in public dressed up in outrageous getups and freaking people out. At his zenith, Tom drove a new convertible Mustang, a moving mass of dents and scrapes, the result of sideswiping the trees lining the narrow road that led up to the Castle.

He was unmaterialistic, with no desire for the sorts of things most people want. His only indulgences, apart from sex and pot, which he bought by the kilo, and scotch by the case, were his installation of a thirty-foot phone wire that allowed him to pace around the room in frantic conversations with his agent, and the acquisition of books for his treasured library.

When Tony came downstairs, Tom and I were sharing a joint and laughing. He had pulled out a book and was showing me the work of his favorite artist, James Ensor. Ensor was an early twentieth-century Belgian painter who was obsessed with depicting people in bizarre carnival costumes—not unlike the ones Tom wore himself. Tony was heading to the city to collect Kathy and asked if I wanted to go along. As we pulled out of the driveway, Tony asked me what I thought of Tom.

“He's really far-out!” I exclaimed, showing him the pot Tom had given me.

“Yeah,” said Tony. “Tom's a complete maniac.”

As we were pulling up to the tollbooth on the George Washington Bridge, Tony extended his hand as if to pay the toll clerk, but instead slammed the accelerator to the floor while he flung his empty fingers in her stupefied face. As we raced away laughing, I could hear the woman's screams halfway across the bridge.

I never actually saw Tony go to work at his “Madison Avenue advertising agency.” Indeed, his business in the city rarely seemed to extend beyond picking up Kathy (using Tom's new Mustang) and occasionally dropping Tom's portfolio off at an agency.