Winter/Spring 2025

Now we’ve reached the summer solstice of 2025, an update is long overdue.

Filming on Season Three of “The Gilded Age” carried on from July 8th 2024 until January 10th and we were kept in the dark as to when the show would be streamed, though rumor had it that it would be in the Fall. Then we learned that it would debut in June, and later June 22nd, and carry on for eight episodes, during which time its streamer will change its name back from MAX to HBO MAX.

The final scene of Season 3 of The Gilded Age

As long as people can still find it, here’s to a ratings boom so intense that a Season Four becomes a no-brainer.

In February, I roped Tom Santopietro into the Annual Straw Poll for the Oscars at The Coffee House, aided by a very skilled two-minute compilation of the films of 2024 and clips from all the Best Film contenders, provided by my son Tim.

At the Montauk Club

At the same place, and also at the Montauk Club in Brooklyn, I interviewed Frances Vieta about her book “Looted – Rescuing Italy’s Stolen Treasures”. All of us who have known her for many years were really unaware of her history of fearlessly investigating theft, smuggling and forgery in the dark and corrupt world of the trade in antiquities. The book starts and ends with her long and eventually successful campaign to repatriate the Euphronius Crater from the Metropolitan Museum to its town of origin in Italy.

A Freeman of London!

On May 14th, I was admitted as a Freeman of the City of London in a brief ceremony at the Guildhall, conducted by the Chamberlain of the Corporation. It’s an order founded in 1237, and, from now on, I can demand, if sentenced to be hanged, that it should be done with a silken rope; I can also drive sheep over London Bridge; walk around the confines of the City with an unsheathed blade; demand to be married in St. Paul’s Cathedral, and if found drunk and disorderly, within the Square Mile, can expect not to be arrested by the police, but sent home in a cab

The cast of The Gilded Age at the Premiere

Season Three of TGA was grandly celebrated with a red carpet gala premiere of Episode One on June 12th at the BMCC Tribeca Performing Arts Center, followed by an afterparty at Cipriani 25 (Broadway).

I was determined not to be dismissed, as I once was by the New York Times as “Man At Left is Unidentified”, and put quite some thought into what I should wear. Finding a smart set of tails in a London Charity Shop was the start, and with accessories from Nancy’s jewelry collection, unused since her death in 2019, I think I pulled it off. At least, fashion maven Luke Meagher aka Hautelemode gave me a rave review on Instagram saying I set an example of how “to slay the house down boots.” I had to have it translated, but was suitably chuffed when I understood.

The day after, blessedly without a hangover, though it might have been good for Method Acting, I voiced the character of Winston Churchill for another audiobook/ensemble drama by Garrett M. Graff: “The Devil Reached Toward the Sky – an Oral History” for Simon and Schuster, produced by Scott Sherratt. This marked a return to WSC after “When the Sea Came Alive – An Oral History of D-Day “, recorded last April and which won the 2025 Audie for its category of Multi-voiced performance. Fingers crossed for a repeat…

On set of The Gilded Age