Isn't That Rich?: Life Among the 1 Percent (7 page)

10. PAID FRIENDS

Weary of Genuine Relationships, Rich New Yorkers Hire Stand-Ins

LAST MAY, AS THE CHERRY BLOSSOMS
transformed Central Park into a confectioner’s dream, Dana and I accepted an invitation to a charity gala from an international couple who maintain a residence in New York. While we see them only occasionally, our interaction, though intermittent, has been consistent, and we have become acquainted with their close circle of friends.

Museum galas can be as dusty as medieval tapestries, but this particular evening the great room sparkled. As we made our way to their table, we saw an eclectic mix of the usual suspects: their obsequious decorator, a silent banker from Monaco, and the wife’s LA-based stylist and couturier. Noticeably absent was the couple’s omnipresent and soigné art consultant, who always seemed to be the chatty third wheel.

As I turned to the hostess over the tuna tartare and avocado and complimented her acorn-size emerald earrings, I asked where the advisor was, having seen him cohost virtually every event.

“We had a falling-out,” she said, misty-eyed.

“That must be upsetting,” I offered. “I know how close you were.”

“Yes. I considered him to be one of my dearest friends.”

“What happened?”

“It was a billing issue,” she said, sniffling.

“Billing?”

“He usually charges fifteen percent on the art he brought us,” she whispered in near grief, “but we found he was also charging us on things we found at auction, and my husband had to let him go.”

Early in September, Dana and I saw those friends at their Park Avenue maisonette for a postsummer catch-up cocktail party. As I navigated my way through the gilt, chintz, and tufted ottomans, I saw that their advisor was happily back on the scene, choreographing the tuxedoed waitstaff and mingling with the guests.

I air-kissed the wife. “I see he’s back,” I said. “You must be happy.”

“Yes, I realized it was all a misunderstanding.”

“Misunderstanding?” I asked.

“Oh, yes,” she said. In her clipped European accent, she explained that she and her husband had worked out a new arrangement with the art advisor. “He charges a premium for his advisory services at auction. So we just created a new deal: a flat thirteen-point-seventy-five percent fee on everything including what we ask him to look at,” she said. “You know, clarity and communication are everything. After all, I wouldn’t want money to stand in the way of friendship.”

Friend
is a flimsy moniker in New York. It might apply to someone one meets at a cocktail party and two lunches later is a “great friend” based on grand commonalities like the private school admissions process or renovation dramas.

Then there are the friends for hire, the innately personable service providers who are sought out to fulfill social obligations, provide companionship, and offer courtlike flattery masquerading as friendship to those who can afford it. Heartache, though, sometimes occurs when relationship demands and financial arrangements are at odds.

“There is a market, a currency for paid friends in New York,” Eternally Youthful Fashion Designer revealed over pecan-crusted seitan at Candle 79. “Some people need the money, and some people need the friends. It happened just last week.”

“What happened?” I asked, eyeing her tantalizing vegan cheese platter.

“My staff was taking measurements, and my client’s entire posse came to the atelier—you know, the hairdresser, the publicist, the stylist, the personal assistant. The housekeeper also came with sliced apples and almonds in a plastic bag as a snack. The trainer was giving my seasoned seamstress an opinion on the length of the garment. ‘Make it shorter, make it longer. It’s too tight.’ Mostly though, everyone was, ‘You look gorgeous.’ You know, with the dramatic hand signal going to the mouth, like in an Italian operetta.”

“That must have been aggravating,” I offered.

“It’s part of the business; if someone needs constant companionship and compliments, paid friends are ideal,” she said, sipping her organic cola. “Honestly, it’s just another form of addiction. I do believe that some care, but for the most part, someone’s always on the make.”

Over the next few months, I broached the topic of paid friends with a broad swath of people, and it turned out to be more taboo than sex. While the subject evoked knowing guffaws from some, others froze in their tracks, acting like I had stumbled upon a clandestine affair. (Guilty, obviously.) Others shrugged it off as something that clearly existed but not in their own backyard. No one I spoke to was willing to cop to possessing or being a paid friend. (Having a dominatrix seemed more acceptable.)

But one evening, I found myself at a dinner party seated next to the glamorous ex-wife of one of New York’s most enigmatic commodities traders, noted for his custom suits and contraband supply of Cubans. Having received a lucrative divorce settlement, she was more than willing to open up about her ex-husband’s assortment of paid friends. In fact, after I artfully plied her with Avión and an orange twist, she couldn’t seem to talk about anything else.

“Everyone, and I mean everyone, was on the payroll.” She played with her chestnut-size South Sea pearls. “When we first started dating, I was annoyed that so many people were always around. But I learned that powerful men all have posses.”

“Why?” I asked.

“I think many really successful men don’t actually have time for real friends. Their old friends are either resentful or bitter or ask for money, and the new friends are often competitive. In my opinion, very rich men have paid friends as an expensive filter, because they can control them. They love to manipulate everyone.”

“Was that difficult?”

“It was actually more boring than anything, but I did see an ugly side to it—the laughing too hard at the bad jokes, the constant flattery, the jockeying for position, the tennis pro throwing the game.”

“Did he view them as real friends?” I asked.

“The way he spoke to them was quite abusive actually, especially the good-looking ones. And they all took it.”

“Did you keep up with any of them after the divorce?”

“Please! They couldn’t wait to see me go,” she said, toying with her endive and walnut salad. “The division of assets was a lot more complicated than the division of friends.”

“How so?”

“There were a lot of assets and virtually no real friends. The people who pay get to keep the paid friends. No one was going to side with me when he was picking up the check,” she said, nibbling on a singular endive, then pushing the plate away as if she had consumed an entire plate of lasagna.

“I am so full!” she exclaimed. “Look, let’s be real. If he didn’t have any money, he’d be sitting all alone in his apartment with a container of Häagen-Dazs and a bottle of vodka.”

Sometimes, just being fun to be around is a currency that translates into social invitations, as it has for a bicoastal producer I know.

Sitting in the afternoon sun on the terrace of the Downtown outpost of Sant Ambroeus, a few glasses of prosecco clearly provided the proper amount of social lubrication to get him talking.

“In Hollywood, you’re either in the starring role or in the supporting cast. I always said I was a paid extra.” He laughed, his stylish frames glinting in the sun.

“Did you know any paid friends in LA?”

“Know any? My partner and I always joke we’re America’s houseguests. We’re always being invited to fun, fabulous places, and it’s always a seaplane, a private jet, five-star villas. Wheels up, baby!”

“Any downside?” I asked.

“Well, you’re always on someone else’s schedule—sort of like being a pet monkey. But when you’re single and a free agent, you can enjoy the paid friend lifestyle at the drop of a hat.”

“Do you see a difference in New York versus LA paid friends?” I asked.

“It’s much more faux democratic in LA. There, the stars go out with their stylists in sweatpants for a latte. It’s more formal in New York. The driver stays in the car; they’re not having lunch with you at Da Silvano. In LA, domestic help really runs the house and raises the kids, because the actors and the producers can be away for months at a time. So they really are an extended part of the family.”

“And in New York?”

“New York is more formal and diversified. In LA, proximity, traffic, carmageddon actually keep your group smaller. You don’t just drop in on people; it’s scheduled, and you tend to socialize only with the people you work with.”

“How do the stars go about finding their paid friends?”

“LA is big on poaching. Once I started working with [one of the great female stars], everyone assumes if you’re good enough for her, you must be good, so they try and poach you. And in LA, it’s accepted that all the paid friends are waiting for their
All About Eve
moment.”

“Such as?”

“I once went to a small dinner party with [the star] at [another huge star’s home], and, of course, the personal chef comes out and wants to know if you eat meat or are vegan. At the same time, during dinner—it was an open kitchen—she’s grilling pineapples and pitching a movie idea to my boss. Of course, no one blinks an eye.”

“So why did you stop being a paid friend?”

“We’re living here now, and we have our own lives to lead. Look, being a paid friend is complicated. When you’re in the presidential suite, it’s amazing; sometimes it can be emasculating, but I put my ego away a long time ago. Truthfully, there’s also something reassuring about it.”

“Reassuring?” I said, not believing my ears.

“Well, think about it. You have these incredibly successful and wealthy people who are at the top of their game and should be so happy.”

“And?”

“And if they were so incredibly happy and satisfied, why would they need me to go to Hawaii to entertain them?”

While the perks, five-star holidays, and constant socializing all seemed somewhat fun, I started to hear more drawbacks to paid friendships.

“There’s nothing more painful than a paid friend breakup,” said a respected entrepreneur with an extensive infrastructure of PFs.

“How so?” I asked, looking out his office window across Manhattan to New Jersey, where life suddenly seemed much less complicated.

“In some ways, it can be frightening. You allow people access to your home, your kitchen fridge, your children’s schedules. So let’s say someone you’ve allowed ‘in’ falls off the wagon, shows signs of having a drug or alcohol problem.” He leaned back in his leather chair fifty stories up. “You have to be careful.”

“Careful?”

“If you have that nagging fear, sometimes, and I’ve done this, you actually have to pay them to leave. You have to, because it becomes emotional, financial, and reputational for the paid friends.”

“Have you ever let a paid friend back after you fired them?”

“There was a situation where my wife’s personal shopper started stalking her at events and stopping by with new items. I had to get firm with her.”

“How did she take it?”

“Not well.” He puffed on his cigar. “No one’s happy when they’re on the gravy train and the gravy train stops running.”

Last Friday, I was being fitted for a cerulean velvet sports jacket at Jay Kos on Mott Street when an ominous black SUV pulled up outside the discreet storefront.

An old client from the agency business emerged and rang the buzzer, his trainer in tow. After a pleasant greeting, he immediately requested the same blazer (in a larger size, thankfully). His trainer, who was still in his yoga gear, pulled a few items for my acquaintance as well.

“Try these on—they’ll look good on you,” he suggested, yawning simultaneously.

“Do you always travel with an entourage?” I asked my former client.

“Why do you ask?” he said, looking at me squarely. “Are you writing a new story? I liked the last one, but my wife was offended.”

“Wait till she reads the next one. It’s on paid friends.”

“Paid friends?”

“As in people who are friends with their decorators, trainers, stylists.”

“Oh, I get it. She has plenty,” he said, somewhat amused. “Why don’t you ask him?” he then asked, pointing to his flexible friend. “He’s a paid friend.”

“No, I’m not. I’m your friend,” the yogi said, somewhat offended.

“But you get paid.”

“Yeah, but …”

“So you’re a paid friend,” he said matter-of-factly.

“I’d rather not,” the yogi sniffed.

“I don’t mind having paid friends,” the client said, trying on a python jacket. “My wife is paid, and she’s not even a friend. Just joking. You know me. I’ve had a few tussles in my day. Once you’ve had paid friends who don’t argue with you, it’s actually quite hard to go back to real friends.” He laughed.

“That looks great,” the yoga instructor said, eyeing my former client in snakeskin.

“You think I should buy it?” the client asked.

“Definitely. And you can throw this on the bill for me.” The trainer picked a perforated cashmere scarf and wrapped it around his neck, Euro style.

“By the way, Richard, right?” The trainer stared me down.

“Yes?” I turned.

“That jacket looks awesome on you,” he said, reaching into his pocket and extracting his business card with a photo of himself in a tree pose.

“Call me for yoga,” he said. “You look like a rock star!”

“A rock star, huh?” I said, taking his card and tucking it into my wallet for safekeeping. “Tell me, anyone in particular?”

11. THE CUSTOMER IS ALWAYS WRONG

Welcome to the New Chef-Waiter World Order

I WAS RAISED TO BELIEVE
the adage “the customer is always right,” and as I’ve learned in advertising, it works better if one actually likes being in a service business.

I always thought this ethos would apply to the restaurant business, where serving patrons with a smile (even a disingenuous one) is part of the job description. However, lately I’ve detected an insidious strain of inhospitable service crossing over into actual hostility.

When an Upper East Side restaurant first opened its designer doors, I was thrilled to have a new eatery in the area, as the mom-and-pop places have all been replaced by glossy international luxury brands.

We joined friends who had booked a table in the dramatically lit main dining room. After air kisses and polite conversation, I asked for my chicken well done, since the newest fashion is to undercook everything as many of today’s chefs think something “well done” is bourgeois and/or infantile.

I happen to like it that way and have resorted to begging the waiter to “burn it,” just to get something fully cooked at the very least. (One trick is to ask them to butterfly everything for a greater probability of having the meat see the fire.) I sometimes use the line “apologies to the chef” to butter them up and also to let them know I’m not a fool.

But when the entrée arrived and I cut into the chicken, I immediately recoiled at the glistening, coral pink flesh inside. I called the waiter over. “I ordered the chicken extra well done and the inside is barely cooked,” I said.

He rolled his eyes. “I’ll take it back and see
if
chef will cook it more.”

I motioned for my companions to eat as I waited for the final verdict. The server finally sauntered over as everyone else was finishing their meals.

“I’m sorry,” he said flatly, bringing back my undercooked chicken, “but this is the way the chef prepares it.”

“Excuse me?” I said as he placed the raw-ish carcass back in front of me. “You’re telling me the chef will not cook my chicken more? It’s almost
alive
.” I was horrified.

“I’m sorry but that’s the way the chef prepares the chicken,” he said in a provocative gesture that was meant to say,
We are not interested in making you happy and there is a line of people waiting for your table.

“That just happened to me here last week,” said my friend, a powerful CEO of a public company, shrugging as I sat there, not quite knowing what to make of the situation.

“So why did you make the reservation again?” I asked.

“Janice (not his wife’s real name) likes the ambiance. She loves the décor.”

I lifted my wineglass and said, “Welcome, everyone, to the newest restaurant in town:
Chez Fuck U
.”

There is and has always been a segment of
the luxury market that borders on sadism. Perhaps there is an underlying philosophy that the worse you treat someone, the more they will want it.

This has spilled over to restaurants that overbook and do not honor timely reservations, keeping groups of people (including the elderly) standing and waiting for hours, while any random celebrity is whisked to a table. Waiters are now given license from imperious chefs to dictate to us how the chefs
want us to eat
, as if we are children who need to be educated on their ingenious and innovative preparation. And testy maître d’s often affect a disinterested and unhelpful persona, their ennui on full display.

One day my dear friend the Impossibly Blond and Glamorous Socialite (TIBGS) and I were seated in the grillroom of a private club I belong to in Manhattan, where Mark Twain once frolicked. I enjoy the club even more as it offers elegant dining in a landmark mansion, its ambiance and gracious service uncompromised by surly staff.

TIBGS concurred that elsewhere restaurant abuse was getting out of hand. “The attitude and airs in this town are ridiculous,” she shared. “And the behavior is topped only by the insecure patrons who put up with it.”

“I agree,” I said, watching the genteel waiter hand-toss the Caesar salad on a vintage trolley.

“I love the restaurants that make up prices,” TIBGS offered.

“That’s a good one,” I said. “The best is the [well-known eatery] where no matter what you order the bill is always one hundred and fifty dollars a person. It always adds up to the same number for two people, whether you have no appetizer or two main dishes,” I revealed.

She mentioned a restaurant once favored by all the social swans. “It was a home away from home for me,” she recalled, “but if my friend [the famous proprietor] didn’t like you, the place could be empty for all he cared. He would say there was no room, regardless of whether your eyes told you otherwise.”

She continued. “The other day I saw a woman at an outside table at [major Euro establishment] feeding her Havanese off a plate with a spoon,” TIBGS said in a tone indicating she was at once amused and appalled. “The restaurant said nothing even though everyone was outraged, because she is friends with the owner and happens to be titled.”

“Maybe her new title should be
Her Royal Heinous
,” I suggested, tasting the fabulous well-done club chicken. “At least the dog had good manners.”

I recently joined some friends for a birthday celebration at an ultrahip Montauk restaurant. I would have preferred the old-school red-sauce Italian we sometimes frequent, oh so happy for the blue cheese dressing on the mixed green salad in the wooden bowls and the comforting eggplant parm and garlic bread. Once again, I bowed to my friends who prefer the “in” spot.

As I was sipping a refreshing watermelon vodka, my friend and neighbor appeared flushed. “They won’t expand the table even though I told them it was my birthday,” she said. It had originally been a group of ten—I detest group dinners but try to be flexible—and three extra friends showed up. While most normal restaurants would have just squeezed in three chairs or pulled the adjacent table over, the brittle maître d’ who clearly graduated with honors from Chez Fuck U told my friend that the extra three people would have to sit at a table across the room, even though there was an empty four-top right next to our table of ten.

“Let’s go.” I happily stood. “There’s a great old-school Italian I love nearby. They are so nice and accommodating and have the best red sauce in town. I am sure we can just pull up a few extra chairs.”

“No,” the woman said. “I like it here.”

“What’s to like? They won’t even seat your friends near each other,” I tried to reason, selfishly trying to push my agenda as visions of saucy meatballs danced in my head.

“We’ll just take the table of ten, and they can sit separately,” she said. “Let’s just stay.”

“Fine. I’ll sit at the children’s table,” I happily volunteered, hoping not to have another group dinner.

“Oh no. You’re part of the main group. We’ll make the so-and-sos sit there since they joined last minute,” she said. “Can you believe this treatment?”

“So why don’t we all leave?” I asked.

“I really want to eat here. I love the view, and my friend said they have the best kale in town.”

My dreams of hearty spaghetti with garlic bread were dashed by the cruel inevitability of rude service and trendy greens.

“I knew it was my fall from grace when they sat me in Siberia,” said my LA-based friend, a well-known movie studio exec, of a high-profile NYC restaurant where they promptly gave him an inferior table after he had left his last high-profile post.

“What, were they reading the trades?” I asked.

He shook his head. “For years I’d been eating there and getting one of the prime tables, and then when I lose my position they give me a table so far in the back I was almost near the service entrance.”

“How far back is far back?” I pried.

“So far back you’ve never ever even seen where they put me. The thing was,” he said on the speakerphone from his car on the freeway, “that not that many people really knew about my departure. But THEY apparently did. Like they had a hotline to insider Hollywood gossip.”

“What did you do?”

“I said to myself, ‘I really don’t like it back here in steerage, I better get another great job and quick.’ Honestly, I had a great package and was considering taking some time off—but that was one of the things that threw me over the edge,” he revealed.

“Have you been back since?”

“I stayed away for a time, but when I got the even better position, I decided to go back. Now I have a new strategy.”

“What’s that?”

“Now, every time I go there or to a new restaurant, I bring a celebrity with me.”

On another occasion, we had just returned from Europe and were catching up with friends at a hip restaurant in Sag Harbor.

It took forty-five minutes of waiting and being jostled while they cleared and set the table. Finally they seated eight of the ten people in our party and everyone was famished.

“Why don’t we order appetizers?” I offered.

“I’m sorry,” the waitress barked. “We cannot take the order until everyone has arrived.”

“Do you think it would be possible to get some bread and water?”

“I’ll see what I can do,” she said with the warmth of a prison matron.

“This is ridiculous,” my friend Second Wife said as she waited for her houseguests to arrive, nervously looking at her watch.

“Why don’t we up and leave and go to the pizzeria in town? They make awesome pizza and the best espresso,” I offered.

Another guest at the table raised an eyebrow. “I’m not eating at a pizzeria. We just have to put up with the abuse. After all, it’s August in the Hamptons. Where do you think you are? Capri?”

“I have an idea,” I said to Second Wife. “Can you call Harry and Mark and see what their ETA is? If they are more than ten minutes away, you can put in their order.”

The waitress returned to slam down a bread basket. “When are your friends getting here?” she said, rolling her eyes. “This can’t be an all-afternoon event.”

“I know.” We now tried the honey versus the vinegar approach. “They apologize for their late spin class but my friend here called them and we actually have their order.”

She tried to process something outside the norm. “Well, we can’t take orders unless the whole party is here, but I guess it might work. But NO ORDER CHANGES when they get here.” She pulled out her pad as she laid down the law.

“We promise. You’re a dear and a delight.”

“Doesn’t everyone just want to leave?” I asked when she left. “This isn’t exactly relaxing.”

“Richard, there’s nothing relaxing about the Hamptons in August. At least you had the opportunity to escape and go to Capri,” my friend lectured me.

I raised my glass of white wine and toasted. “Welcome to Chez Fuck U.”

No one has more restaurant stories than a Hamptons neighbor who is known for his
very specific culinary desires
.

“So there we were at [hot restaurant by hot restaurateur] when I asked the waiter if they had any salt and pepper. A reasonable request, no?” he said.

“I would think so,” I said, eating my well-done egg white scramble at a diner that could be one of the few places on the UES that takes real requests seriously.

“So as I was saying, the actor/waiter came over and said, ‘I’m sorry but the chef prefers that you do not eat his chicken with salt or pepper.’

“So I told him that if he was a good actor, his role that night was that of a waiter—and he should act like one and bring me what I want.”

“And did he bring it?”

“It was a Mexican standoff. I eventually won it, of course, but I never went back. That said, it’s a popular restaurant and it’s packed all the time.”

“That’s the problem,” I said. “Everyone is whipped.”

The invitation was vague enough to make it interesting, and Dana and I decided to attend the Ralph Lauren event during Fashion Week in Central Park. We arrived close to the nine p.m. call time at the entrance to Central Park and Seventy-Second Street. As we exited our car, we were met by a group of helpful security and polite handlers who directed us to individual golf carts that drove us into the park and deposited us with the other guests. Ralph’s staff, beautifully turned out in crisp summer white Polo shirts, were extremely polite, groomed, and beautiful.

“My, you look lovely this evening,” a young man complimented Dana as we walked by.

“Would you care for popcorn for the show?” another graciously offered.

“Would either of you like water?” The chiseled waiter offered bottles of signature-branded Polo water.

We all gathered by the lake to watch the projected fashion show, the images creating a ghostly yet artful runway against the Central Park West skyline. After an image of Ralph took a bow to great applause, we were ushered out where a cart and retinue of Ralph Lauren waiters smiled brightly and offered the guests whimsical and creative Ralph’s coffee cups to go. The way in which one of America’s greatest success stories and luxury brands treated his guests in contrast to the appalling behavior now being served in many of today’s supposedly best restaurants only reinforced why some people rise to great heights and others flame out.

If Mr. Lauren ever opens a restaurant in New York, I’d like the first reservation. I know the ambiance would be extraordinary and the service gracious and well turned out.

Finally, I’d be able to get chicken the way I want it. Now, wouldn’t that be a fashion statement?