Honeymoon Nov 9, 2012

FRIDAY NOV 9

WIW: grey turtleneck, jeans.

WRW: lavender striped shirt, jeans.

One last continental breakfast in the hotel restaurant. We walked to the Victoria and Albert Museum and saw the Hollywood costume show, which was unbelievable. Fantastic, huge, high tech, extraordinary. The first room focused on how costumes create character: Charlie Chaplin’s Little Tramp, Joan Crawford’s waitress uniform from *Mildred Pierce*, a stunning Dietrich gown from a Lubitsch movie called *Angel*, Kim Novak’s green outfit from *Vertigo*, and a set of costumes from *Ocean’s Eleven*, showing how the characters were delineated through their clothes. A collection of costumes from what are called “costume pictures” - - Bette Davis in *The Virgin Queen*, Cate Blanchett in *Elizabeth: The Golden Age*, Judi Dench, Gwyneth Paltrow, and Joseph Fiennes in *Shakespeare in Love*, Norma Shearer and Kirsten Dunst in their respective Marie Antoinette movies, Glenn Close in *Dangerous Liaisons*, Glenda Jackson in *Mary, Queen of Scots*, and Vanessa Redgrave in *Camelot*.

Please permit me a brief jump forward to July 2025, when I created this page for my website. Here are two pictures of the post card I bought that day with a picture of my favorite item in the show, the outfit from *Vertigo.* This post card is mounted on one of my kitchen cabinets. I took one picture of the long view (with me photo-bombing in the reflection of the microwave) and a close-up of the post card itself.

There was a room called The Conversation Room, where they had tables set up with videos being projected of people talking about the costumes in a movie, with the costumes on the table between them. Tippi Hedren, in a recent interview, talking with Hitchcock and Edith Head in archival interviews, about *The Birds*. Ann Roth and Mike Nichols talking about Natalie Portman’s costume in *Closer*. Sandy Powell and Martin Scorcese talking about Daniel Day Lewis’s costumes in *Gangs of New York*. In another room, a special exhibit of Meryl Streep and Robert DeNiro: Meryl in *Out of Africa*, *Mamma Mia!*, *Lemony Snicket*, *French Lieutenant’s Woman*, *Iron Lady* - - Bob in *Taxi Driver*, *Raging Bull* (I hadn’t realized that he did his boxing training with the real Jake LaMotta), *King of Comedy*, *Frankenstein*.

And a big final room with all kinds of iconic costumes: Katharine Hepburn in *The Philadelphia Story*, talking with Audrey Hepburn in *Breakfast at Tiffany’s*, Uma Thurman in *Kill Bill Vol 1*, Christopher Reeve in *Superman*, Reese Witherspoon in *Legally Blonde*, and my favorite thing in the show, a stunning Joan Crawford gown from *The Bride Wear Red*, a real masterpiece of design and tailoring. And the movie was in black and white! The grand finale of the show was Dorothy’s blue gingham dress and ruby slippers from *The Wizard of Oz*. Did you know the shoes were silver in the book? They decided the ruby slippers would have more punch against the yellow brick road, and boy, were they right.

There was one other show we needed to see at the V and A, a show of British ball gowns. A few nice pieces, but the show in general was a snooze. The highlight was a feathered Alexander McQueen gown - - they included a photo of Daphne Guiness wearing it to the red-carpet opening of the recent Met Museum McQueen show, and a card explaining that she was in a window at Barney’s getting dressed the night of the gala! What a hoot.

We grabbed a sandwich at the train station (I had chicken, bacon, and swiss, Richard had brie and bacon), we checked out of the hotel and got in a cab to St. Pancras to take the Eurostar to Paris. It was a big drag schlepping our five heavy bags all over hell, and I got a little grumpy. This is a moment when Richard would call me Grumpella, but I tell him I prefer La Grumpissima. I don’t quite turn into The Incredible Hulk, but let’s just say it’s not pretty. We got through security and Richard said, “Now we go through passport control.” I didn’t hear or understand what he said, but rather than saying, “Pardon?”, I said, “WHAT?!?” Like I said, not pretty.

We got on the train and all was well. The trip was just over two hours. Setlled in, wrote in my journal, Richard took a little nap.

We went to the food car and got a San Pellegrino for me and a coffee for him and a bag of dried sausage balls for us, which we ate back at our seats with an apple and an orange. The two middle-aged couples across the aisle drank three beers and three bottles of wine. Each. And there was the cutest little girl behind us, about two and a half, with a Buster Brown hairdo. She had a raspy little voice, and she would not shut up! Richard would say she was vaccinated with a phonograph needle. The little girl spoke French but her mother answered her in English, very interesting.

GIRL: Ici maman.

MOM: No, you’re going to sit here.

GIRL: Non, je veux être ici.

MOM: No, I’m sitting by the window and you’re sitting here.

GIRL: Non, maman.

MOM: I don’t know why we’re discussing this. You are sitting here and I am sitting there.

And the discussion was over! Brilliant parenting. Later we saw the father walking back from the bathroom with the little girl in his arms, her talking non-stop. He didn’t say a word, just looked weary and harassed. She took a nap later, and the parents had a sparkly halo surrounding them.

Off the train and in line for a cab. Welcome to Paris, everyone was smoking their heads off. The line moved quick, we got in our cab, Richard told the cabbie where we were going. The cabbie was playing a classical music station and I correctly identified the recording as Kathleen Ferrier singing Bach. Pretty good, no? It was dark and rainy so we couldn’t really see much, but it definitely looked like Paris.

We got to our hotel, the Hotel Quai Voltaire. Richard lived there for five months about twenty-six years ago. It’s a cute, simple hotel, very sweet. Our room is on the third floor, with French doors and a little balcony over the street with a view of the Louvre. Here's the stairwell:

We unpacked a little bit and went out hunting for dinner. We passed a place called Ellis Island Café - - they have three breakfast specials: the Groucho, the Chico, and the Harpo. We will not be going there, I’d rather get New York diner food at the source. We found a cute place that specialized in galettes, which is a variation on a crepe. Our waiter was charming, spoke a fair amount of English. Richard had a galette with smoked trout, sour crème and chives, and herbed potatoes, I had the same thing with salmon instead of trout. All of it delicious.

Richard had a beer, I had an artisanal apple cider, which tasted a little musty. I made the waiter giggle when I paid with a 100 Euro bill and asked, “Ce n’est pas trop gros?”, which means, “This isn’t too fat?”

Richard walked me around the neighborhood. We walked past Les Deux Magots, a famous café where Richard used to go at 4 PM every day, for a tea and a sandwich or a dessert. The Café Flore, where the intelligentsia of the 20s hung out. L’Eglise St. Germain de Pres, an ancient church, they were having a concert of Vivaldi that night. It started to rain so we went home. We asked the desk clerk how to get to the Paris Nord train station the next morning, he gave us directions we thought we might be able to follow.

Next day...