Bad News for Baz

Jay McInerney is one of America's most celebrated writers having published many best sellers including the legendary Bright Lights Big City and The Last of The Savages. Bright Lights was made into a movie in 1998 and starred Michael J.Fox. A re-make of the film is underway.

Amy Fay Collins & Jay McInerney in New York

McInerney contributes to prestigious publications like Vanity Fair and The New Yorker and does book reviews for The New York Times and the Times Literary Supplement. He's the sort of hip writer that defines the new American urbane author- sophisticated, connected, knowledgeable and in demand.

He's just contributed a piece to the UK Guardian titled : "why Gatsby is so great". It's an ode to the great F.Scott Fitzgerald and his brilliant novel The Great Gatsby. McInerney is clearly a Fitzgerald fan and enthuses over the book and the extraordinary eight hour West End play Gatz which is receiving rave reviews. He likes Gatz because it presents the book in it's entirety and he clearly loves the poetry and mastery of Fitzgerald's writings.
It seems then he would be looking forward to the upcoming Baz Luhrmann production The Great Gatsby (in glorious 3D) to be released in early 2013.
Alas, no. As Jay says:

This is just one reason why I avoided the 1974 version starring Robert Redford and Mia Farrow, with a screenplay by Francis Ford Coppola. And why I will almost certainly be skipping Baz Luhrmann's film, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, much as I would love to see Isla Fisher in the role of Myrtle Wilson, the floozy mistress of Gatsby'

 Read more at The Guardian here  and see Jay McInerney's website here
                                      ***************************** 

Andy Warhol once famously said of New York photographer Patrick McMullan " If you don't know Patrick you should go out more".

McMullan at work

Along with 81 year old Bill Cunningham he is a regular fixtures on the New York social, party and fashion scene. McMullan even has his own TV show and online magazine PMc Magazine. If you have party in New York and Patrick isn't there (or at least one of his snappers) it's a dud!

Sydney publicists could probably learn a few things from a night out with Patrick. There are probably three of the old guard snappers left in Sydney (Melbourne prs are far more civilised) who really know what it's all about, know the new and old faces and aren't bedazzled by the latest X Factor contestant.
The above snap of Jay McInerney is by McMullan who has worked on projects with the writer- here are a few of his latest pics from New York:

Anne Hathaway & Jim Carrey at Stella McCartney's fashion show.

Dita Von Teese

Bill Cuningham

NY Photographer Honoured

The career of the legendary New York snapper Bill Cunningham , now 81 years old, was celebrated when he was awarded a Medal of Excellence at the Waldorf Astoria hotel at a charity gala that raised over a million dollars for Carnegie Hall's Well Music Institute.

Bill &Anna Wintour

Cunningham is one of the last residents of the few apartments in Carnegie Hall and he has been a fixture on New York streets and at fashion shows and parties for decades.

The movie on his life (trailer below) should be required watching for the coterie of Aussie publicists who often exude a demeanour far grander than their clients and armed with their precious 'communications' degrees, really have no clue what the business is all about.
Sydney must be one of the few major cities of the world where the unkempt aggressive paparazzi are taken seriously by many publicists and public relations 'experts'.

Sarah Jessica Parker

At red carpets openings. movie premiers and such  the press pen will be packed with ghastly paparazzi - the same snappers who prowl the streets and beaches of Sydney, are aggressive, rude and have nil interest in their subject apart from the few dollars that may be made from a picture.

There are probably four genuine photojournalists in Sydney who operate like Cunningham , who have respect for the people they photograph yet are shouldered aside by the bores of the pap world. These snappers tend to like getting to know their subject, often chatting to them and building up a rapport. The paps on the other hand are mostly filling their files with generic snaps of celebrities for future use.
 But who are we at the Shuttle with a combined 100 years of experience to tell these woolly newbies how to work?                              
 Photographs : www.patrickmcmullan.com