Brown Tina - All that glitters: Anna Wintour, Tina Brown, and the rivalry inside Americas richest media empire

Copyright 2019 by Thomas Maier

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file.

Cover design by Paul Qualcom

Cover Photos: Getty Images

Print ISBN: 978-1-5107-4490-5

Ebook ISBN: 978-1-5107-4492-9

Printed in the United States of America

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CONTENTS

Cast of Characters

DRAMATIS PERSONAE

S.I. Si Newhouse Jr. secretive billionaire chairman of the Newhouse media empire.

Alexander Liberman long-time Cond Nast editorial director and Sis confidant.

Tina Brown Cond Nasts star editor who revived Vanity Fair and later the New Yorker.

Anna Wintour stylish and competitive Vogue magazine editor and eventually Cond Nast artistic director.

NEWHOUSE FAMILY AND FRIENDS

S.I. Sam Newhouse Sr. Sis father created Advance Publications media empire.

Mitzi Newhouse Sis mother favored Cond Nast.

Donald Newhouse Sis younger brother managed newspapers.

Roy Cohn Sis best friend/lawyer, also counsel to Donald Trump.

Richard Shortway Vogue publisher taught Si the business side.

Jonathan Newhouse Sis cousin oversaw Cond Nast in Europe.

COND NAST AND NEWHOUSE MEDIA COMPANY FIGURES

Graydon Carter replaced Brown as Vanity Fair editor in 1992.

Grace Mirabella Vogue editor fired in 1988, replaced by Wintour.

Diana Vreeland legendary Vogue editor, fired by Si in 1971.

James Truman replaced Liberman as Cond Nast editorial director in 1994.

Andr Leon Talley fashion editor at Vanity Fair , then Vogue .

Harold Evans famed British editor and husband of Brown.

Ron Galotti publisher at Vanity Fair and Vogue .

William Shawn longtime editor of the New Yorker .

Dominick Dunne star writer at Vanity Fair .

Irving Penn traveled the world for artistic photos in Vogue .

Richard Avedon famed photographer at Vogue , later the New Yorker .

Annie Leibovitz iconic celebrity photos for Vanity Fair and Vogue .

OTHER BOLD-FACED NAMES

President Donald Trump Si published future presidents 1987 memoir, making him nationally famous.

Rupert Murdoch owner of rival media company, also Trump patron.

Liz Smith syndicated columnist chronicling Cond Nast.

Norman Mailer famous novelist recruited by Roy Cohn.

President Ronald Reagan White House photo helped save Vanity Fair.

Diana, Princess of Wales friend of Wintour, critiqued by Brown.

Andy Warhol pop artist asked to paint portrait of family patriarch Sam.

Demi Moore her 1991 cover defined buzz for Browns Vanity Fair .

Calvin Klein his high-gloss ads mirrored Cond Nast editorial pages.

A publisher is known by the company he keeps.

Alfred A. Knopf

I am happy to hear that Pres. Obama is considering giving Anna Wintour @voguemagazine an ambassadorship. She is a winner & really smart!

Donald J. Trump, @realDonaldTrump, December 5, 2012

PREFACE

THE BIG PARTY

B ig hair, big egos, big dreams. All the ambition and over-the-top stylings of Manhattan in the 1980sa time when the Reagans ruled the White House and Donald Trump was a mere local developerappeared on display at the annual Cond Nast Christmas party.

From a distance, this gathering looked like one of those Old Hollywood studio luncheons where newsreel cameras panned each glittering actor, movie director, and famous face. Only this private event for the Cond Nast media empire was far more exclusive, with its stars compared to a then-popular television show called Dynasty .

S. I. Newhouse Jr., a small, reclusive man known as Si, reigned supreme over this dazzling affair, along with his debonair, long-time editorial director, Alexander Liberman. For decades, these two men controlled an array of glossy magazinesstuffed with perfume-scented pages full of beautiful models, clothes, and accoutrementswhich dictated how women should look, dress, and feel.

At tables near Newhouse, each editor was seated in proximity to their perceived favor with the boss. Closest to Si were his most celebrated stars, Anna Wintour of Vogue and Tina Brown of Vanity Fair.

While these two female editors traded polite smiles and bons mots , the press portrayed their relationship as nothing less than a duel. An air of contention pervaded the room like perfume or the aroma of a fine wine. From the moment that Wintour walked through the door as a Cond Nast editor, Time magazine reported, rumors of a Dynasty -style cat fight with Brown began to circulate.

Both pooh-poohed talk of any rivalry, and under different circumstances, the two young British women might have been friends. But in the intense world of Cond Nastwhere Newhouse presided over a managed competition among his editors a tug-of-war for power and influence was only natural.

This tension seemed reflected even in the group photo taken at these holiday conclaves held at the Four Seasons restaurant, an elegant mid-Manhattan eatery known for its power lunches. Usually in these photos, Si could be found in the middle, with Anna standing to his right and Tina on the opposite left.

Virtually everyone in Americas media took note of the Cond Nast fireworks, just as Newhouse intended. No longer would the Newhouse name be weighed solely by the chain of dull gray newspapers started by his father in out-of-the-way places.

Anna Wintour and Tina Brown have become twin symbols of the new Cond Nast, where glamour and celebrity are the coin of the realm, editors are stars, and Britannia rules the waves, enthused the New York Times in 1989. In their glossy journals, they are purveyors of gossip and celebrity, yet they themselves have become celebrities of a sort, fodder for the rumor mills. Their clothes, their homes, their husbands, their rise through the organization, their salaries (said to be very well into the six figures) and perksall are grist. Wintour and Brown have brought a high-flying style to the company that the gossip columns dote on.