The villa on the Caribbean island of St. Barth — where an episode of “Keeping Up with the Kardashians” was filmed in 2015 — used to feature nightly drag shows.
In “Treasured Island: The Story of St. Barth…and Its Barbarians, Billionaires, and Beauties,” bestselling author Michael Gross writes that the villa in the 1980s was the site of a restaurant La Banane run by Jean-Marie Rivière.
When dinner was done, the waiters would turn into drag queens and perform cabaret on a stage built over the swimming pool.
“I didn’t invent the transvestite. I gave him his letters of nobility,” Rivière once said.
Gross wrote, “Jean-Marie Rivière, with his taste for high heels and low lives, would have approved of the Kardashians.”
But the book’s publisher Harper apparently didn’t agree and left the Kardashians out of the index.
Greta Garbo used to go to St. Barth in the 1960s, staying at the Eden Rock, the resort with 37 rooms, suites and villas that drew such stars as Paul McCartney, Howard Hughes, Montgomery Clift, Gianni Agnelli and Prince Rainier.
The elusive Garbo booked as Suzy Schmidt, but insisted everyone call her Miss Brown, although her luggage was monogrammed “G.G.”
Garbo brought her girlfriend, Cecile de Rothschild. At meals in the dining room, Garbo would face the wall, and de Rothschild would face the other guests.
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Theodore Roosevelt in Montauk in 1898. (Photo by Smith Collection / Gado / Getty Images)
Teddy Roosevelt inspired one of four fragrances from Montauk Man.
The scent was dubbed Rough Riders after the 1st US Volunteer Cavalry unit formed in 1898 to battle in Cuba during the Spanish-American War.
After their victory, Roosevelt brought his unit of cowboys, athletes and frontiersman to Montauk to recuperate from yellow fever, malaria and typhoid.
“There are photos of them at the Montauk Lighthouse, Teddy on his horse. That was the inspiration,” Andrew Rose told me.
Rose points to Liev Schreiber as an example of a A contemporary Montauk man. “Masculine in a rugged way,” said Rose, who is just 30 but began collecting fragrances in ninth grade.
Rose spent his boyhood summers on the eastern end of Long Island, and learned to drive on Old Montauk Highway.
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Joshua Bell and Larissa Martinez. (Photo by Rabbani and Solimene Photography / Getty Images)
Grammy Award-winning violinist Joshua Bell was at the Bryant Park Picnic Performances to hear his wife, singer Larisa Martinez, perform.
Bell also led the applause for composer Karen LeFrak’s piece, “Prairie Dawn,” played by the NYC Opera musicians led by maestro Constantine Orbelian.
Dancers from Larissa Saveliev’s Youth America Grand Prix performed new choreography by Maria Konrad to both Martinez’s and LeFrak’s pieces. Guests included Julia Haart, Peter Thomas Roth and top divorce attorney Martha Cohen Stine.
The performances are open to the public and free. Their last concert will be on September 11 to commemorate the 25th anniversary of that infamous day.
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Chaz Dean knows a thing or two about comfortable living — and renovating and selling homes — from his ten years on Bravo’s “Flipping Out.”
He’s also a celebrity hairdresser who loves his dogs as much as his VIP clients like Brooke Shields and Kelly Bensimon.
“I’ve had dogs for over 25 years, and I have bought so many dog beds for them,” but Dean snips, “I’ve never been satisfied with any of them.”
So, to complement his line of WEN Pets, which includes cleansing conditioners and replenishing treatment mists, he has created the ultimate washable dog bed, a plush faux-fur bed with 3.5 inches of memory foam and waterproof liners that come in three colors: olive, graphite, and latte.
Dean tested the beds with his own dogs, including his 13-year-old lab Riley, who flies private with his owner in his own customized bed. chazdean.com
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Artist Christoph Niemann, who has illustrated the cover of The New Yorker magazine, will present his first solo exhibition at Isabelle Bscher’s Galerie Gmurzynska in Zurich, opening on June 11, followed by a show at her NY gallery this fall.
The artist designed the magazine’s first augmented reality cover in 2016 and produced a hand-drawn 360-degree VR animation for its US Open issue. The exhibition will spotlight illustrations of the Big Apple, including the A Train, the Manhattan skyline, and the Brooklyn Bridge.
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Out & About: Congresswoman Nicole Malliotakis hosted a party for entrepreneur Joseph Hernandez, who’s running for State Comptroller, at Milos the Mediterranean restaurant in Midtown … Jodi Della Femina hosted a dinner party at Lily Pond Club celebrating authors Kristina O’Neill and Laura Brown and the success of their new book “All The Cool Girls Get Fired” at brother Michael Della Femina’s new West Village hotspot … Tina Fey, Will Forte, Erika Henningsen and Steve Garrin at a screening of Netflix series “The Four Seasons” at the Robin Williams Center … John Lithgow, Tovah Feldshuh, Adrien Brody, Nathan Lane, Laurie Metcalf, Alec Baldwin and Charles Busch at The Longacre Theater for The 80th Broadway World Awards.