The Andy Warhol Diaries

by Andy Warhol

  Barbara Allen was there with the Polish guy, Kwiatkowski, and he does have capped teeth. I mean, she could have just had Joe Allen’s teeth capped, if that’s what she wanted. I don’t get it. And Joe Allen was there with his new wife, Rhonda.

  They had a dance band that played during dinner and everybody danced. PH was with Jed.

  And I went into the big room where they had a Marilyn over the mantle in a gold frame and it looked just beautiful. Really beautiful. It looked like a million-dollar painting. It looked so right in that room with all the America stuff. I wish I’d painted better in those days, though. The painting on it—it’s not painted too well. I didn’t know how then. And they had my Merce Cunningham in the same room where the Jasper Johns was. And they had my Mona Lisa on the way up to the stairs. I tried to take Jon back to see the Marilyn but then there were Glorious Food waiters telling people not to go into the rooms.

  Monday, July 30, 1984

  I didn’t want to go to Robert Hayes’s memorial service, I was thinking of giving his family a painting of him, but in the end I decided it’d be easier to just go so people wouldn’t talk.

  And Chris just called me up to talk about the service saying that it was all a fantasy and why didn’t Robert’s old boyfriends get up there and talk. He said he should have worn a black veil and gotten up there and said he was the first Mrs. Hayes. I told him that eulogies are always a fantasy, but that that’s what you do. I think he must be nervous, too, though, about Robert dying. I think we’re going to have to do something for this disease, though. I mean like a benefit, because it’s like polio or something. I mean, they don’t know that it’s sexually transmitted for sure—it’s just a virus!

  Chris is so outrageous, though. After getting months of free lessons from Lidija by being with me, when she needed a photo for the ad she wants to run, he said it would cost her $750!

  At 4:00 we went over to 22nd and Park to the church for the service for Robert Hayes, and the place was completely filled.

  Tuesday, July 31, 1984

  Susan Blond called and wanted to know who the people were who I wanted to get the Michael Jackson tickets for, if they were anyone who could do anything for her. And she said that Michael might want to go to an art gallery with me while he’s here. She said that they’d close the Museum of Modern Art for him, so that might be fun. Steve Rubell said (laughs), “Michael might want to see a little art.”

  A couple of people called about Bill Pitt—he died. I think maybe he committed suicide. His best friend called and we talked. He thought maybe Bill had gone to a doctor to get a test for AIDS and that maybe he found out he had it and decided to take an overdose. He wasn’t happy. Worked till 7:00. Went to bed at 11:30.

  I’m going to go to a doctor who puts crystals on you and it gives you energy. I asked Dr. Li to recommend one and she gave me a name. Jon’s gotten interested in that kind of stuff—he says it gives you “powers,” and I think it sounds like a good thing to be doing. Health is wealth.

  Wednesday, August 1, 1984

  Somebody told me there’s a thing in the Sunday New York Times Book Review about me in a review by an Iranian guy, saying that the Shah and somebody else got together and talked about how unattractive I was. That ruined my day, hearing that.

  I went to the crystal doctor and it takes fifteen minutes and the three people in the waiting room I knew, even. It cost $75 and he told me my pancreas was the only thing still giving me pimples. It was fascinating. Really fascinating. He and the secretaries wear crystals around their necks. He said his was very special because it was programmed by the head person of the crystal place. And the secretary’s was blinking like a light show. He didn’t give me a crystal, he gave me the name of a place to go to buy one and then I’ll bring it to him and he’ll check it out.

  Christopher came by the office. He saw a lot of pictures and he said, “Oh, do you have work for me?” He still doesn’t know that I’m using his ex-assistant Terry, but I’m going to have to sit him down and break it to him one day. I mean, she does it for half the price, for $3 a print— and he charges $6. I mean, after all those free trips he got and everything, he’s just crazy. Well, I’m crazy. Why did I take him?

  Oh, and Dotson Rader is doing a book on Tennessee Williams and he interviewed Chris for it. Chris used to work for Tennessee—he got $400 a week for taking care of his dog, he says. Remember, I first met Chris at my Whitney Retrospective in ‘71 when Dotson Rader brought him, and Dotson was a friend of Tennessee’s.

  Friday, August 3, 1984

  Went to Bernsohn, the crystal doctor, and he worked on my pancreas.

  Saturday, August 4, 1984

  Worked all afternoon till 7:00. Susan Blond called and said that we could go to maybe meet Michael Jackson in a hotel room before his concert at Madison Square Garden. So we cabbed to the Penta Hotel ($5). It’s the hotel that was called the Statler Hilton until last week or something and now it’s the Penta. But the cab wouldn’t go near the place because of the mobs for Michael, so he let us off and we had to walk.

  Finally we found the place, we got Elevator B and went up, and Calvin was there, and he was mad that he’d come so early. And Marina Schiano was with him and his girlfriend Kelly. And Rosanna Arquette, the actress, came up and was so sweet, and I asked her if we’d ever done anything on her in Interview and she said, “No, and you’ve just got to!” But then I remembered that we had done something—but just a “First Impression.” Little Sean Lennon was there and that was exciting. And then this apparition appeared and it was Michael Jackson.

  Susan Blond pushed me into his arms and he was shy, and then people pushed me away, and Keith gave him T-shirts and everybody was meeting everybody and then I was pushed back at him and it was anticlimactic and then it was over. I shook his hand and it was like foam rubber. The sequined glove isn’t just a little sequined glove, it’s like a catcher’s mitt. Everything has to be bigger than life for the stage.

  We went to the show and it was laser beams and a movie where a sword had to be pulled out of a stone and Michael pulled it out. Bianca arrived late and the Jackson father was in her seat and she didn’t know who he was and tried to kick him out, but Susan Blond got up and gave her her seat.

  And then after the concert we called Mr. Chow’s to see if they’d be open and they said yes, that they had leftover food. And at Mr. Chow’s we were next to Anthony Quinn and he said hi and I didn’t know if I should go over to his table, I never know, so I played it shy, but then when he was leaving he came over and sort of hugged me, and I remembered that he’s an artist, that he paints.

  Sunday, August 5, 1984

  Jean Michel wanted to go to the Jermaine Jackson party at Limelight. So we went down there (cab $7). And it was one of those parties where the bouncers were all dumb Mafia-type guys who didn’t know anybody. Jean Michel took us to the wrong section and they told us to beat it, and he said, “Now you see how it is to be black.” And all the people who I don’t know, Jean Michel’s just sitting there and then he’ll say, “Hi, man.” He went to school with them or something. He told me he went to a school in Brooklyn, St. Ann’s, that’s sort of chic because you had to pay. And then he said that when his father lost money he had to be bussed to a public school that was a lot of Italians and the boys there used to beat him up and he didn’t like it. But I guess the education was good, though, and that’s why he’s smart.

  Then we got to the VIP room and it was like a remake of an old party. Janet Villella was there and Linda Stein, and it was free drinks (tip $10). Then they came in and told everybody to leave and get out because Jermaine was coming in, and that we could come back later, that (laughs) some of us would be selected to come back. There were some sort of drag queens there with jewelry on, and so we all had to get out, it was so stupid. And you have to walk for a block to get to the next room. And the photographers there are so bored with seeing me, they don’t even say hi anymore. Hold on, the other line’s ringing….

  Oh ge
e, that was Benjamin calling and he said that he and Paige were at the Limelight and they heard I was in the VIP room and they tried to get in but couldn’t. And—this is funny— he said that there were three Olympic guys there wearing their gold medals. So I guess those were the ones I thought were drag queens with jewelry! Gee.

  So anyway, Jean Michel wanted me to see his paintings down on Great Jones Street, so we went there and it’s a pigsty. His friend Shenge—this black guy—lives with him and he’s supposed to be taking care of the place, but it’s a sty. And the whole place just smells so much of pot. He gave me some paintings to work on. Left there (cab $8).

  Monday, August 6, 1984

  The unmentionable day. I’d told everyone I didn’t want to hear the word “birthday.” Benjamin picked me up and we cabbed to 70th and Broadway ($4). Dr. Li said that she’d been at the Michael Jackson thing and I was surprised. Then I put it together—Benjamin had said he saw Roberta Flack at the concert, and Dr. Li has a picture of Roberta Flack in her office, so I asked her if she was with Roberta Flack, and she said yes. So now I’m trying to figure out if they could be dykes.

  Then cabbed to the Whitney where there was the lunch for the presentation by Ethel Scull of the portrait of her that I did in the sixties (cab $4). They were serving lunch in front of the painting.

  Ethel hadn’t arrived yet and when they called her she was in the bath, she thought the lunch was Tuesday. Finally she arrived in a wheelchair and a hat with the big cast on her leg. It was so sad. Like a movie moment where everybody’s waiting. The painting’s not very good, even. It was just—I don’t know. And she said all these things about how I’d wanted $1,200 cash for the painting. In cash, she said, and I mean, I don’t remember that—I wouldn’t have even discussed money. I can’t even do it now, so I can’t see myself saying, “I want $1,200 cash.” It must have been one of the Bellamy Gallery people or Ivan Karp or something who got paid. And she said she came to my house and my mother answered the door, but why would my mother answer the door if I was expecting somebody—I’d be right there. I don’t know, it was nutty.

  And I ran into one of the old kids from Max’s and they told me they finally read Edie over the weekend and that they weren’t shocked by the drugs or anything anybody said about me—that the only thing that shocked them in it was reading that I sold some of my early films to somebody, that they couldn’t believe I wouldn’t be keeping them for myself. But, see, I didn’t really sell them—I have them back now, the guy’s contract expired.

  Oh, it’s all Fred’s fault that I’m in that book. He kept after me to talk to Jean Stein. Because she was “social,” my dear, and was having parties. So me talking to her made it look like I sanctioned her book.

  So it was so boring and gee it’s such a sad family—Ethel doesn’t speak to her sons. David Whitney gave us a tour of the Fairfield Porter show, though, and I looked at Mondrian, and he just took tape and painted it and then Sidney Janis owned these things and it became a business.

  Then at 3:00 went downtown (cab $6). Drue Heinz called to wish me a happy birthday. So did some other people. I got a big twelve-foot weed from Renny the florist.

  Paige picked out a place to have dinner and I invited Jay but then he called back and Benjamin got the phone and Jay asked would I mind if he brought Kate Harrington, and I didn’t say anything, and then he asked Benjamin, “Did Andy just make a face?” He just wanted to start trouble. He does these things so people will feel guilty when he doesn’t want to come anyway. But Benjamin was great, he just said, “Here’s the address—if you want to come, come.” And I would have yelled at Kate if she came, since she’d left work at Interview that afternoon saying she was sick.

  Well, we went to 79th and Lexington to this place called Jams that we go by all the time and never knew was there, this chic place. It was expensive, but the food was so good. The whole thing was like the Four Seasons used to be when the guy was there who used to grow the garden stuff in his own patch in Connecticut. The dessert was incredible. Jean Michel ordered a lot of champagne and he said he’d pay for it but I wouldn’t let him (dinner was $550). It was underplayed, nobody said “Happy Birthday” and it went smoothly. Paige had a strapless pink dress on and she took her camera into the kitchen to do movies. Jean Michel dropped me off and it seemed like being with Jean Michel didn’t bother Paige too much, she’s more recovered from him. Then when he was dropping me off he said that he wanted to go fuck her. I told him that that would just start trouble again. I told him he should give her some artwork because she’s the only girl who ever really helped him out, gave him his first uptown show and sold so many of his paintings. And she never would let him pay for her, she was being very independent, paying her own fare to Hawaii and things like that, and I don’t know why he never liked that, somehow.

  And it was nice to see little Suzanne the makeup girl the night before at Limelight wanting not to get stuck with him—it was refreshing to see a girl trying to get away for a change.

  Tuesday, August 7, 1984

  Went to see Dr. Bernsohn. I told him that after seeing him the last time I went out of alignment and he said that maybe it was a good thing. He was sort of putting down Dr. Li. She sent me to him. He was saying he doesn’t believe in vitamins. I’m going to stop taking them and see if I feel better.

  I was meeting David Whitney and Philip Johnson for dinner at the Four Seasons. Invited Keith and Juan and Jean Michel. Philip goes to bed at 9:00, so he wanted to have dinner at 6:30 but I made it 7:30.

  The Four Seasons was jammed. I expected good food, I’d been spoiled by Jams the night before, but the food was terrible. Doc Cox was there. I’d put on my Stephen Sprouse neon tie. I really looked like the sixties.

  Helen Frankenthaler was at another table with Andre Emmerich and she sent a note to Philip that she was keeping an eye on him with all the boys, and I’ve got that note and it goes into the archives. Everyone was sort of quiet, not much chit-chat.

  Then David got drunk and started what he always starts when he’s had a few drinks, that when Philip kicks the bucket he’ll move in with me. It’s scary.

  Keith wanted to go to Rounds, the gay place at 53rd and Second, and I didn’t, so I said I’d never been there because I hadn’t in five years, and so we walk in the door and the first thing the waiter says is (laughs), “Mr. Warhol! It’s so nice to see you again!” Jean Michel wouldn’t go to Rounds. He called this morning and told me that in the old days when he didn’t have any money he would hustle and get $10 and he didn’t want to remember that.

  So Jean Michel went downtown with Keith. I walked the Doc uptown and he kissed me on the cheek, which was so tender.

  Wednesday, August 8, 1984

  There were eighteen trucks parked on my street and sitting on my stoop was this guy from a movie company, and I asked him what they were shooting and he said, “Brewster’s Millions.” And then he said he was Carol LaBrie’s half-brother—Carol, our star of L’Amour. He took us into the big truck near us and there was Richard Pryor. And he was a lot better-looking than I remember when I last met him. Actually handsome. With this blonde. I don’t know if she was in the movie, too.

  It was really hot and muggy in the truck, the air conditioner wasn’t working too well, and I was going to invite them into my house but the air-conditioning there wasn’t much better. I was considering it, really I was. And it was hard to hear because the air conditioner in the truck was going. He said he’d just seen Bad a couple of months ago. I wonder if the little gold cross he was wearing was his own or for the movie.

  Thursday, August 9, 1984

  Cornelia called while the auction for her debutante book that she’s doing with Jon and another person was going on, and it first was twenty-eight, and then it was thirty-seven with a smaller royalty and then it was thirty-five but with a bigger percentage.

  Went to the movies with Keith and Bobby, Madonna’s ex-boyfriend who’s sort of Keith’s friend now. I had to sign autographs and they were am
azed that so many people yelled my name and would know an artist. I should have asked the people who yelled if they knew what I did for a living. All the blacks know me, I must be in their consciousness. It’s the white hair.

  It was almost empty in the theater but it should’ve been completely empty. This movie, NeverEnding Story, my God … and it’s a big hit in Germany. It’s sort of my philosophy—looking for the nothingness. The nothingness is taking over the planet. It was like Alice in Wonderland and E.T. and “Rumpelstiltskin.”

  Then afterwards Bobby knew all the places in the area, because Madonna had taken him to all of them. So we went to Jezebel’s and then Jezebel came over and she was this fancy black lady. And then in walked guess who? Mickey Rourke. Who PH just interviewed for the cover of Interview. But he didn’t see me and I didn’t say hello.