Vanity Fair Jan-15

When the good people of Britain opened up their Sunday Times one morning in November—actually, they didn’t even have to open it—they were treated to what the editors knew was a delicious scoop: the private details of former prime minister Tony Blair’s 21-page consulting contract from 2010 with PetroSaudi, an oil company founded by a member of the Saudi royal family. Blair, it turns out, had been receiving roughly $66,000 a month for his services, along with an additional 2 percent of any deal that might result from his working his connections. There’s nothing technically wrong with former leaders spinning their Rolodexes to bankroll their retirement. What makes Blair’s arrangement noteworthy is the fact that he was brokering his access on behalf of the Saudis even as he continued to…

PATRONS OF THE ARTS Musician Joni Mitchell and artist Mark Bradford were the honorees at the Hammer Museum’s 12th annual “Gala in the Garden,” in Los Angeles. The event, which supports the institution’s nationally acclaimed exhibitions and free public programs, was generously supported by Bottega Veneta. TOASTING A CLASSIC Images from Chanel’s “The Little Black Jacket” global exhibition are showing in seven cities. Photographers, designers, friends, and muses fêted Karl Lagerfeld at Balthazar following the New York City debut. FUNNY BUSINESS Comedian and host Seth Meyers, along with environmental media powerhouse Discovery Communications, presented an evening filled with laughter as champions and supporters of the Natural Resources Defense Council came together in New York City to raise money for environmental and health initiatives.…

Lmost zombie Americans, I tend to zone out once tucked inside an elevator. For us introverted chaps, the slide of the closing doors can be like the lowering of eyelids to begin meditation, the cue to attend to the white noise within and without. Or, if one is in a more sociable frame of mind, it can be a bitsy opportunity for mindless chitchat in which the mouth forms words while the mind drifts elsewhere. Ideally, an elevator ride offers brief entry—a bracketed interval between points A and B—into what the authors Orvar Löfgren and Billy Ehn called “the secret world of doing nothing,” which served as the title for their engaging study of everyday ethnography (2010). It’s a tiny packet of “me time,” a momentary prelude when one waits…

Paul Ryan doesn’t care for “politics or politicians.” He says so in his recent book, The Way Forward: Renewing the American Idea. He prefers the ordinary folks of his childhood in smalltown Wisconsin. It must have been sheer selflessness that propelled him into Congress at age 28. As chairman of the House Budget Committee (and the Republican vice-presidential nominee in 2012, who is eyeing 2016), Ryan has to deal with politicians all day long. Yuck! But there is one politician who escapes Ryan’s censure: “The one exception was Ronald Reagan. I knew about him mostly because my dad thought his story was so inspiring… An Irish guy who … had overcome a childhood of modest means and adversity and become president of the United States.” Ryan Sr. “would often see…

When the history of 2014 is written, it will take note of a large fact that has received little attention: 2014 was the last year in which the United States could claim to be the world’s largest economic power. China enters 2015 in the top position, where it will likely remain for a very long time, if not forever. In doing so, it returns to the position it held through most of human history. Comparing the gross domestic product of different economies is very difficult. Technical committees come up with estimates, based on the best judgments possible, of what are called “purchasing-power parities,” which enable the comparison of incomes in various countries. These shouldn’t be taken as precise numbers, but they do provide a good basis for assessing the relative…

Every day before going on location Bradley Cooper recited the six pages of exercises. They had been pieced together by his speech coach, Tim Monich, to further reinforce a Texas accent and dialect that Cooper knew, if it didn’t come to him automatically, would rob all credibility. In a film such as this, and a role such as this, the most challenging of Bradley Cooper’s career, there was no margin for error. Don’t get it right, don’t do the movie. There are many Texas accents in Texas. This particular one, because of all the places the reallife character once lived, had parts West Texas and country Texas and home-on-the-range Texas, a little bit southern, a little bit western, a little bit shitkicker, with idiosyncratic inconsistencies, and yet poetic in its…