Page 10
Tuesday, March 3, 1987
Daily Nebraskan
tcds Maclhail Musto
S(Q1 IT m
Ait s
C1
Village Voice columnist and gos
sip virtuoso Michael Musto
is on the phone long-distance
and he sounds like he just woke up.
"Are you sure this is Musto?" 1 want to
say. But 1 don't want to sound like the
naive Nebraska college boy he thinks
he's talking to, so I refrain.
I'm still perplexed. This can't be the
same person who writes "La Dolce
Musto," a weekly name-dropping chroni
cle who's hyping who in New York's
endlessly star-studded, enviable club
land netherworld known to the locals
as simply "Downtown."
Harrah's
Hollywood
by Scott
Harrah
I have many reasons to be skeptical.
Can this be the same man who purport
edly runs around New York wearing
hoop skirts, tablecloths and Statue of
Liberty get-ups while he participates in
the scene he loves to send up and glor
ify simultaneously every week? Can
this be the same man who claims he
majored in English instead of journal
ism in college because he wanted to
avoid mock conferences and instead
"do real journalism" and get to meet
Donna Mills?
Yes, it can.
On the phone, Musto comes off so,
well, earthy. He has a rough, trashed
out Brooklyn accent and sounds like
the kind of guy who serves fat house
wives pastrami sandwiches at the corner
deli. 1 wanted glitz and glam, but it's
obvious that he saves that for sundown,
which occurs in New York about 1 a.m.
in Lincoln, the bars close at J, but in
Manhattan many of the hot spots don't
even start hopping till at least 1:30 a.m.
That's dusk for Musto,
Now it's 2:30 in the afternoon on the
East coast and way past the crack of
noon. For Musto, this time of day is
well, breakfast time, I guess.
Once I'm convinced I'm talking to
New York's leading gossip guru, I pose
the inevitable question: "Are you sur
prised that people read you in Ne
braska?" A sarcastic retort ensues.
Yep, I tell my shivering, nervous self,
this is Michael Musto.
Suddenly, the benevolent king of
New York quirkdom feels sorry for the
poor little fan and gives a serious
response.
"I'm surprised people ready me
anywhere," he says.
Next, he tells me about the subject
of his next column, Yma Sumac,
whom he recently interviewed.
"She's still alive?" I say, remember
ing the campy caterwauling mambo
queen from South America known to
njany as the poor man's Charo.
"They passed Yma off as an Inca
princess from Peru, but she's really
from Brooklyn," he insists.
Now I know I'm talking to Michael
Musto. 1
For over two years, Musto has been
writing about the young, outrageous,
artsy cretins who slink through lower
Manhattan trying to promote them
selves while having a hell of a time
doing it. These rejects from American
suburbia, known as "celebutantes,"
wear everything (including the kitchen
J
sink, if they think it looks fashionable)
and cruise through nightclubs hoping
someone will notice them. Some actu
aly make it. Madonna is a former
club rat, as is Bruce Willis, who used
to be a bartender at the once-trendy
Kamikaze club. And many simply stroll
through the scene for creativity's sake
like James St. James; a teenage
boy who became a club star by donning
feather boas and carrying around a
lunchbox filled with wooden dolls.
Many of these people are artists, wri
ters and actors who were made fun of as
as children, but grew up, moved to New
York and became well-known for the
qualities that were just too faux pas
in their hometowns.
Being faabulous1
And Musto is at the top of the lot. He
goes out several times a week and rubs
sequined shoulders with Cher, Vanna
White and Grace Jones. But he says
he doesn't go out with the idea of dig
ging up dirt; such a tactic would be a
definite way to be expelled from what
he calls "the 'faaabulous' crowd,"
the scene makers who set the trends
and the sensibilities for the rest of the
country. He merely records the events
he observes and participates in.
"The whole thing is based on elit
ism," he says.
Sometimes, he explains, the scene
snubs even established stars. Case one,
Nell's, the hottest club in town, man
aged by Little Nell of "Rocky Horror"
fame. "Nell's is simply the best club in
town and, boy, does she have style,"
Calvin Klein told Vanity Fair mag
azine. Not according to Musto. "They keep
saying Nell brings warmth to the club,
and it's quite the opposite," he says,
adding that they once turned away
Cher because someone didn't feel she
was hip enough to enter the club's
golden gates.
But things aren't always that uppity,
he explains. Those who grow tired of
the snobbery and the attitudes create
their own scene and wait for the main
stream press to come along much later
arjd say, "What do we have here?
Trends! Subversion! Call People maga
zine, quick!"
A perfect example is porno lounge
lizard John Sex, who has a monolith
of spiked hair held up with egg whites
and semen. He recently released a song
called "Hustle With My Muscle."
It's freaks like these who keep the
scene suffused with enough satire and
self-parody to shock their uptown
counterparts, celebrities with money
and respect.
Downtown 's everywhere
Downtown is more than a geographic
region south of 14th Street. It is a sen
sibility that defines all the notions of
bohemia and can be found virtually
anywhere, like in Omaha's Old Market
district, where victims of suburban hell
go to glorify their idiosyncrasies, buy
Joan Crawford T-shirts at Drastic
and meet living characters from Jean
Genet novels. Athens, Ga., Austin,
Texas, and other cities in the middle of
the Bible and corhbelts have scenes
similar to the one Musto idolizes, but
he thinks New, York's young and reck
less crowd will always be in the van
guard simply because there are more
poeple there to act subversive.
Musto, who wrote a book on the
scene last year called "Downtown," has
parlayed his own insights and expe
riences into fame, well, OK, infamy.
Sometimes, he says, the public is
hardly kind to him. One magazine
lashed in a review of his book that he
merely glorifies absurdity and it's hard
to take anything serious that's written
by a man who "runs around New York
wearing a shower cap."
Even some of his colleagues at the
notoriously left-wing, politically con
scious Village Voice find his column
and obsession with celebrities ridi
culous. "I really feel the vibes when I go into
the Voice office," he explains. "Half of
the people there think my column's a
breath of fresh air, and the other half
think it's just a joke."
But he can't help it celebrity wor
ship is his life.
"I basically have a fan mentality," he
deadpans.
W)io makes Musto's column
And his fans, the "celebutantes"
and those wishing to be a part of the
scene, will often do anything to make
his column. Like the guy he saw on
Valentine's Day, running around with a
sign on his chest that said, "Thank you
for hating me." Most often, it's the real
celebs who are the most annoying.
"My main problem with celebrities is
that they're so afraid of bad press that
they'll only say acceptable things, but
the Downtown people are always saying
appalling things just so they can get in
print," he says.
One of the greatest benefits of his
job is being able to write virtually any
thing he wants, as long as it's approved
by the Voice's libel lawyer.
His most recent victim of vitriol was
Dust in Hoffman, who was "mou
thing off about how show business
sucks." Musto says he printed the four-
.
r
'1,
Y .
lip
- Millh
Columnist and author Michael Musto
letter-word-laden slam verbatim.
"It gives you a real rush to print what
you want," he muses earnestly.
And Musto, who is often his own best
PR man and Greek chorus, is always
looking for a reason to print what he
wants to say. When he asked the late
Andy Warhol to write a blurb for
"Downtown," the pop-art king replied,
"Michael, I loved the book, say wha
tever you want me to say about it," so
Musto wrote a glowing plaudit and
stuck it on the tome's cover.
I immediately wonder why Musto's
telling me such secrets. The pope of
pop-cultural lowbrow, touted as a phony
by some, a flake by others, has just told
some kid in Nebraska that he came up
with a fake Warhol blurb for his book.
Suddenly, the truth hits me. Musto,
beneath all his pretensions and self
promotional tactics, isn't afraid to
admit that he satirizes himself. He
knows he's a marketable eccentirc,
shocking the gray-flannel crowd Down
towners live to revile, but he is surpris
ingly sincere about it.
Dressing up like the entire show
room of Frederick's of Hollywood is
merely part of his job. And when he
feels that he's become too self-indulgent
about being a celebrity and living for
the ridiculous and the outre, he's
happy to admit it.
"It's lonely being the only one who
knows that Molly Ringwald is dat
ing the Beastie Boys' Adam Horo
witz," he wrote in a recent column.
"It's even lonelier being the only one
who cares."
Celebs or friends?
What sets him apart from the gossipy
prattlers of the past are his pheno
menal ability to be witty without being
vicious and the admirations he has for
his subjects.
Photo courtesy of Kevin Higgins
Unlike most celebrity chroniclers,
he thinks of the people he writes about
as more than stars. They're also friends.
At a "Drag Aid" AIDS benefit at the
Palladium club recently, a drag queen
walked off the stage in tears"Wrhy are
you crying?" he asked. The dragster
wiped the tears from hisher false eye
lashes and replied, "Let me think of
something to say for your column."
But he didn't want a witty quote for
his column. He jiist wanted to know
why heshe was crying.
It's at times like that when he's no
longer Musto the columnist and becomes
a weird little kid from Brooklyn again,
going to the high school immortalized
in "Welcome Back Kotter" and feeling
out of place. But there's always a new
club, star or green-haired Downtown
bimbo trying to become the next Joey
Heatherton to bring him back to his
world, his kingdom. Downtown. And
gossip.
"I think gossip is an art in itself and
it's quite underestimated," he says of
his favorite pastime and vocation.
He knows he'll probably never reach
the realm of fame and fortune so many
of the names he drops in boldface type
do, but that's not important to him.
Exploring his own idiosyncrasies and
being "faaabulous" are. Unlike the
"Uptown" mainstream columnists like
Liz Smith and Suzy, Musto lives the
life those media magnates read about
in press releases. To him, it's worth a
lot more than their hefty salaries.
"I know I'm never going to make a lot
of money doing thisjob and I'mjust too
weird," he proclaims, his voice drip
ping with satisfaction.
And that's a statement Musto ob
viously believes. It's a philosophy that,
yes, skeptics, you can take serious
ly. . . even from a man who runs around
New York in a shower cap.
