I was sad to see that Richard Belzer died today, aged 78. Belzer first rose to prominence as a stand-up comic, but he became famous with a capital F when he was cast as television’s sardonic Detective Munch, a character he played on two different shows — Homicide and Law & Order: Special Victims Unit…
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RIP, Vivienne Westwood
British fashion designer and outspoken climate- and human-rights activist Vivienne Westwood died at age 81 yesterday. During her 50-year career, Westwood pioneered punk, then pivoted to history-driven high fashion that provoked critics almost as much as her bondage pants did. She never caved to convention. Even in 1992, when Westwood was so established that Queen…
A Met Gala In Memoriam: André Leon Talley
The Gilded-Age-themed 2022 Met Gala is tonight, not quite eight months after the 2021 Met Gala, which COVID-19 delayed to September from May. The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute and Vogue’s editor-in-chief Anna Wintour — the gala’s chair since 1999 — worked with the pandemic-skewed calendar by creating a two-part exhibition. Tonight’s gala celebrates…
RIP, Virgil Abloh
When I saw eclectic designer/artist/DJ Virgil Abloh’s name trending on Twitter yesterday, I expected that he was sharing more big plans for next week’s Art Basel Miami Beach, for which he had already announced a Louis Vuitton menswear show and the debut of an electric Maybach that he collaborated on with Mercedes-Benz. But instead of…
Throwback Thursday: OMG, It’s Anya Phillips
In November 2010, I tumbled down many Internet rabbit holes while writing a post about 1970s New York style icon/fashion designer/Mudd Club co-founder/Debbie Harry friend Anya Phillips. It was so difficult to find any information about her. READ MY ANYA PHILLIPS POST. So tonight I almost lost my mind when I saw the New York…
RIP, Chiara D’Agostino
A year ago today, I brought a cake to the hospital so my friend Chiara D’Agostino could celebrate her 48th birthday during her chemo appointment. Chiara died this August 4 of a complication of stage 4 triple negative metastatic breast cancer — leptomeningeal disease, in which the cancer invades the fluid around the brain and…
RIP, Larry Kramer
Larry Kramer, a writer and one of the earliest AIDS activists, died today at age 84. You can read his full resume in the many obituaries that have been and will be published but, in short, Kramer was a co-founder of two AIDS activism groups — Gay Men’s Health Crisis, in 1982, which provided support…
RIP, Kobe Bryant
After the death of my friend Elizabeth Wurtzel earlier this month, I spent a lot of time thinking about how complicated people leave complex legacies. I returned to that line of thought today, as the country reacted in shock to the death of basketball legend Kobe Bryant, 41, in a helicopter crash that killed a…
RIP, Elizabeth Wurtzel
Writer Elizabeth Wurtzel died yesterday at age 52 of leptomeningeal disease — a complication of metastatic breast cancer that had spread to the fluid around the brain and spinal cord. I met Elizabeth on Wednesday, May 27, 2009. I know the exact date because we were at a black-tie dinner at the Metropolitan Museum of…
Year in Review: Remembrances
I’ve had a hanging shoe rack inside my closet door for a long time. Since last month, the bottom few racks keep collapsing for no clear reason — they’ve done it even when there are no shoes on them. Towards the end of November, the bottom four racks fell down with a big bang, sending…