Gatecrasher
How I Helped the Rich Become Famous and Ruin the World
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- $18.99
Publisher Description
A smart, gossipy, and very funny examination of celebrity culture from New York’s premiere social columnist.
Ben Widdicombe is the only writer to have worked for Page Six, TMZ, and The New York Times—an unusual Triple Crown that allowed him personal access to the full gamut of Hollywood and high society’s rich and famous, from billionaires like Rupert Murdoch, Donald Trump, and the Koch brothers, to pop culture icons Kim Kardashian and Paris Hilton. Now, in Gatecrasher, New York’s premiere gossip-turned-society writer spills the sensational stories that never made it to print.
Widdicombe has appeared at nearly every gossip-worthy venue—from the Oscars and the Hamptons, to the Met Gala and Mar-a-Lago—and has rubbed elbows with a dizzying array of celebrities (and wannabes), and he whisks us past the clipboard and velvet rope to teach us the golden rules of gatecrashing, dishing on dozens of boldface names along the way.
Widdicombe shares secrets for how to crash the parties, climb the ladder, avoid the paparazzi, or make small talk with Henry Kissinger and Anna Wintour. Endlessly fun and extremely telling, Gatecrasher makes the unnerving argument that Paris Hilton conquering pop culture two decades ago lead to Donald Trump winning the White House. “As the gossip pages go, so goes the country,” he says.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Widdicombe, editor-in-chief of luxury lifestyle magazine Avenue, debuts with a fascinating and punchy account of his more than 20 years reporting society and celebrity gossip for Vanity Fair, Town & Country, and the New York Times. For Widdicombe, being a gossip columnist is a serious job that "requires the skills of a critic, detective, interviewer, and humorist, all balanced like a tray of mismatched glasses" skills he has honed since arriving in New York City from Australia in 1998. He admits that, "as glamorous as it may look, hanging out with rich people is mainly just stressful and expensive." Among his many interviewees are Elton John ("We were being provided to the star as an apr s-show buffet"), Paris Hilton ("a rich person performing being wealthy for the purpose of gaining celebrity"), and Jared Kushner ("a nice-seeming, if somewhat wet, young man"). But most fascinating are his observations on how the nature of "celebrity" itself has changed. He highlights how gossip reporting shifted its focus from the "classic New York Society' " of wives of wealthy men who eschewed publicity to a new generation of wealthy people who began to see how publicity could be used to brand themselves. This eye-opening account of a moment when "being wealthy was becoming embraced as a sub-culture" will delight pop culture enthusiasts.
