The prayer breakfast during the Republican Convention is revving up its final hallelujahs as Mary Lou Retton burbles her introduction of President Bush. Thousands of miles away, in his aerie on the Mediterranean, an avid CNN watcher is taking in the action and talking back to his TV set. Of the ex- gymnast, he predicts, "She'll be running for office very soon." The President, as usual, quotes a letter, this one from a child named Joy Vaughn. "What if her name were Joy Previn?" asks the viewer sarcastically. One of the pols plugs voluntary prayer in schools. "Well," is the response, "there goes the First Amendment again."
Despite his glee at the campaign antics, Gore Vidal is disgusted. He has loved politics passionately all his life. The grandchild of a U.S. Senator, he himself ran for that office unsuccessfully in 1982. In 1960 he wrote The Best Man, a witty, astute play about a presidential campaign. What he sees around him now is all change and decay. "We have one political party with two right wings," he says. "See why I go so deep into satire? You know, there are only two great issues -- converting from war to peace and managing the economy. Instead we're talking about the fetus and the flag."
Vidal -- perversely brilliant novelist, acerbic gadfly and now movie actor -- lives in self-imposed partial exile in a massive villa in the postcard- picturesque town of Ravello on Italy's Amalfi coast. All his surroundings are serene. Vidal, 67, is a tireless, disciplined author, and his house is in every detail of location and layout designed to enhance concentration.
For the first time in nearly six months, he recently left Ravello. Paramount persuaded him to go to Hollywood for a press jamboree to promote Tim Robbins' shrewd, bumptious political film Bob Roberts. Vidal co-stars as an aging liberal Senator, and he does it with authority and panache. His reviews have been excellent, and the ham in him loves it. "I keep saying, 'John Houseman is dead. Maybe I'll get those nice parts.' "
On the literary front, Random House is publishing LIVE from Golgotha, an outrageous recasting of the Jesus story ("All these excuses and all this fund raising, and still he hasn't come back"). Harvard University Press has just brought out Screening History, a gentle, charming memoir of the movies Vidal saw as a child and how they influenced him. Two books and a movie in two weeks -- not bad.
Not surprising, however. Vidal has written 23 novels, six plays, eight volumes of essays and he isn't sure how many film and television scripts. At the moment he is reading the page proofs of his collected commentary -- 1,200 pages' worth -- representing just two-thirds of his output since 1952. But to him all this is old hat. "I have a new career," he exults. "I'm now a journalist. And all because of the fax!" He keeps the machine nearer to him than his phone. "I'm full of opinions, but with the mails, the pieces were . out of date when they arrived."