What was so entertaining about the perfect parties presented by Vogue for our socio-culinary edification? For one, these were no mere blueprints for do-it-yourself domestic festivities, à la Martha Stewart. We were being treated to ACTUAL accounts of ACTUAL parties thrown by ACTUAL socialites: the guest list, the location, the food, the clothes, the Little Crises that Almost Ruined Everything. At their best, these fabulous feasts recalled Gatsby’s ethereal evening parties, where guests "came and went like moths among the whisperings and the champagne and the stars." Other episodes -- and this is what made for such droll reading -- seemed too absurdly perfect (and perfectly absurd) to be true, almost the stuff of parody. Maldwin Drummond, for example. That’s the name of an actual person, aptly characterized by Vogue as a "bon vivant extraordinaire." (You can be reasonably sure that someone named Maldwin Drummond is not going to be a plumbing contractor.) Anyway, Maldwin had decided to throw actress Lara Harris a party at his ancestral summer home, Bird Cottage, on a tiny island off the coast of Maine. Here’s how Vogue describes Maldy’s critical challenge: "Drummond, flying up from New York in a seven-seater plane, was a little concerned that landing with his heavy cargo of Veuve Clicquot and Beluga caviar might be difficult." Oh, the burdens of affluence! I’m happy to report that the landing went smoothly, and that the dinner-guests (described as "a rather Hollywood-y bunch") were treated that evening to "local foods" prepared by chef Colleen Johnson, formerly of the Ritz in Paris. What did the quaint local fare include, besides the caviar and champagne? Let’s see: Vanilla lobster ("A-yup, my cousin Bahney always makes his lawbstah with a smidgen o’ vanilla to enhance the flayvah"), seared venison with a red wine reduction, truffled potatoes and a potato galette for garnish (I didn’t know you could truffle a potato... I truffle, you truffle, he/she/it truffles?), blueberry soup with a small quenelle of lemon sorbet touched with heavy cream and mint for garnish. I’m sure any Maine lobsterman will tell you how essential it is to add that quenelle of sorbet to your blueberry soup. ("A-yup, and don’t fehget the mint gahnish, eithah!")

Next party scene: Nashville. Socialite/boutique-owner Jamie Stream has pulled off a formal black-dress affair for sixteen guests. "There are a lot of tastemakers," Stream gushed to Vogue about her guest list. "What really makes people tastemakers is glamour, mystery, and beauty that you find in unexpected places; I guess that’s allure." The alluring guests were treated to fennel bisque with parsnips and wild red lobster mushrooms, cracked-pepper pappadams, timbales (why do I always feel I need an interpreter when I read a menu these days?) of Dungeness crab, and Guinea hens specially flown in from Grimaud Farms of California "before being stuffed with cranberries, prosciutto, and cornbread." I like to think the Guinea hens were still alive to enjoy their last meal, and that the prosciutto agreed with them. The table linens at the feast were custom-made outside of Florence and hand-embroidered with Jamie Stream’s family crest, of course. They took eighteen months to complete, which, to give you some perspective, is three times longer than it took Mark McGwire to sock his 70 home runs in 1998.

Other parties memorialized by Vogue: a private dinner dance hosted by the William Rayners of East Hampton, with none other than Peter Duchin at the piano (the wooden dance floor was carefully stenciled to match an arabesque pattern on the tablecloths)... an outdoor fly-fishing breakfast at the Sun Valley spread of "scenemaking New Yorkers" Gigi and Averell Mortimer (grandson of former New York governor/tycoon W. Averell Harriman)... a dinner party for twenty-four "Bohemian aristocrats" at a Spanish palacio, orchestrated by Miguel Muñoz-Justa del Alamo, a.k.a. Count von Ousck-Nathembourg ("I have a couple of titles," he told Vogue nonchalantly)... a London bash thrown by Mr. Saffron Rainey at his Belgravia apartment (when the electricity unexpectedly failed, he calmly moved the proceedings to a stately Georgian house in Notting Hill)... a Long Island clambake attended by the likes of Richard Gere, Chevy Chase, and Rolling Stone founder/publisher Jann Wenner ("a Celtic string band wandered among the guests and complemented the sound track of the sea")... and, of course, the affair at Moomba: a rollicking karaoke birthday party for the Ronson twins, whom Vogue authoritatively dubbed "easily the most popular girls in Manhattan;" guests included gossip columnist Liz Smith, who presumably captured the event on paper for posterity, and ex-Seinfeld flame Shoshanna Lonstein, now a designer and a mini-celebrity in her own right. According to Vogue, "young" and "game" were the "keywords" -- "Retro sneakers to boogie in; low-riding leather to flirt in." It’s refreshing to know that you don’t need hand-embroidered Florentine table linen to have a good time; you simply need to know the most popular girls in Manhattan.

As I reflected on the articles and peered at the glossy photographs, I wondered what it was about these fabulous feasts that provoked both my cynic’s bile and my cynic’s mirth. The bile -- that’s easy. Each party emerged on the pages of Vogue not only as an affair to remember, but as a deliberately orchestrated gathering of superior genes. Beauty, brains and bloodlines, assembled together in a not-so-secret alliance that conveniently excluded us lumpy and ill-connected commoners. I watched the privilegentsia reveling in the beauty of their company: the famous and the merely moneyed, movie stars and interior decorators, publishers and playboys, the sleek and the stylish. It was a strange mingling of worlds, but you can be sure there wasn’t an Aunt Marge or an Uncle Murray in the lot. Would I ever be admitted to their tables? Would you? Would anyone outside their sequestered society of rank and glamour? Why do I keep thinking of the old high school in-crowd with its inner and outer circles, its pecking order, its implicit cruelty toward the genetically and socially handicapped? I feel an urge to crash a party and sneeze into the monogrammed table linen, don’t you? 

As for what provoked my mirth, that’s easy to explain, too. I somehow drew immense satisfaction from knowing that the privileged can be as silly as the rest of us in their own timeless and discreetly charming way. Oh Maldwin, could you pass me another quenelle of sorbet for my blueberry soup? I'm afraid the first one melted while I was writing.

"Some Cynical Guy" column archive:
2002
81 -- A Brisk Walk Through the Ruins
80 -- The Fountain of Futility
79 -- Farewell to the Big House
78 -- The Cynical Guy Contemplates Cell Phones
77 -- Rich and Poor in Paradise
76 -- Dead Ducks: A Tale of the Food Chain
75 -- Old Comedians Just Fade Away
74 -- Suburbia Comes to Manayunk
73 -- When Nestlings Won't Leave the Nest
72 -- The Curse of High Standards
71 -- Inside the House of Horrors
70 -- The Post-Yuppie Handbook
69 -- Spring Reflections
68 -- Priestly Perversions
67 -- British Teeth: An Apology
66 -- The Sniffling Snout
65 -- Bullies with Social Skills
64 -- Supermarket Rage
63 -- Is the U.S. Really the Greatest?
62 -- The Holes in Our Armor
61 -- A Breath of Used Air
60 -- The Cynical Guy Has Sex
59 -- Let's Abolish the Seven-Day Week!
2001
58 -- Why Worry About the Future of Books?
57 -- The Friendly Face of Evil
56 -- Why We Live Where We Live
55 -- The Cynical Guy Discovers Talk Radio
54 -- Kite-Flying and Other Crimes
53 -- My Night as a Socialite
52 -- Gardening Is Not for Sissies
51 -- Invaders of the Honeysuckle
50 -- To Be a Cat
49 -- The Upside of Terrorism
48 -- The Vanishing Nerd
47 -- Anger Management for Cynics
46 -- Let's Level the Playing Field for Disadvantaged WASPs
45 -- First Impressions, Lasting Impressions
44 -- Close Encounter with a Go-Getter
43 -- Cheering for a Perennial Loser
42 -- The Cynical Guy Reads the Tabloids
41 -- When Does the Good Part Begin?
40 -- Confessions of an Internet Addict
39 -- The Decline of Punctuation and Civilization
38 -- Oh Baby, What a Nightmare!
37 -- The Cynical Guy Watches 'Xena: Warrior Princess'
36 -- A Night-Stroll into the Void
35 -- In Search of the Elusive Wild Tomato
34 -- Getting in Touch with Your Inner S.O.B.
33 -- The Lure of the Lurid
32 -- Black Tie and Beard Stubble
31 -- In Heaven There Is No Pez
30 -- Did You Make the Forbes Celebrity 100 List?
29 -- Redesigning Mt. Rushmore
28 -- On Listening to Dead Voices
27 -- Selling Your Soul on eBay
26 -- Sympathy for Colonel Klink
25 -- Democratic Celebrities in Exile
24 -- High School Revisited
23 -- A Farewell to Bachelorhood
2000
22 -- Requiem for a Middleweight
21 -- Is There a Gene for Tackiness?
20 -- How the Beautiful People Entertain Themselves
19 -- The Cynical Guy Gets Behind the Wheel
18 -- The Fickle Finger of Fame
17 -- Adventures in Bodybuilding
16 -- Some Don't Like It Hot
15 -- The Cynical Guy Watches Oprah
14 -- Sports Parents: Menace to Society?
13 -- Airfare Is No Fair at All
12 -- There's No Such Thing as 'New and Improved'
11 -- Celtomania!
10 -- The Naked Pate
9 -- Vanishing Act
8 -- Bush vs. Gore: It Could Be Worse
7 -- Who Wants to Be a Survivor?
6 -- Adventures in Heart Attack Prevention
5 -- Where Men Are Men
4 -- Thoughts While Listening to the Car Radio
3 -- History Is HISTORY
2 -- The Great Casino
1 -- Greetings from Your New Cynical Guy