CONTRIBUTORS

Norman Jean Roy

Photographer Norman Jean Roy's work in this year's Hollywood Issue encompasses both the re-created world of Alfred Hitchcock and the self-created world of Jerry Weintraub. "Directing some of Hollywood's best actors in classic roles," Roy says, was even more enjoyable than capturing the "exquisite visuals" of Hitchcock's films. When Roy visited Weintraub in his magnificent, custom-built Palm Desert, California, home, the mega-producer and former talent promoter set the tone immediately by bringing out a bottle of tequila. "Jerry and I had a great time hanging out rather than shooting, which led to a very relaxed session," Roy says.

Peter Biskind

While reporting on the making of Coming Home and The Deer Hunter, page 266, contributing editor Peter Biskind was surprised that some of the films' participants had changed their tune with respect to the politics of these movies, while others had not. "Jon Voight has made a hard turn to the right," says Biskind, "while Jane Fonda is as committed as ever. She drew the obvious parallels between Vietnam and Iraq." This wasn't Biskind's first time revisiting a politically sensitive film. In March 2006, he wrote about the making of Reds.

Ingrid Sischy

Contributing editor Ingrid Sischy, a longtime resident of Greenwich Village, in New York City, has been keeping a close eye on artist and filmmaker Julian Schnabel's Palazzo Chupi, on West 11th Street, ever since its construction started, in 2005. This month, Sischy writes about the architectural creation in her piece "Artist in Residence," which begins on page 410. "This is the biggest manifestation of Julian's love of creating places that feel a certain way," she says. "It's an aspect of his work—whether we call it interior design, exterior design, architectural work, or giant sculpture—that's an integral facet of his creativity. Design and architectural thinking are parts of Julian's DNA, and I like the idea of writing about it at center stage." Sischy is the editor of Interview magazine.

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Sam Kashner

"The first time I saw The Graduate, I was with one of my mother's friends!" recalls contributing editor Sam Kashner, who describes the making of Mike Nichols's 1967 classic this month in "Here's to You, Mr. Nichols: The Making of The Graduate." "She was, if I remember correctly, very sexy. She was probably only babysitting me, but it meant a lot more to a young boy who had never even been on a date. This was at the Coronet Theatre, in New York, across from Bloomingdale's, and afterward she took me to the Sign of the Dove. She had a martini; I had a ginger ale. I remember she was smoking, and she threw back her head and said, 'Benjamin was such a wimp—he should've enjoyed it more.' I almost fainted." Kashner, who calls Nichols "one of my heroes," is the co-author, along with Nancy Schoenberger, of Hollywood Kryptonite (St. Martin's), a book about the life and mysterious death of TV Superman George Reeves. The pair's biography of pianist and wit Oscar Levant (Villard, 1994) is currently being developed into a feature by Red Hour Films.

Patricia Bosworth

The works of contributing editor Patricia Bosworth, who has moved in a social circle that included director Elia Kazan, director and actor Lee Strasberg, and Marilyn Monroe, are often inspired by her own encounters. For this year's Hollywood Issue, Bosworth profiles former colleague and friend Norman Mailer, the late Pulitzer Prize-winning writer and filmmaker, with whom Bosworth sat on the board of both the Actors Studio and PEN American Center. "Norman had a huge ego, but it galvanized his creativity," she says. "His energy was infectious. He could really change consciousness through the brilliance of his thoughts." Bosworth is currently working on a biography of Jane Fonda, to be published by Houghton Mifflin.

Frank DiGiacomo

Already blurring the lines between video games, film, and reality, LucasArts— George Lucas's gaming company—is set to release a revolutionary Star Wars video game, The Force Unleashed, this summer. Contributing editor Frank DiGiacomo visited Lucas's entertainment empire in San Francisco in order to witness the development of the most lifelike video game ever. "A lot of people I know exhibit a kind of knee-jerk snobbery about gaming," DiGiacomo remarks. "But I think if they actually took the time to look at how these games are made and spent some time traipsing through the vivid, threedimensional worlds that are created, they would realize that it's actually an amazing field full of remarkably intelligent people who love pushing the envelope."

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Punch Hutton

What strikes you about Vanity Fair's Fanfair and Fairground editor, Punch Hutton, each time you talk to her, is how much she loves to help. Need a doctor? She's got a great one. A last-minute hostess gift? She knows the perfect shop—in any city. Taking a date to dinner? She always has the maitre d's private number on file. Because of this, she's been the creative force behind Vanity Fair's Oscar Guide from the start. This year's edition encompasses everything from sartorial secrets only an L.A. native would know (Who can do a top-stitch hem in a jiffy?) to gourmet guidance (What's the best dish at the Polo Lounge?) and Big Night know-how (Where should I go for pre-party prep and after-hours fun?). Her talent for introducing new things makes the guide wholly indispensable, but if she had to give just one piece of Oscar wisdom, it would be this: "You have to love how you look in what you're wearing. Oh, and Spanx are amazing."

Rich Cohen

When contributing editor Rich Cohen met Jerry Weintraub, whom he profiles in "Jerry Weintraub Presents!," on page 386, he found the archetypal Hollywood producer "really familiar in a weird way," he says. "My father is a very similar kind of guy—in his 70s, from a Jewish neighborhood in New York. So many successful guys came out of that kind of neighborhood, and they love to talk." For Cohen, staying at Weintraub's grand Palm Desert home and hearing his stories about the likes of Elvis Presley and Frank Sinatra (Weintraub was the promoter for both of them by age 31) hardly felt like work. "I've done a ton of magazine stories," Cohen says, "and this one ranks right at the top in terms of fun."

Michael Wolff

For the record, contributing editor Michael Wolff says he has never been a real screenwriter and thus has always been grateful for the script work he's been given. That said, in keeping with the thrust of his column this month, his advice to aspiring screenwriters is "Don't go there. It's a black hole from which you won't emerge. One of the interesting things about working in Hollywood is that, while at any given time there are thousands of scripts in development, essentially there are not many more than 100 major studio movies released each year. Everybody is basically writing into the void. You have to ask: Is an unproduced script sort of like a tree falling in the forest? Has it really been written?" Wolff, one of the founders of the Web site Newser, is currently working on a book about Rupert Murdoch and the takeover of Dow Jones, which Doubleday will publish in the fall.

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PROMOTION

Agenda >

MISS PETTIGKEW

COMING SOON

Every Woman Will Have Her Day

In the sparkling comedy Miss Pettigrew Lives for A Day, Academy Award® winner Frances McDormand plays Guinevere Pettigrew, who finds herself once again unfairly dismissed from her job. Without so much as severance pay, she realizes that she must—for the first time in two decades—seize the day. She does this by intercepting an employment assignment outside of her comfort level, as a social secretary. Arriving at a penthouse apartment for the interview, Miss Pettigrew is catapulted into the glamorous world and dizzying social whirl of an American actress and singer, Delysia Lafosse (Amy Adams, star of the blockbuster Enchanted). In this Cinderella story, two women are about to discover that you can get a life, and discover love, all in one day. Coming to movie theaters March 7.

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SunHee Grinnell

Aptly enough, senior photography and beauty editor SunHee Grinnell got goose bumps watching the likes of Naomi Watts, Charlize Theron, and Renee Zellweger transform for this year's Hollywood Portfolio, "Hitchcock Classics," which re-creates the master's oeuvre in thrilling detail, right down to real, live seagull in Jodie Foster's scene from The Birds. Of working with a team of more than 20 people to produce the 24-page section, Grinnell says, "In 17 years at Vanity Fair, it's one of the most creative things I've done, by far. All the sets were custombuilt, to echo the aesthetic of that era." In the coming months Grinnell plans to continue working on the children's book she's writing, inspired by her son, Roman.

Jessica Diehl

"Many actors are used to arriving at a shoot to find daunting racks and racks of clothing, and many were surprised—and I think relieved—by the tight edit for this year's Hollywood Portfolio," says senior style editor Jessica Diehl, who dressed the "Hitchcock Classics" cast so that the leading ladies and their male counterparts mirrored Alfred Hitchcock's original silver-screen stars. "All the clothing we used is current," Diehl says. "For example, Savile Row tailors Norton & Sons, who worked with Cary Grant, made the suit for Seth Rogen." Diehl was impressed by how every actor approached his or her session as a role to play, and not as a typical fashion portrait. "Everyone was very at ease in his or her character," she says. "To see them turn it on, so to speak, was quite incredible."

Nathaniel Rich

For last year's annual Hollywood Issue, film noir buff Nathaniel Rich helped write the story line for the magazine's star-studded noir portfolio. He returned this year to craft the captions for the Hitchcock portfolio, which begins on page 357. "I watched Psycho for the first time as an eight-year-old, and it disturbed me so deeply that I made a point of watching all of Hitchcock's films," says Rich. "He's been one of my heroes ever since." Rich, an editor at The Paris Review, thinks the famed movie director is as relevant and beloved today as he has ever been. "Although he was dismissed by critics for much of his career, Hitchcock's films have come to represent the most refined style, dark humor, and sexual perversity that Hollywood has to offer." Rich's first novel. The Mayor's Tongue, will be published by Riverhead this April.