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Nowadays not just singers and actors but opticians hire press agents. So do restaurateurs, resort owners, novelists and increasing numbers of socialites. Nor is the phenomenon restricted to the East and West coasts. Says society writer Bill Zwecker of the Chicago weekly Skyline, who grew up in the business (his mother was a fashion columnist): "I'm finding more and more individuals who have public relations people."
To be sure, a lot of the gossip reported in Chicago and elsewhere is about people who are based in New York City or Los Angeles and who thereby attract national attention. "The people who crave the publicity in Chicago in the way the Trumps do," explains Zwecker, "aren't in his league financially. The people in his league financially go to bed at 9 p.m., lead a simpler life and don't care if they're in my column." Something of the same is true in the home of the bean and the cod, according to Boston Herald gossipist Norma Nathan, whose column "The Eye" is the paper's best-read feature. "Boston has no celebrities," she says. "The best items are the ones that have big names" -- actors in town to shoot a movie -- "mingling with the people here."
Where do column items come from? Though the particulars vary from city to city, the tricks of the trade are fairly constant. Sources must be cultivated, glamorous friends coddled, and, of course, press agents heeded as they relentlessly push tips. Certain restaurants are musts. In Los Angeles it's Le Dome or the Ivy for lunch, Morton's or Spago for dinner. In Chicago the image- conscious can be found at the Establishment-oriented Pump Room or the more hip Eccentric, partly owned by Oprah. In New York City the Russian Tea Room is best for the show-business throng, Elaine's for the print glitterati, Le Cirque for the well-heeled ladies who lunch. But to endure on the job, a gossipmonger must also be a tireless attender of parties. Syndicated columnist Karen Feld, who writes from Washington, attends six to eight events a night and dowses for dirt on the tennis court, at teas and on the embassy circuit. Says Feld: "I do think columnists like me can make or break people."
That is open to debate. Some columnists point out that there is little one can say today that can ruin a person. Extramarital affairs, divorce, children out of wedlock are no longer utterly shocking (though they may bring harsher judgments on politicians than, say, screen stars, because indiscretions call character and judgment into question). "There is no one today who has the power of, say, Louella Parsons," observes novelist Nora Ephron. "Those people could really punish you." When Parsons revealed in 1949 that Ingrid Bergman had left her husband for director Roberto Rossellini, the scandal kept her from making movies in Hollywood for more than five years.