Archives for posts with tag: Lee Hall

MR. SPEAK!

July 30, 2015 //

The Quirky Brilliance Of The Head Guru

Haresh Shah

I have just swiped my card and entered the sixteenth floor through the glass door. I see Arthur sitting by himself through the glass wall of his office across the atrium – the bank of offices we have come to call the fish tank, overlooking the square. I hurry to my office, remove my outer garments and pick up the phone and dial Arthur’s three digit inter-office number. Might as well get it out of the way before I chicken out. Having to call Arthur is something of an ordeal, because you never know what kind of mood you might catch him in. But there is nothing I can do about it. I am the one who needs him. Most of our telephone conversations would go something like this:

‘Good morning Arthur!’

‘What’s so good about the morning?’

‘Hi Arthur. How are you?’

‘Why do you want to know?’

‘Hi Arthur. This is Haresh.’

‘I know who you are!’

This has me flustered for a small moment. Both of us breathing on our side of the line. While I am still trying to form my next sentence, I hear his curt

‘Speak!’

‘Hi Arthur, this is…’

‘What do you want?’

And when I try to explain the reason for my call, he would cut me off abruptly.

‘Come to the point. I don’t have all day to talk to you.’ The gruffness of his voice scratches the skin of my ears.

Sitting in my windowless office, I imagine the frown on Arthur’s face, his eyes squinting behind his thick Coke bottle glasses. And when I do get around to tell him why I was calling him, rest of our conversation is brusque.

‘Why do you want me to meet with a bunch of Hungarians and tell them what you have already told them?’

‘Because you’re the head guru.’ Or, ‘So that they can hear directly from the horse’s mouth!’ While I’m just a chela, I am thinking.

He is not in the least flattered.

‘Cut it out. Have Mary (Nastos) call me later and I’ll look at my schedule.’

Done! Whew! And I take a breath of relief. I am on the edge of my chair, but now push my butt backward and make myself comfortable before picking up the pile containing that morning’s faxes from the editions around the world.

Arthur, if you are wondering, was the Editorial Director of Playboy magazine for the thirty of it’s first fifty years up until he stepped down in 2003. He had started at the magazine as an associate editor to A.C. Spectorsky in the mid-Sixties, he took on as its editorial director in 1972, the year I too had joined Playboy, stationed in Munich, Germany. I don’t remember ever having met him up until 1979 when I was brought to Chicago. Even so, in my job as the Production Director for the international editions – if not for Lee (Hall) having handed me the organizing of the annual international conferences, I would have no reason to cross paths with him. And eventually working my way into everything international publishing including assuming the same title as that of Arthur’s, the Editorial Director, albeit of the International Editions. But even years before it had fallen upon my shoulders to orient and train the creative teams of every new edition that were launched over the years, being one of the most frequently traveling members of the division – based on my sheer fondness and acquired knowledge of the magazine, I would end up answering questions that were way beyond the realm of my job description and the responsibilities. Something that didn’t go unnoticed – resulting in me eventually running the whole show.

During my early days in Chicago, one of my most important tasks was to do major in-house PR. International Publishing, then referred to as the Foreign Editions was tucked away on the ninth floor, which most everyone must have passed on their way to the production department without giving much of a thought to our existence. Some of the U.S. Playboy people may even have looked at us if not with some disdain than with indifference. To the most of them, we had become just THEM, the people who came bothering them wanting something or the other.

It took a while, but over a period of time, I was able to establish close working relationships with most of the top editors on the 11^th floor. That is, except with Arthur. As much as I would have liked to have a pleasant and friendly working relationship with him, it wasn’t any consolation to be aware of the fact that neither of my two bosses, Lee Hall and Bill Stokkan were able to crack the hard shell that was Arthur. While Lee was quite reticent and tight lipped about it, I know that it frustrated Bill not being able to communicate with Arthur with both of their hair down and over a couple of drinks. I didn’t know anyone else who did. Bill once told me that on one occasion, he even went as far as approaching him at a party thrown by Christie Hefner for her top executives aboard a boat cruising Lake Michigan. Hi, my name is Bill Stokkan, I run the Merchandizing and Licensing division of the company. Unfortunately, to no avail.

‘Are you kidding me? Him and Ed (Wattlington) get along famously. They even play tennis together!’ Tells me Karen (Abbott), my first heart throb in the U.S. when we worked together at Time, and coincidentally who now worked at Playboy along with Ed, both as photo lab technicians. Similarly, my assistant Mary had absolutely no problems communicating with Arthur. This was a sign of relief for me, because even though as a matter of protocol I would make the first call, Mary would take it over from there, sans any difficulty. And of all of my international editors, he got along famously with Holland’s Jan Heemskerk. Most every time that Jan came to Chicago or during the conferences, they made it a point to get out and hit some tennis or golf balls. I envied them, because I was never included in those soirées. I would often share with Jan my “conversations” with Arthur. He would find them funny. Somewhere along the line, we both came to refer to Arthur as Mr. Speak. And so it continues even today.

I have often wondered why? Because other than his exterior demeanor that can make you feel totally uncomfortable, when the time came, he always came through. He met with the editors, and once we were in his office, he never rushed us out. During the conferences, when he took the floor, he would be the most fascinating and precise speaker of them all. He knew Playboy inside out, from cover to cover. He would define for you the purpose and the philosophy behind every single page, rubrics, the graphic style, the focus of each article and fiction, the illustrations. Now that I think of it, even better than Hefner (Hugh M.) himself did. I have heard hours and hours of tapes of Hefner speaking to the first set of editors that came for the orientation, and spent a couple of days at his mansion in Chicago. Of course, who would know the magazine better than its creator? He was good and he was precise. But seemed a bit bashful when imparting the information. While Arthur was clearer and more emphatic, passionate even.

No one, not even the interview editor G. Barry Golson could define the tone of Playboy Interview as clear as Arthur once did during a conference in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin in the early Eighties: over and above Playboy Interview tries to bring out the human face of the person being interviewed. If we were to interview Hitler, he would come out to be a sympathetic figure. You could hear the silent gasp from the editors. Absolutely admirable, considering this coming out of the mouth of the born during the war time Jew. And he said of the anyone who still had any illusions about the magazine reflecting the current lifestyle of its publisher and therefore the young American males: No one aspires anymore to Hefner’s lifestyle. And I said to myself, right you’re, why would I want to live like Hefner in the self created gilded cage, if I could be sitting at a sidewalk café in Paris and sipping on my pastis, watching the world go by?

He was just brilliant when he spoke. He would be the star attraction of all of our conferences. And our personal relationships or lack thereof apart, I often said to myself that he never once hindered my ability to get closer to the people like Tom Staebler or Gary Cole, or any of his other top editors from devoting as much time as I needed of them. Why then not Arthur himself?

Well, one of those anomalies of life. Something you just accept. Things you accept about your dad or someone you respect, and resign to that’s just the way he is. And yet, I hated to be alone with him face to face. Because he would go without saying a word for the longest time. If not for the entire duration you are sitting across from him. Once I ran into him at my favorite fast food restaurant, Mama San, located in the Water Tower Place. Turned out to be his favorite as well. Seeing how crowded the place was and there was only one booth open, we end up parking ourselves across the table from each other.

‘The damn best fast food Japanese place in the city!’ Is the only thing I remember him saying during the whole twenty or so minutes it must have taken us to do justice to our food. We may have exchanged a couple of uncomfortable sentences at the very best. Realizing that he would not be the first one to blink, I somehow managed to live through those most uncomfortable moments.

The other time I found him towering over me on the other side of the partition in the bathroom of Playboy’s corporate offices. While we are both peeing, I sense his face turn over to mine and hear him utter:

‘You know, with the nose like that, you could be Jewish!’

‘I don’t think so, because my dad’s nose is much flatter. Perhaps I should check with the good old mom!’ I try to be humorous.

That’s as close as I ever got to Arthur.

On my last day at Playboy, Mary organized a going away party for me and invited everyone she could, especially from Chicago office. While everyone else had something to say; be it funny, sympathetic or just wishing me luck, I don’t remember Arthur having said anything that stuck with me. And yet, in the photos that Mary sent me afterwards, Arthur and I are posed together, he has his arm around me and both of us have on our faces the matching happy laughs. Uncharacteristically, Tom is standing next to us, looking a bit removed and looking sad and confused. I put the photo in my personal scrap book, the caption underneath reads: Is that a genuine smile Arthur?

That was the last I saw of Arthur up until three some years ago when Jan came to visit. We got together with some Playboy old-timers to reminisce the shared déjà vu. We meet up with Arthur at his favorite restaurant The Indian Garden on Chicago’s Devon Avenue. The best Indian restaurant on the strip! He proclaims. He is regular at the place and is made fuss over by the staff and the owner. He has now gone vegetarian and frowns at the sizzling Tandoori chicken being served. He has ordered Baingan Bharta which they specially prepare for him. Another proclamation comes: the best baingan bharta! I suppress the urge to say: have you tried the dish across the street at Udupi Palace? But I know better to keep my trap shut. With Arthur, it’s mostly him talking and you listening. And so it is during the lunch. Even so, if you pay attention to what he says, you are more likely than not to part with a feeling of having added something vital to your cache of knowledge. His very presence intimidated me, creating an atmosphere of speak only when spoken to. So it were Jan and Arthur conversing with me pushed in the background. But somewhere along the line, I got to interject and now having acquired distance of time, I confess, I was always intimidated by you.

‘You should have been.’ He answers and even though I would have liked to know precisely why, I leave it at that.

© Haresh Shah 2015

Illustration: Jordan Rutherford

SISTER SITE

http://www.downdivision.com

Other Profiles

FACE TO FACE WITH GABRIEL GARCÍA MÁRQUEZ

FACE TO FACE WITH JAN CREMER

DESIGNING IN HIS DREAMS

TRAVELING AGENT EXTRAORDINAIRE

ABOUT

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Next…

PLAYBOY STORIES ARE FOREVER

This post marks the 100^th Playboy Story. When I began blogging them in the fall of 2012, I thought I had about twenty five stories to tell, at the most. And here we are… I still have a list of about a dozen more and can’t tell how many unlisted would pop up along the way. But the stories that don’t compel me to write, are the stories that are not yet ready to be told. Basically, stories tell themselves, an author is just a medium – the facilitator. For now seems they are going on to an indefinite hiatus. But I am sure one or more of them would pop up and compel me to return to the screen. Hope you all will still be there to receive them. In the meanwhile, I have some other writings that I want to do and the stories that I want to tell. Stay tuned.

Can’t thank each one of you enough for your staying with me for almost three years and keeping me inspired and motivated to roll them out week after week. And you would agree with me that this blog wouldn’t have been as complete as I have tried to make it without my illustrative partners in crime, Celia and Jordan. I feel absolutely lucky to have stumbled upon them.

So long my friends until our wiedersehen.

Tags Arthur Kretchmer, Bill Stokkan, Editorial Director, Jan Heemskerk, Karen Abbott, Lee Hall, Mary Nastos, Playboy, Profile

Categories Arthur Kretchmer, Editor, Memoire, Playboy, Profile

THE NAIL THAT STUCK OUT…

November 20, 2014 //

Haresh Shah

Daring To Be Different

When our Japanese partners were reported what Shah-san was up to all through the week, flabbergasted, the executives and the editorial team are in awe of the fact that an executive of Playboy Enterprises was in their country expressly for meeting with them and yet they would not see him for an entire week. They were equally astonished when heard from Ray Falk’s office that Mr. Shah, nay Shah-san, accompanied by Sasaki-san, was crisscrossing their country and visiting places in an attempt to glean first hand some understanding of the land and its culture, its people in general and the young existing and potential readers of the Japanese edition of Playboy in particular.

Even though they didn’t know what to make of this Shah-san, they were positively impressed and intrigued, not to mention amazed. And then approved of my itinerary as was set up by Ray’s office. The places I would visit and the people I would be exposed to should give me a fair idea of some of what they had hoped to communicate to me when Lee (Hall) had originally conveyed to them what my mission would be working with the new team. That my role would go beyond giving them pep-talk,, turn around and then catch a plane back home. That I would roll up my sleeves and work hand-in-hand with them, not only in making and re-defining the magazine itself, but also talk about and make possible ancillary publishing activities as an extension to the regular issues.

I have returned to Tokyo that Friday night from our six day long exploratory trip through the country. On Saturday morning, I am met by Yuko Kato of Shueisha. American educated, Yuko is not a part of the creative editorial staff. She is more of an “it” girl who is assigned to expose me to the bustling with colors and the neon lights in the high decibel city of Tokyo. Yuko is in her mid-to late twenties, moon faced – sort of an attractive girl who is brimming with energy and enthusiasm to add and to finish up what Yastaka Sasaki had started out. It’s a rainy and a crowded day. Not that Tokyo is ever without crowd, but it’s Saturday and the people are out in troves, further cramming the space with their colliding umbrellas. Yuko and I huddled under a large umbrella loaned by the hotel, we negotiate the streets and alleys of the city. Duck in and out of the various places that I would visualize years later when I began to read works by Haruki Murakami. Neighborhoods clustered with cafes and jazz clubs and the cozy little bars and down home compact and crowded mom and pop eating places. The dark and narrow alleys, dingy little public establishments, the smallness of everything that would eventually define Tokyo and Japan for me.

After having stuck to the typical Japanese eating places through the week, Yuko takes me to the Italian Toscana and French Ile de France. At night we end up at the Tokyo branch of the discotheque Maharaja. We spend most of the Sunday roaming about the all alluring neon signs bedecked Ginza. That night I have a date with uncle Jaman’s publishing associate Frank Watanabe accompanied by Mrs. Watanabe and his son Nori. They take me to Zakuro, an exclusive and expensive Shabu-Shabu restaurant. Sort of like Swiss fondue, cooking your own food in the boiling water in a larger pot, instead of in smaller fondue pot sizzling with oil. We are seated on the floor and are served by traditional Geishas. They prepare the spread for us, making sure that the water is properly heated and spiced and then bowing, reverently walking backwards, leave us to prepare and enjoy our meal. Popping in now and then to make sure our Sake cups are filled and if we’re in need of anything else.

Submerged in all things Japanese for an entire week, now I feel ready to face the Shueisha crowd and hopefully be able to ask and answer and defend a group of them sitting across the long conference table, with me alone on the other side, albeit Sasaki or Kayo Hayashi interpreting by my side.

Even though I have already forgotten about the hot water I had found myself in five years earlier over Norman Mailer’s The Executioner’s Song, however faint the memory, it still plays out in the front of my eyes.

As I face about ten of them, sitting across the table from me, the showdown about to erupt, conjures up the image of a hundred Kauravas to my lone Arjuna with Krishna as my chariot driver on the battle field of Mahabharata. Me having to fend off my hundred step-brothers, the bows tensed and the arrows ready and pointed at me like in a modern firing squad, over something I had presumed settled between them and the rights manager Jean Freehill in my office. The Japanese language rights to the excerpt of the Mailer book. That was 1979 and to the best of my memory the beginning of splitting of the rights to the text that was bought by Playboy. Up until then, the rights to the text would normally be available to all of our editions around the world. But not in the case of The Executioner’s Song. The foreign rights were sold separately. Playboy wasn’t even given an option to bid on them.

I no longer remember exactly, but to add an insult to the injury, the Japanese rights were sold to Shueisha’s arch rivals, Kodansha. I knew our rights department had fought and negotiated hard for our international editions, but to no avail. I remember some clever literary agent summing it up for me. There is no such thing as exclusive rights any more, that the rights now could be infinitesimally divisible. Whew!!

Soon the pattern followed when Playboy bought a bunch of short stories by Gabriel García Márquez, our internal table of contents started showing up with NO FOREIGN RIGHTS stamps in the bold type face. In my naiveté, I show up at García Márquez’ agent Carmen Balcell’s office in Barcelona. I offer her $10,000.00 for foreign rights. She all but laughs me out of her office. But considering that after all I was a señor de Playboy, gives me as a gift, the original first edition of the master’s El Amor en los Tiempos de Cólera. The book I still cherish and from which read a paragraph now and then and be in awe of how fluid his original words in Spanish are.

Even though this phenomena of NO FOREIGN RIGHTS by now is more of a norm than an exception, I am still prepared to face the “squad” with whatever grill worthy issues they may have to confront me with.

But wonder of all wonders, this time around, not only they don’t have any bones to pick with Chicago, there are absolutely no group meetings planned. My whole week of already being in Japan and not wanting to see them so that I would have a better feeling of things Japanese, have thrown them off balance. Instead they have decided to meet with me individually or in pairs to discuss with me section-by-section of how they envision the future editorial direction of the magazine and are eager for my input. And even more astonishing is: other than a perfunctory quick visit to the editorial department, they have arranged to meet with me informally at cafes and bars. In restaurants and talk over lunches. Absolutely un-Japanese thing to do.

I guess I have earned my stripes over the five years since my last visit to Tokyo by collaborating closely with them and having facilitated several mutually profitable special projects. My week long trip through their country expressly designed to get know them better has added to the PR rhetoric from Lee and Ray. It has become clear to Shueisha, that Shah-san is not there to lecture them. That honest to God, as communicated to them, I am indeed there to roll up my sleeves and become a part of their team in Tokyo and their solid ally when back in Chicago. They are appreciative and welcoming in the way I would have never imagined the Japanese would ever do.

I am overwhelmed by the biggest honor bestowed upon me one evening by the top Shueisha executive Mr. Tadashi Wakkana by hosting a dinner for me at the garden restaurant Happoen. Invited are about twenty of the company’s top executives and the editorial staff of Playboy.

It’s a traditional Japanese affair in which we are all seated on the floor in a large circle and are being entertained by a group of Geishas. What I remember fondly of that evening and with a smirk on my face is: as we settle down, an aging and experienced Geisha kneels down in front of me. She is holding a platter full of little ceramic Sake cups surrounding the tokkuri (carafe), ready to be filled . The polite most and the traditional thing for me to do would have been to motion her to fill the cup and then wait for all the glasses being served and for Mr. Wakkana to propose a toast.

As much as I love Japanese food, raw fish as in sushi and sashimi and all, I just haven’t acquired taste for the two of their most traditional beverages. Green tea and Sake. And what I really feel like having is and normally drink with the Japanese food is one of their great beers – fresh and chilled. Either Kirin or Sapporo. But at the time, I am in my newly acquired taste for the crisp and cold Asahi Dry phase. I almost accept the cup of Sake, and then thinking to myself, that would mean an evening full of drowning the potent liquor that I didn’t care for in the first place, why not be honest and have a beer instead? After all, I am the guest of honor! I also know that by then I have accumulated fair amount of capital in the goodwill, perhaps I can risk just a little bit of it and dare order a glass of the thirst quenching beer instead.

So I ask the Geisha, whether they had any beer? For a moment, just for a split second, there is a palpable hush in the room. I have knowingly committed a faux pas. But then, without missing a beat, from the opposite side of the circle, Mr. Wakkana commands: ‘I’ll have a beer too!’ And guess what? Everybody in the room orders biru. Very Japanese thing to do. Deru kui wa utareru. Literally: Nail that sticks out, gets hammered down!

It turns into a lovely evening. Along with the exquisite food, first the beer and than the Sake also flows. Rest of my stay goes well. The discussions, the agreements, the concrete plans and the time table for their execution of editorial changes and the promotion to follow.

But there still had to be a group meeting. Not the kind I remember from my earlier visit, cooped up in a windowless corporate meeting room, sitting around with a group of editors at a long conference table with me alone on the opposite side with Kayo or Sasaki sitting next to me to interpret.

This time around, they have another surprise waiting for me. On Thursday afternoon, Sasaki and I board yet another bullet train and head for the resort town Hakone, known for its hot springs and picturesque Mount Fuji, about sixty miles (96 km) south of Tokyo. After having checked into yet another Ryokan, Sasaki escorts me to the inn’s spa featuring its own private hot tub. Sitting around are all the editors I have worked with through the week, naked as jaybirds and sipping on their Kirin beers, the bottles resting by them over the rim. The splashing in the tub and drowning of beer and an elaborate dinner that follows makes for a wonderful farewell. Mission accomplished, I am touched at finally being admitted to their inner circle.

© Haresh Shah 2014

Illustration: Celia Rose Marks

SISTER SITE

http://www.downdivision.com

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Next Friday, November 28, 2014

UNDERNEATH HER CLOTHES

You might think that the glamour photographers who shoot the nudes would be devoid of any such male fantasies. After all, what would remain to fantasize about when you see the most beautiful women in their most seductive attributes through your lens and watch them prancing around the studio in the nude, day in and day out?

Tags Geishas, Lee Hall, Ray Falk, Sake, Shabu Shabu, Shueisha Inc, Tadashi Wakana, Yastaka Sasaki, Yuko Kato

Categories Corporate Matters, Culture, Food & Wine, Japan, Social Customs, Travel

BACK IN THE USA

November 6, 2014 //

Haresh Shah

All I Want To Do Is To Take A Beak

As I roll off the QE II in my Buick from the port of New York city, my plan is to drive cross-country with the destination of Santa Barbara, California. Or more precisely, Mark and Ann’s (Stevens) farm house in Goleta, some twelve miles north of downtown Santa Barbara and a stone’s throw away from the carefree Isla Vista off UCSB campus. Awaiting me is the culture and the people so unlike the America I have known so far. Three years earlier, just before Playboy offered me the job, I had planned a long vacation to explore the California Coast from Los Angeles to San Francisco. Instead, on the very day I was to fly west, I end up making a sharp hairpin turn to fly east over the Atlantic. I owe it to California to make up for my sudden turn. But I am not in a hurry. And I am open to any other possibilities that may exist or arise.

Chicago awaits for me with its arms wide open. Lee (Hall) throws a staff lunch for me and am treated like a homecoming war hero. He has even arranged for me to meet with the Photography Director Gary Cole. Lee thinks very highly of me and feels I would make a good photo editor for Gary. Gary is congenial, but not so sure. He has probably agreed to speak with me more out of courtesy than to consider me for a position he didn’t have in the first place. As devastated as Lee is at having to let me go, this is his way of demonstrating that it wasn’t his decision or within his power to keep me.

Of all the people, the person most upset and concerned about my departure from Playboy is the production boss, John Mastro. Even when he hired me away from Time, he had his apprehensions. Not because he had any reservations about the job I would do, but to take me away from what in the industry was considered to be one of the best jobs around. Worrier that he is, it ended up being just what he must have feared in the beginning. What if things with the foreign editions of Playboy didn’t work out the way they had planned and envisioned?

After all, these were uncharted waters. They had not yet figured out the cost-benefit ratio of maintaining a staff abroad. So there were going to be all sorts of uncertainties and the growing pains to deal with. It was not the performance, but the cost cutting that caused my position to be eliminated.

John feels personally responsible for my well being. And he is intent and insistent on finding me a comparable, if not a better job once I returned back to the States. He himself doesn’t have anything to offer, but with his wide spread contacts and the influence within the printing industry, he is sure to find me a desirable position. Totally ignoring my protests and wish to take a little break after the nineteen years of squeezed together hectic life.

I am only thirty five years old, but I have spent nineteen of them going to school. Joined my uncle’s publishing company Wilco soon as I graduated from high school, while enrolling myself for college education. First majoring in Economics and Political Science and then taking a ninety degree turn and joining the printing school. For two years, I served apprenticeship at the Precision Printing – a small printing house to learn the ropes. That was between eight in the morning until the noon. Hurry home and have a lunch on the run and be at my desk at Wilco by one. Dart out of there at five and off to the evening courses at the Government School of Printing, which took me until nine or later. Come home and barf down the lukewarm dinner my mother had shelved – still an hour or two of homework and that day’s diary entry ahead of me and make it to bed around mid-night. My mornings would begin around the time when I heard the first clinking of the milk bottles being unloaded at the government owned milk kiosk down the street. My eyes still half closed, I would pick up family’s ration. Perhaps grab another hour’s sleep and be under the cold shower and gulp down a glass of hot milk before running out to start my apprenticeship.

But I never felt stressed. On the contrary. My back-to-back long active days invigorated me. After I graduated from the London School of Printing, I loved every minute of the several odd jobs I had to take on before the three post-school real jobs that stretched into nine years. I am suddenly tired, exhausted even. I certainly need a break from the routine, and for now, all I want to do is write. I want to get off the speeding train – side step the rat race and stop to smell the roses. What’s more, I have saved enough to live on for a couple of years, supplemented by the unemployment benefits I am entitled to collect.

But how do I explain this to the man to whom having a job rates on the top of his priorities? And how do I fend his genuine concern for my well being?

‘You have all your life ahead of you to rest and write and do whatever else you want to. But I have just the job for you. Go talk to them. What you’ve got to lose?’

John’s gentle but insistent prodding reminds me of how my mother and auntie Shukla had began to nudge me soon as I had turned barely eighteen. All they thought of was to hook me up with one girl or another at every opportunity they got.

‘Doesn’t cost you anything to see her. I bet you’ll fall in love with her. And she is from a family just like ours. Will fit right in. You’ll never find anyone as pretty and sweet. Longer you wait, the best ones will all be picked clean.’ And auntie Shukla, the poet as she is, would even recite a couplet or two to describe her beauty, as if she were a serious contender herself. Not to mention, how pretty she herself is.

Once it became clear that I was going to go abroad for further studies, they begin in earnest their campaign to convince me to at least get engaged before I left for London. Their crafty underlying logic being, once committed, I would have to come back and not be lost forever to the West as did most others. And the horror or all horrors, what if I were to succumb to the wicked charms of a gori – a white woman? But I was steadfast and so it came to pass. And then when fifteen years later I came home, indeed not only with a gori in tow, but also nine months old Anjuli perched atop my shoulders in a back pack, they couldn’t have been happier.

But John turns out to be more persistent than my mother and the aunt were. So I relent. As much time and energy he has put into finding me another job, I don’t have a heart to tell him with any more emphasis that I really wanted to take bit of a break for some months, give my first passion at least a chance and then decide if I want to go back being the color guy. Not to mention that long ago, I had decided I didn’t want to work for a printing company in the same position as I would for publishers. Because I would rather be in a position to give shit than having to take it. Never mind, John has arranged an interview for me with the World Color in Louisville, Kentucky. As much to please him as with the thought, what have I got to lose? An airplane ride and bit of a diversion would do me good. Now it’s been six months since I had been on a plane last, something that had become practically a part of my daily routine, so to say. And I am beginning to miss it. It feels good to get on a jet and fly to Louisville.

First I meet with the production boss Grover Plaschke, who sounding serious, talks to me at length about the organizational details of the World Color and how the company is growing by leaps and bounds and how they are proud of their ultra modern equipment and the talented professionals who help them grow. Hopefully I could add to their pool of talents. I can tell I have positively impressed him. He enthusiastically turns me over to his press supervisor Bob Saxer. I like Bob. He is soft spoken and easy going no nonsense kind of a production guy like Ben Wendt of Regensteiner. My would be boss if I took the job. I get a good feeling about him and I am sure, we would get along well. I spend a whole day walking the huge World Color plant and I am indeed impressed by their streamlined operation, the cleanliness and the efficiency of the plant and the quality of the signatures rolling off web presses. I make appropriate comments and compliment him on how impressed I was with the plant and the people. And doing so, I can see that I have impressed him too without really trying.

‘I am sure we could use someone like you. I am very positively impressed by your resume and your experience of the last few years at Time and Playboy. So is Mr. Plaschke.’ Bob concludes.

To which I thank and tell him how I too would be proud of being a part of his team. But lacking from my voice is the excitement and the enthusiasm that of a man really wanting the job. I am struggling with how best to tell him what I am thinking. But he is more perceptive than I give him credit for. He doesn’t say anything, that is: until late in the afternoon when we are having lunch at a local bar and the grill. He lifts his beer mug, says cheers and while putting down the mug, looks at me point blank: You aren’t really looking for a job, are you?

So I square with him and tell him the truth. The only reason I was there was to please John, that I wanted to take a break first and give my desire to write a chance. At least give it a try, while I am able.

‘Fair enough. But when and if you ever want to come back into the work force, give us a call first.’

© Haresh Shah 2014

Illustration: Celia Rose Marks

SISTER SITE

http://www.downdivision.com

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Next Friday, November 14, 2014

UNLOVED IN THE LANDS OF L’AMOUR

A Recent Lufthansa ad goes: Seduced by Paris. Inspired by Rome. Shelves are filled with dozens of books raving about wonderful and romantic experiences of the people who have been to Italy and France. I can’t even count how many times I must have been to Paris and Rome and Milan. And yet!!!

Tags Anjuli., Ben Wendt, California, Cross Country Travel, Ddropping out, Gary Cole, Job Interview, John Mastro, Lee Hall, Mark and Ann

Categories Employment, Memoire, Playboy, QEII, Travel, Writing

OF BOOKS AND WHORES

April 10, 2014 //

Scattered Gems Of Practical Wisdom

Haresh Shah

The train pulls up at some unknown station. The peacefulness of the night turns into a little puppet show for those few minutes. The flickering dim gaslights illuminate the platforms, the guard blowing his whistle, the signal man running in front of the locomotive with his red and green flags, the tea and food vendors reciting their sales pitches, “chai garam babuji, chai garam, garam garam bhajia, khalo saab, aisi puri bhaji aage nahin milengi, pani, thanda pani. (hot tea, hot hot fried dumplings, have some, you won’t find them as delicious at the next stop, cooled water)The people getting off the train and running to the water fountains to fill up their water flasks with fresh drinking water, some sipping the piping hot delicious local chai in clay cups, some savoring the spicy puri bhaji. Sudden burst of activity, the train will pull away in a few minutes, the station would doze off once again. If there is another train arriving in an hour or so, they would just sit around puffing on their chillums, and the next puppet show would begin at the sight of another approaching express. It’s amazing to watch all those people moving around in such synchronized harmony, like in a well choreographed musical. Everyone has his own place, his own kind of product to sell, his own price, his own lyrical voice to recite and get his product to his consumer’s ears and eyes who only have seconds to make up their minds. Make a quick sale. And then once again, they disappear, they fall asleep. The train moves on.

I still feel dreamy and nostalgic about those train rides of more than fifty years ago when I crisscrossed India and played traveling salesman for Wilco – my uncle’s book publishing company. Train stations were some of the biggest outlets for the periodicals and the paperbacks. If there were an impulse buying, the train stations with their continuous transient stream of passengers were it. People would have just enough time to glance at the display out of their windows. It wasn’t good enough just to have a good product tucked away some place under the counter. You had to make sure that your product jumped at them before anyone else’s. As one of the stall managers, Vidya Kapur at Kiul Junction put it, Look Sahib, books are like whores, if the whores and the books are not dolled up and displayed, neither of them sell. What incentive do we have to give your books prime display space and sell more copies?

Pure and simple. True. What incentive did they have to display our titles up front at the standard discount of 25% as compared to other publishers doling out 33% and even up to 40%? The young Sureshchandra Jain in Nagpur throws at me, “We are banyas – business people, we do anything to make money, even sell your books.” And his brother Jagpal Jain in Calcutta even recites a poem of sorts for me: “It doesn’t help sitting on the shore if you are looking for the pearls, all you find on the shore are the shells. For the pearls, you have to explore the depth of the ocean.” Simplistic maybe, but their message was clear. Something no business school or the bestsellers can teach you.

Thus my first lessons in How To Succeed In Business Without Really Trying came from the folk wisdom of those down home but cunning operators of the book stalls across India. I am still young and naïve, but this month long crisscrossing the sub-continent teaches me more than up until then, fifteen years of schooling.

●●●

My father’s way of dealing with crisis was to not react hastily, but sleep on it. Depending on the time of the day, he would either take a long restful nap or literally sleep it off over the night. And when he woke up, most of the time, the crisis had passed. Or he had woken up with a solution to deal with it. I have inherited this trait from him and must confess, it has served me well. But there are times when you don’t have such an option. Especially in the business world. I run into what could have been a major crisis the very first week of having taken up my job in Germany. It’s almost middle of the night and the crisis has arisen over my denial to sign off on the centerfold of that month’s Playmate Marilyn Cole. The only way to make it better would be to reprint the entire lot. We are talking tens of thousands of Deautsche Marks.

‘Where do we stand with this fucking folder?’ I am standing face-to-face with the publishing director Heinz van Nouhuys, who has taken a special trip from Munich to the printing plant in Essen, with his girlfriend Marianne Schmidt over that election night in Germany on November 19,1972.

‘This is how we stand with the fucking folder.’ I counter, and then sit down. We talk, and then both of us realize some other solution had to be found. I am not yet established enough to make that kind of decision. I call Bob Gutwillig, our group head in Chicago.

What do you think I should do? I ask. There is a brief pause. I could almost hear him figuring out what it would mean in the long run for us to take a harder stand. Do nothing. Go back to your hotel and get a good night’s sleep. Just like what my good old dad would have said. Sky didn’t fall because Marilyn didn’t look quite as radiant. And the goodwill created by our letting go that night puts our partnership on the solid ground.

●●●

I enjoy years of steady growth and the fun but secure work environment under Lee Hall. I am quite comfortable with my role of playing the second fiddle without having to worry about profit and losses, contracts, budgets and the ever present corporate politics. He’s happy that I have taken to the heart his mantra of iron fist in the velvet glove. And I respect his axioms of I don’t like surprises by keeping him informed and always telling him the truth – one thing about lies is that you’ve to have good memory. I am good at my job also because I like people and love what I do. He passes on appropriate compliments to me with comparing my diplomatic way of doing things to that of the Secretary of State Henry Kissinger’s.

What I appreciate the most about him is that he would give me an assignment, sit down with me and discuss it at length, introduce in minute detail the cast of characters I would meet and work with. Tell me what my mission would be. He may throw in a hint here and there, but all in all, leave it upon me to take it from there and pursue the course of action as I saw fit. His job was then done. He could then close his office door, sit down with his New York Times and put his feet on his desk and light up one of his smuggled Cohibas.

Despite his ivy league stiffness at times, Lee feels special affinity for me, because he has spent some time in India during his youth and remembers fondly those days and also because both of us have come to Playboy from what was and still is the gold standard in the industry – the house of Time Inc. He is pleased that in addition I bring to the equation the solid educational background of two completely different and yet quite compatible fields, including the philosophy of two of the teachers who felt it important also to teach us about the thing called life.

Professor Nadarsha Mody at Jaihind College in Bombay taught us Shakespeare, but would often drift away talking about “life”, instead. If you are thinking God has given us these knuckles on our fingers so that we can count how much money we’ve got, wrong! Because in India we use the knuckles as if they were built-in calculators. When you’re on your death bed and if you could count even half as many friends, you know that you have earned and lived a good life.

Leap forward to our teacher Edwin Banks at London College of Printing, where I studied technologically oriented printing management. He would pound into us time and time again, don’t be afraid of trying anything. Mistakes will be made and sooner you make a mistake, better off you will be. And that you know that the foreman is doing a good job when you walk into the plant and hear the consistent drone of the printing press running, he is sitting on his chair with his feet up on his desk, reading the newspaper. Not the one who is frenetically trying to re-start the press with broken web and the ribbons of paper flying all over.

●●●

This all changes overnight, when after years of Lee having successfully run the department is suddenly usurped in a corporate coup d’état. Now I have a new boss – Bill Stokkan. It takes us a while to adjust to each other. But somehow we manage. Bill leaves me alone even more than Lee did, because he is not a publishing guy who believes that his managers should be able to do their jobs well on their own. But he does find his ways into all his direct reports’ areas more as an advisor/guardian than a boss. I like his modus operandi.

At times it takes me several days or even a couple of weeks to get him to sit down with me. Then suddenly he would show up at my office door just before lunch.

‘Let’s go!’ He would say. Hurriedly, I would collect my files containing things I need to discuss with him and we would dart out of there and walk a couple of blocks to our favorite Japanese restaurant, Hatsuhana, have our first course of sushi and tempura washed down with sake and beer, and then walk next door to the Shucker’s and top it up with fresh soft shell crabs, shrimps and oysters with some chilled vodka.

His favorite jargon is: That’s a no brainer, which would follow quick decisions.

‘Do it.’

‘Let’s discuss.’

‘Not now.’

And we would be done. But Bill is also given to what his other direct reports and I came to call, pontificate! He has an extremely analytical mind in which he has looked at a given situation from every possible angle. And he has a set of business philosophy that is plain and simple and above all fair to everyone concerned. Something I absolutely admire.

We are on our way to Brazil and Argentina. Up are two very delicate contract renewals. I have provided him with copies of the contracts and am giving him rundown on what we maybe up against when sitting down at the negotiating table.

‘They’re right. We should consider giving them reduction in the minimum guarantee!’ This is a new concept to me. He senses it and he knows what the corporate philosophy has been all along.

‘Minimum guarantee shouldn’t be a minimum penalty. I see that we actually make more money than they do!’ This too is a new concept for me.

Aren’t we supposed to be? I don’t even have to ask.

‘We may try to get 51% out of the deal, but even if we end up with 50/50 split, it’s still a win-win situation and therefore a true partnership.’

‘But that would throw off our budget…’

‘Don’t worry about the budget. Just make one up the best you can. In the end you could be either over budget or under budget.’ Well, he is right. But no one has put it to me that way before.

‘Just look at these numbers. What’s in these contracts for our partners? What incentive do they have to invest more and make more money? So they can pay us more in the royalties?’

The question hangs in the air while our Varig flight bound for São Paulo pierces through the dark of the night. His question what incentive do they have? takes me back to ten thousand miles away and twenty five years earlier. And to my month long jaunt across the Indian sub-continent and to a different kind of dark nights, not up in the sky, but down on the earth. And instead of the jet engines roaring, I hear the screeching of locomotives on their tracks and the train slowly inching into a station. And hear the echo of Vidya Kapur, loud and clear:

Look Sahib, books are like whores, if the whores and the books are not dolled up and displayed, neither of them sell. What incentive do we have to give your books prime display space and sell more copies?

© Haresh Shah

Illustration: Celia Rose Marks

SISTER SITE

http://www.downdivision.com

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Next Friday, April 18, 2014

HUGH GRANT IN MY SHOES

When in June of 1995, Four Weddings and a Funeral and Notting Hill star Hugh Grant was arrested and booked by LAPD, his police mug shot along with that of the prostitute Devine Brown were splattered all over the international print and television media. I couldn’t help but think: it could have been me nineteen years earlier.

Tags Bill Stokkan, Edwin Banks, Jai Hind College, Lee Hall, London College of Printing, Professor Mody

Categories Corporate Matters, Memoire, Playboy, Profile, Time Inc., Travel

PERFECTLY UNBOUND

October 24, 2013 //

Haresh Shah

Taking A Stab At Respectability

When Celia – the young woman who so beautifully interprets and illustrates Playboy Stories week after week, returned the copy of my July 1988 issue of Playboy featuring Cindy Crawford on the cover, she had secured the pages with a little yellow and pink binder-clips. Apparently the pages of the issue had come apart at the perfect bound stiff spine, just like that of the cheap paperbacks from the Fifties. The issue was never before opened and was in mint condition. Quite unsettling for an avid fan and the collector of the magazine.

When the first issue of the perfect bound Playboy dated October 1985 landed on my desk, sometime around the first week of September, with the cover blurb proclaiming: COLLECTOR’S EDITION / THERE IS A BOLD NEW LOOK UNDER OUR COVER, I felt disoriented like never before. Devoid of the staples and lying there flat as the thick Dutch pancake, it felt akin to me returning to the little town of Schutterwald in Germany to visit my old landlady Frau Lipps – fully expecting, as in the past for her to have prepared my favorite Wiener Schnitzel with pommes frites and a small side of butter lettuce salad – instead to find a plate of a salmon filet with boiled potatoes and green beans. It threw me completely off balance.

Even though there were talks in the air for a while to switch to the perfect binding, deep down in my heart I still held out hopes that Hefner would never agree to such a move. But he did and now I was holding in my hands something I had thought would never come to pass.

On the Playbill page the editors wrote: As you know by now PLAYBOY is a tremendously well put-together magazine. And for the past 381 issues, the thing that has held it together, through thick and thin, through Marilyn Monroe and through Venice Kong, had been a humble underappreciated yet respectably old-fashioned staple. What you have in your hands right now is the first spanking-new tough spined staple-free PLAYBOY. So much for the tough spine.

Playboy began and remained saddle stitched for more than thirty years – the standard magazine binding format used by the majority of large circulation consumer magazines around the world. It’s flexible, it’s reader friendly and cheaper than perfect bound magazines, such as National Geographic, Architectural Digest and Vanity Fair and now Playboy – the stiff unbending coffee table books.

First and foremost, Playboy’s identity has always been its centerfolds, so much so that Hefner himself has famously said at one of the Playmates reunions that without you, I would be a literary magazine. The centerfolds were defined by the young women who occupied the specially printed three page gatefold, inserted and stapled near the naval of the Playmate of that month. And because of the way the magazine was bound, it was easy to find her with your finger tips even with your eyes shut. Open your eyes and find her there with her enticing eyes staring at you and the rest of her laid out bare in all her glory. Not to mention how easy it was to lay it flat when open and feel its soft and smooth bulge and the curvaceous spine. You could fold it, you could bend it, toss and turn while lying down on your sofa and reading thousands of words of its interviews and in-depth articles comfortably without having to keep forcing those pages open.

These kind of decisions are not taken lightly. To change even a layout of a single page in a well established magazine requires very serious considerations. Because more than anything else, even the slightest deviation from the standard format can disorient the loyal readers.

As I am writing this in October 2013, The New Yorker has changed radically its front of the book section Goings On About Town to the point where it’s totally unrecognizable from its classic, albeit stale version. Even though I think that the new design is more contemporary with lot of white spaces, new elegant type face and all, now several weeks later, I still feel lost and disoriented and can’t seem to navigate my way around those pages. But I am sure, I’ll get used to it and even forget the old design. Alas, no such luck with Playboy’s perfect binding even after twenty eight years.

●●●

When I worked for Time, the editors decided after forty years of retaining the same look with which the magazine had debuted back in 1923, time had now come to give it a fresh new look. Change the design, change the typeface. Change the philosophy of the covers. That’s a giant step, especially within Time Inc. family. It was Life that glowed with flashes of colors inside its snappier articles – sort of prelude to the video clips with narrative text. But Time magazine remained black and white for the longest with its mini-newspaper look and the format, wrapped inside its red bordered covers framing some of the most alluring illustrations. It wasn’t up until in the Seventies that the first photographs began to appear within those red borders. When Time introduced color photos inside its editorial pages, they were sparse and limited to a four or eight page signature printed on higher quality coated paper. Even discounting that the color pages cost more to reproduce and print, that wasn’t why they hung onto its black and white origin. The biggest concern in their hanging onto the original mono color format as long as they did was the shock of switching to the color would give its readers. I am not a hundred percent sure now, but I faintly remember their instituting minor design changes in the late Sixties – I believe with the help of one of the most celebrated and creative designers, Milton Glaser.

But it wasn’t up until 1977 that the magazine was completely redesigned by the legendary Walter Bernard. And not until well into the Eighties that more and more color pages began to crop up in Time. But not before discussing endlessly the pros and the cons of introducing photographs on the covers and changing their inside look from staid mini-newspaper like black and white pages to its current contemporary, bold and colorful layouts.

The second most popular feature in Playboy has always been its interviews. Even though the magazine was launched in December 1953, it wasn’t up until September 1962 that Playboy interview made its debut with Miles Davis talking to the journalist Alex Haley. Since then Playboy interviews have become the standards against which all other interviews are measured. And its simple three columns, three iconic black and white photos format has become an immediately recognizable graphic identity. So much so that to this date, it remains unchanged, though as of February 2009 issue it has replaced the black and white with the color photos. And yet to an old aficionado like me, those color photos seem more pasted than they look natural. Some international editions tried out different formats including full page photographs or illustrated profiles of the personalities, but at the end of the day, the only image that conjures up in one’s mind at the mention of Playboy interviews is that of the three head shots with the quotes underneath them.

Then why you would think Playboy eventually succumbed to such a radical physical makeover as switching from its loyal tried and tested saddle stitch binding to the pretentious perfect binding? This much I know:

Back in January 1983, Playboy Italy changed hands from Rizzoli to Mondadori. In an effort to transpose the edition’s perceived readership from the truck drivers to the sleek and sophisticated, Mondadori approached my boss Lee Hall, asking for the permission for them to go perfect bound. We had internal meeting and concluded swiftly; that would no longer be Playboy. Even so, Lee in his practical wisdom, sent out a memo, I think to the US edition publisher Nat Lehrman, Editorial Director Arthur Kretchmer and the President Christie Hefner, requesting their input. It was probably circulated among other top executives. The response from the most was NO. Except a scribble at the top of the first page from Arthur, which said something to the effect, are we sure we want to say no? From what I understood, the logic behind his question was that let one of our editions try it out and then see what happens. What I also understood was that some were in favor, probably the advertising bunch. In the end, Hefner must have been sold the idea of the advantages of giving his baby an “upscale” look. But I or even Lee weren’t privy to any of that information. So I decided to ask Gary Cole – now the retired Photography Director, who has been a friend and with whom I have remained in touch. Here is what he had to say:

“The push to switch the magazine to perfect binding came almost exclusively from the Ad Department. Most magazines were already perfect bound. Ads had to be created just a little differently for a saddle stitched magazine. You realize that the outer pages of a saddle stitched magazine has to be wider to be able to wrap all the way around the inner pages. So the Ad Dept. convinced Hef.

“As you know, Hef was very, very resistant to change. One of his favorite axioms was “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” Another was “Why do we need to reinvent the wheel?” He didn’t like perfect binding. He liked the more open look that saddle stitch gave him. And he was very married to the idea of the centerfold being in the center of the magazine. Everything was built around that. Of course, when ad sales began to falter, when money became tighter, when he continued to hear from the Ad people that they could sell more ads if the magazine switched to perfect bind, he finally relented. I honestly don’t believe that it gained us one page of advertising. The reluctance of advertisers was based on the growing sensitivity in the business community to the subject of nudity. As long as Playboy had nudes in it, there were lots of advertisers who were afraid to come near us regardless of how we were bound.”

All true. And yet, something kept gnawing at me. In my mind, I still remembered that tiny scribble at the top of the memo, initialed AK. Since I left Playboy at the end of 1993, I had seen Arthur Kretchmer only once. I wasn’t exactly comfortable approaching him, but that’s what I had to do. I shot out an e-mail to Arthur. He was most gracious and forthcoming.

“As for perfect binding. I remember the meeting with Hefner very well. It was not an editorial meeting. It was a business meeting. After the full business presentation was made — and it was made mostly from an advertising sales point of view — Hef said, “The reasoning sounds all right, but you’re asking me to re-invent the wheel. This is a gamble that I’m very reluctant to take.”

“He asked my opinion, and I said something along these lines: I thought that getting rid of the staple would move the magazine into the category of classy mainstream magazines — a psychological shift that I thought the magazine was ready for.

“He considered that. There was more conversation. I’m not sure that he went on to approve the change in that meeting, but I think he did. I think he said yes before that meeting was over.

“In the name of complete honesty, sometime after we made the change, I thought we’d made a mistake. Not right away, but certainly within the year. All the business people were happy. Even the newsstand guys liked the way the magazine stacked. But I became uncomfortable. Obviously we never seriously considered going back.

“I don’t remember the circulating memos that you describe, but your telling of the story rings true. You have chosen the right words with ‘upscale look.’ I think once Hefner saw that as part of the conversation, he became a convert.”

I got my answer with that gnawing feeling now subsided.

© Haresh Shah

Illustration: Celia Rose Marks

SISTER SITE

http://www.downdivision.com

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Next Friday, November 1, 2013

IN PRAISE OF MY BUICK

As of now, I’ve had seven cars. The first one, a Chevy Nova practically killed me many times over. But I missed her so when sold it to a couple of neighborhood kids. The second, an Oldsmobile Cutlass was stolen, requiring me to buy my first brand new set of wheels, a Buick Skylark. It went with me from Chicago to Munich to Santa Barbara and back to Chicago and many other exciting places in-between and had become as much a part of me during those ten most dynamic years of my life. It was loyal, it was reliable and it never let me down. The least I can do is to pay a little tribute to her

Tags Arthur Kretchmer, Celia Rose Marks, Gary Cole, Lee Hall, Magazines, Playboy Binding, Playboy Interviews, Playmates

Categories Binding Methods, Italy, Playmates

DESIGNING IN HIS DREAMS

August 22, 2013 //

Haresh Shah

The Spookiness Of The Creative Mind

It’s It the Easter Monday in Italy. I am on an over crowded train going back to Milan from Pontremoli. Everybody is returning from the long holiday weekend and as squeezed together as we are, I have managed to find a “comfortable” corner of my own where I get to stand for all three hours of the train ride without being crushed.

This is the first time I am alone face to face with myself since the fateful late Monday night of the week before. I am reading Andy Warhol’s autobiographical excerpts, while the conflicting thoughts rush through my mind, they collide with each other to the rhythm of the oscillating motion of the train piercing through the still night of the Italian country side.

I have just spent a very pleasant and a relaxing weekend with Rainer (Wörtmann) and his wife Renate in their newly acquired old mill in Italian country side. It’s a beauty, standing proudly in a little village called Mulazzo near Pontremoli. It stands forlorn in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by a stream and rocks and a cluster of trees. The place is to serve as a retreat from their hectic lives in Munich. It also turns out to be a great and timely escape for me in the aftermath of the week before.

Lee (Hall) is smooth as silk when he tells me how great a job I had been doing, so much so that like any good manager, I had succeeded in eliminating my own position. It’s the night of Monday, March 24, 1975. Lee is doing his regular European stint. Bob (Gutwillig) has left the company and Lee is traveling with Richard Kopf, the new divisional VP. His note at the reception leads me to his suite 375 at Principe de Savoia, which is where we are staying.

‘How about some Scotch now?’ The offer I had declined earlier. Seems he have had a few already. I guessed he probably needed them before he could execute a swift coup d’état. Shocked? Yes. Devastated? No. All of a sudden, I see the word FREEDOM begin to flash in front of my eyes like on a digital billboard. This meant I could now write the book I have been wanting to for so long and go to California – the vacation I had planned to take the very week I took over the job at Playboy . Okay, I do end up spending a sleepless night. But am thinking about the ways this will change my life as I toss and turn.

Two days later, I return back to Munich with Lee and Richard. They are travelling in the first, of course. While standing in line at Milan’s Linate Airport, I run into Rainer, who is returning to Munich from his Italian country home. I don’t yet tell him about me having been fired, because Lee needs to inform the top Bauer management first. That evening. Rainer and I end up having dinner at Le Cave.

The night after, I am deep in sleep when the door bell rings. Its around two in the morning. I hear Rainer’s slurred voice on the intercom.

‘I was out late and as I was driving home, it suddenly dawned on me that poor Haresh is jobless. What would he do now?’ I am touched. I assure him that I was doing fine and that how this break opens up so many exciting avenues for me. But Rainer seems to need to talk and so do I. We sit around until four in the morning, drinking Sambuca and listening to music.

I am not even sure if Rainer went home that night or just caught a wink at my place before we headed for the airport to catch the Milan bound morning flight and from there on drive to Pontremoli.

●●●

The place is not finished yet, but its very livable with open fireplace and little nooks and crannies that make for ideal dining, cooking and sleeping spaces. The only snag that weekend is: it’s wet and it’s cold. We place the only available electric heater in the middle of us as we try to keep warm through the nights. I slide into my sleeping bag with all my clothes on. Including sweater and socks.

During the day, we meet up with Udo Wüst, an editor at the German edition, and his wife, they too own a similar property in the area. The weekend is spent living the idyllic Italian country life. Leisurely and languid. Strolling and stopping for coffee and cake at cozy little cafés and I remember eating one of the most delicious Italian meals at a local family restaurant. I fall in love with their signature dish Testaroli, a version of home made flat pasta which I had never tasted up until then and have not since then. It tasted and looked so much like Khata Dhokla, as whipped up by Mama Shah back home in Bombay. As cold and wet as it is, most of the weekend we just sit around and play Backgammon and drink Calvados – the golden glow of which rushing through our veins help us keep warm. Entspannend, I wrote in my journal. Couldn’t have thought of a more relaxing way to spend my first weekend of freedom.

●●●

As I lean against the outer wall of the train, making myself comfortable, Andy Warhol now snuggly tucked back into my shoulder bag, I think of the thirty wonderful months of being a part of Playboy, and how I had landed in Munich in the middle of the overt hostile environment and how along with Freddy (Baumgärtel), Rainer was the first one to warm up and work with me. We also began to socialize. Realizing my predicament with the vintage apartment I had taken over from Gerrit, him recruiting his wife Renate to help me find a place more to my liking. In general, Rainer becoming my guardian angel. Us two, along with Heinz (Nellissen) in Essen, becoming a team.

●●●

We are sitting in Rainer’s office, drinking champagne at eleven in the morning. I watch the bubbles rise in the flute, Rainer asks: ‘So what did you think of my idea?’

‘Which idea?’

Because Rainer is an idea machine, hailed by Quick and Playboy Germany’s editorial director, Heinz van Nouhuys as the wunderkind, because at the age 27, he has become the youngest art director of an international publication. . And also because Rainer says with all the modesty, maybe (because I was) talented? By then he already has under his belt, the experience of having done graphically progressive magazine Jasmin. He has also put in his time at DM and Zeitung in Stuttgart. And admirably, he doesn’t jump at the once in a life time opportunity when offered the position at Playboy. Instead he stipulates: I’ll fly to Chicago at my own expenses and meet with the art director of the “whole shop “and see if at all I can make it with my own graphic ideas. A meeting is arranged with Art Paul, the man who designed Playboy’s ubiquitous Rabbit Head and defined the magazine then and forever for its graphic excellence. And then Rainer calls back from Chicago, Well okay. I’ll start with you.

I no longer remember the exact illustration and the article about which we began to talk, but here is a scenario I just made up as an example. It would be pretty much true of the way Rainer “dreamt up” visual aspects of Playboy’s German edition.

‘You know the one about the illustration for the Maxim’s de Paris.’

‘The one (Franz) Spelman is writing?’

‘Yeah.’

‘What about it?’

‘You know, the werkdruck, the special stock four page cutout?’

‘Sorry, I don’t. Refresh my memory.’

‘You know the one where the first page would be the die-cut pop up of the façade of the Maxim’s, and when you turn the page, the spread shows the interior of the main floor of the restaurant with the page four crossing over the opener, showing the chefs working in the kitchen?’

‘Sounds like a great idea. With an illustration like that, why would anyone want to read the article?’

‘Genau. You know? Plus does it make a difference? I mean, who cares what Franz has to say?’

I don’t say anything to that. We just look at each other with knowing smiles on our faces. Probably envious of the fact that Franz got such a plum assignment, staying at George V in Paris and eating at Maxim’s a few times during his stay there. If we knew Franz, he probably had one or two of the local lovelies accompanying him to the meals – all at Playboy’s expenses. Franz certainly knows how to live! A born bon vivant!!

‘I’m sorry my friend, but I don’t remember you ever telling me of your idea before.’

‘How can you forget? It was last night, when we were having drinks at Le Cave.’

‘Can’t be. Because I just flew back from Düsseldorf.’

‘You did?’ And he momentarily seems lost in his thoughts. ‘Must have been that I dreamt about it. But I swear, I remember even having drawn you a rough sketch on the Le Cave napkin.’

‘Must have been on another night. Do you have the sketch?’

He fumbles into his jeans pockets and then breaks out in a broad smile. ‘Verdamt noch mal, things I dream about! Anyways, let me draw it for both of us now.’ And he pulls out the blue lined calibrated spiegel – the format sheet – and begins to draw the façade of Maxim’s.

●●●

Working with Rainer is fun. He is easy going, but can at times also be insistent and blunt when called for. I am amazed at his perception and being able to see through things.

A year after I arrive in Germany, I am planning a trip to India and am in need of several rolls of films. Instead of just going out and buying them, I am being cheap! It occurs to me that perhaps I can get a freebie pack from the photo department which is under Rainer. I pick up the phone and call him.

‘I was wondering if I could get a dozen rolls of Ektachromes from your stock.’ Not to sound too obvious, I add: ‘Maybe I can get them at the same bulk rate?’

‘Oder umsonst? – or gratis!’ He doesn’t miss a beat. In the laughter that follows I detect slight sarcasm in his voice. Touché! He has seen right through me.

I save the day by laughing it off with: ‘Das wäre eigentilich besser/‘ – that would obviously be better!

Laughing back he says: ‘Of course you can have them.’ But boy his oder umsonst? stung. So much so that I still remember it forty years later:).

●●●

While I am still living in Munich and pounding away relentlessly at my bright orange Triumph portable electric typewriter, writing my book tentatively titled The Lost Identity – Personal Reflections, Rainer blows me away with a very pleasant surprise. He offers for me to become Playboy Germany’s photo editor. Susi (Pletz) and Helga Colle-Tiez the two who ran the photo department up until then have given their notices to leave.

Rainer’s offer puts me in the whirlwind of conflicting emotions. I am flattered and I am emotionally overwhelmed. My mind begins to whirr with all sorts of special pictorial ideas, and the Playmates I would find and produce. Still living in Munich and working with Rainer and Freddy and Heinz, opening up a whole new horizon for my future. The offer puts me between a rock and a hard place. It hasn’t taken me too long to get over my job loss. In the meanwhile I am more than halfway through writing my book. And am dreaming of starting a magazine of my own with a real possibility of Celeste (Huenergard) – the young American woman working as editorial assistant to Donald Stewart, our Italian in-house editorial executive – partnering with me. She has been a big moral support following my termination, keep the chin up. We have shared many a meals together and have lingered in the evenings with Grappas. Boy she is beautiful. Rainer kept saying when we had stopped at the offices of the Italian edition on our way to his country home

So what do I choose? A bird in the hand or two in the bush? Rainer’s offer is so tempting that I really don’t know. For three sleepless nights I agonize over should I and or shouldn’t I? I am conflicted between the future I was beginning to envision and the future that’s offered to me on the silver platter. I am torn and tortured. I am tempted to accept Rainer’s offer and think later. Perhaps I take it for a year or two, defer my dreams for a while – I tell myself, Rainer doesn’t have to know. Things can always change, can’t hey? And I remember the wisdom imparted by Mr. Moore, while both of us laid next to each other at St. Charles Hospital in London; that in business, you should never let your left hand know what your right hand is doing. But that would be totally against my grain, and I want to be honest. I share with Rainer what I am thinking. Rainer wants me on indefinite basis, he has big plans for me.

At the end of those three nights of tossing and turning and having done some serious soul searching, I decline the offer.

Illustration: Celia Rose Marks

SISTER SITE

http://www.downdivision.com

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HERR DOKTOR SHAH

DEVIL IN THE PARADISE

The Site

ABOUT: Brief bios of the author and the illustrators.

TABLE OF CONTENTS: Brief descriptions and direct links to the previous 37 posts.

Next Friday, August 30^th, 2013

MY INTIMATE ENCOUNTER WITH EROTIC OYSTERS

How I Came to Like, No, Love Oysters?

Oysters have been credited for their aphrodisiac qualities, but are also considered visually erotic because of their succulent, raw, moist, tender and glistening look. And yet, I couldn’t for the life of me, see them in that context, let alone really put them in my mouth and savor. The story of my not so keen encounter with this most delicious of the fruit from the sea.

Tags Art Paul, Celeste Huenergard, Donald Stewart, Franz Spelman, Fred Baumgärtel, Germany, Italy, Lee Hall, Playboy, Rainer Wörtmann, Renate Wörtmann

Categories Profile

IN THE NAME OF LOVE

February 14, 2013 //

Haresh Shah

Every Picture Tells A Story

Its crispy cold December morning. The sun is shining bright outside and I am having my usual Sunday breakfast of Shahmolette – so christened by Jan Heemskerk – our friend and at the time editor-in-chief of Playboy’s Dutch edition. Because in addition to mushrooms and onions, my recipe includes finely chopped, insanely hot Thai peppers and cilantro. Also our Sunday morning feast included freshly baked bagels from Skokie’s famous and the best in the world, Bagels & Bialys, and their home made cream cheese with chives. Carolyn is futzing around the kitchen when the phone rings. I hear her making a perfunctory but pleasant conversation with the caller. Not knowing or caring to know who she might be talking to, I flip the pages of that week’s Time.

‘Sure! He’s right here. Just a minute.’ She covers the mouthpiece of the receiver and mouths ‘Lee Hall.’

Lee Hall? That’s my boss. What is he doing calling me at home on a Sunday morning? It sure couldn’t be good news. I take the receiver and lean against the credenza by the phone.

‘Mr. Shah!’ I hear him say. Once in a while he would call me that endearingly. But still…

‘Sorry to bother you at home on Sunday morning – but as you know I’ve just returned from my far east trip and thought I fill you in on Hong Kong before things get crazy tomorrow morning at the office.’

A sigh of relief! ‘Sure. You want me to come over?’ I offer.

‘No that’s not necessary. But I was wondering if not too inconvenient, I could stop by at your place and we can talk over a cup of delicious masala chai. You know, my body clock is upside down and I am wide awake. Would do me good to take a ride along the lake.’

About an hour or so later, his unpretentious burgundy Chevy Malibu pulls up in front of our house in the Chicago suburb of Evanston. His tall frame stoops down on our relatively low sofa. As we sip on our tea he gives me run down on his visit with our Japanese publishers Shueisha.

‘They love you down there,’ he tells me and also compliments me on the job well done.

‘That brings me to Hong Kong. We are about to conclude an agreement with Sally Aw of Sing Tao Newspaper Group. I would like you to take a trip there at your earliest convenience soon after the holiday rush is over, and help them set up and launch the Chinese edition.’

Hong Kong!!! In The World of Suzie Wong! He tells me in detail about the two principles. Sally Aw and the Playboy’s publisher designate, dynamic Albert Cheng. He shares with me what he has jotted in his notes and gives me Albert Cheng’s direct phone number and asks me I should call him in a day or two and establish initial contact. It all sounds so wonderful that I am absolutely thrilled. But at the same time, I sense in Lee a certain amount of discomfort. Telling me everything in minute detail, almost stretching it, giving me a feeling that there is something else hidden behind all of that nervous energy and that he is somehow having hard time leading up to it.

‘Well, I have taken up enough of your family time on this weekend morning. I better be going.’

‘Not at all, we are delighted to have you in our home.’ I say sincerely. Following that he says his goodbye to Carolyn and thanking her for tea and probably pats Anjuli on the head and prepares to leave.

‘There is something else…’

‘Yes?’

‘Come on out with me. There is something I want to show you. A bit confused and a bit curious, I follow him to his car. He opens the trunk to the car and lifts out of it what looks like a framed painting. He shows it to me. It’s a water color of an Indian temple perched atop a steep hill, with the stone stairs leading up. He rests is against the open door of the trunk and lifts up two more paintings. One that of an Indian village iron smith working on his anvil right outside of his thatched hut and another one, a bit modern-ish of a woman with an infant raised up above her head.

‘They are beautiful.’ I say. Thinking he is showing them to me because of their origin.

‘I acquired them when growing up in India. As you already know, my father was in diplomatic service in Delhi. I just love them. Makes me nostalgic about the times I spent in your beautiful country.’ The way he stares at them with such fondness demonstrates one of those rare emotional moments of his otherwise stoic demeanor.

Still not getting why he is showing them to me, I wait.

‘I would like to ask you for a big favor. If you can. If its alright with you, I would like to loan them to you.’ He must have noticed a confused look on my face.

‘See, the thing is; Sarah is decorating our new apartment and she absolutely hates them!’ I am speechless. I had of course known Sarah and liked her the way you like your boss’ pleasant spouse. But other than when thrown together during the required company social gatherings, our talks never went past perfunctory pleasantries. Neither was I personally that close to Lee. Our relationship was congenial and warm but mainly based on mutual professional respect. Other than his foray in India, we also shared a common thread of both of us having worked at Time Inc., where he was editor-in-chief of Life en Espanol. He worked out of the editorial offices in New York and I think also in Paris and Tokyo. I worked in Time’s production offices in Chicago. Our paths had never crossed during our Time & Life days. Of his personal life, I knew only bits and pieces. That he was married before and had three kids and had been divorced – must not have been that pleasant. From his accidental comments, his relationship with his kids too seemed more obligatory than warm. That he have had a serious bout with alcoholism, which too I was only somewhat aware of at the tail end. But the ones who knew him better, would tell me that it was real bad until after he married Sarah. All of them were in agreement that it was Sarah who had helped straighten him out. And that she loved him and had been good for him. That she was the reason Lee has been and was dry for some time now.

They had just moved from their matchbox of a highrise on the North Lake Shore Drive to a vintage lowrise on the short strip at the curve of the lake on Oak Street, from whose windows you could practically touch the water. An elegant place. Sarah’s own domain. And as much as Sarah had done for him, even having mostly given up drinking herself and whatever else it must have taken for her to steer Lee in the right direction – and as much as Lee seemed to love her, giving up those three paintings was the least he could do for the woman who meant so much to him.

All that scrolled through the screen of my head as I heard him continue: ‘I would be grateful if you would agree to take them. This way I would know that they are in good hands and I am sure that you and Caroline (sic) would appreciate and enjoy them. And whenever I feel homesick for them, I can always stop by and look at them.’

That was in 1985. I still have those paintings occupying very prominent spots in my apartment. Lee never looked back, never reclaimed them or visited to admire them. The sacrifice he made turned out to be worth his while, because Sarah and Lee remained happily married up until indeed death did them part. And now he is no longer among us. But when in 1997, I wrote about the incident in my book, Of Simultaneous Orgasms and Other Popular Myths: A Realistic Look at Relationships, as an example in the chapter titled, Little Things Make Big Differences, and sent him a copy of the book – he wrote back. Thank you for the dedication as well as the mention in the book (including the nicely disguised one about the Indian Paintings.)

Illustration: Jordan Rutherford

SISTER SITE

http://www.downdivision.com

Next Friday, February 29, 2013

BY THE TIME I GET TO AMSTERDAM…

Not every relationship problem is resolved by giving away paintings. There are times when the only solution is to go your own separate ways. Here is the story of a dramatic escape of someone not waiting until the death did them part.

Tags Albert Cheng, Carolyn, Hong Kong, Jan Heemskerk, Lee Hall, Love Story, Relationship, Valentine's Day

Categories Uncategorized

THE GIRL NEXT DOOR

November 29, 2012 //

Haresh Shah

How I Managed To Put My Foot In My Mouth

About a year in my job, my bosses Bob Gutwilig and Lee Hall come down to Munich. Other than the three of us, sitting around the dining table are Franz Spelman, our local editorial consultant, Heinz van Nouhuys, editorial director of Playboy’s German edition and Fred Baumgärtel – the man really in charge of it all. And not to forget Rainer Wörtmann, the art director wunderkind. Of the group, Rainer is the youngest and I am the second youngest.

Playboy Germany in it’s over a year of publication had taken off like a rocket. The time had come to look back and look forward instead of resting on the laurels of success. Among other editorial matters, the subject of the Playmates came up again. The basic concept of the young woman who would adorn the centerfold as defined by Hefner was that she couldn’t be a professional model, an actress or a celebrity. She had to be the girl next door. Playmate is not just another pretty face with near perfect vital statistics. She has certain personality traits. She is smart, she is articulate, she is confident and she is gracious. At the same time, she is down home wholesome and unpretentious. The kind of girl the readers can relate to and not be intimidated by in the way most attractive women could be.

Now with three European editions of Playboy dotting the western Europe, that included Italy and France, it was becoming imperative to expand the scope of their local editorial contents. Even though a lot of editorial material such as Playboy After Dark, Playboy Interviews, Playboy Advisor as well as most of the non-fiction and fiction pieces covering the local scene were already produced by the respective editions, missing glaringly from their pages were the local Playmates. By now I too had become a true Münchener and as many pretty things as I saw walking Stachus, Schwabing and the pedestrian zone of Marienplatz, I could well imagine one or more of those home-grown beauties becoming the girl next door to grace the German centerfold.

Technically, I was “just” their production manager with the primary function of overseeing the printing quality and shouldn’t even be included in that night’s dinner at the trendy Neuer Simpl, breaking bread with the top brass. I was invited perhaps because I was a part of the very small American team of three in Munich, perhaps because after the initial coolness and apprehension, I had succeeded in endearing the Germans to my presence among them. So after they were done talking text and illustrations, Bob once again brought up, something we had already touched upon during their visit a couple of months earlier.

‘When are you going to start producing your own Playmates?’

‘I don’t think we are ready to take that step yet. I am quite content with the American Playmates. Besides, to produce our own Playmates would be prohibitively expensive. I would rather use my budget in trying to get good authors at this time than put the money into Playmates,’ responded Freddy.

‘Yes, but that’s not the same,’ said Bob.

‘And they aren’t exactly girls next door for the German readers,’ I quipped.

‘How do you mean it?’

‘I mean, Miki Garcia from California, Ellen Michaels from Long Island and Marilyn Cole from London, are not exactly what we could call the girls next door for “our” readers.’ I rattled off the list of some recent American Playmates that had appeared in the German edition. Bob let me continue and just listened encouragingly.

‘One hardly could relate to them if you lived, say in Munich, Milan or Paris. They never could imagine running into any of them walking down Leopoldstrasse, for example.’ I added. I saw both Bob and Lee shaking their heads in assent and also Rainer while Heinz remained visibly non-committal.

‘Okay, here is the main reason. Even not considering the production costs and while Munich is overflowing with most beautiful models and starlets, they are not exactly girls next door either.’

‘But there are so many beautiful young women all over Germany.’

‘So they are. But I don’t think any of them would want to pose in the nude. It would be very difficult to find the ones who would and still be up to the U.S. standards.’ Freddy said, looking a bit frustrated. He had a point. Nudity per se was not a taboo in Europe. Even the “news” magazines such as Quick and Neue Revue carried nudes on their covers, majority of them of unknown origin, submitted by freelance photographers. Would we want one of those girls to be in Playboy? Probably not.

‘What if I found us an acceptable Playmate?’ Don’t ask me what made me say that. Even I was astounded at my own chutzpah, especially considering that both of my big bosses sat at the table and I was at the very bottom of the totem pole of our group hierarchy. It must have been that both Bob and Lee remained silent, tacitly allowing me to take the reign.

‘You probably could Mr. Shah. But I wouldn’t want it to interfere with your day job!’ Lee said in half jest, being his Machiavellian self as ever.

‘What if I do it in my spare time?’

I didn’t want to divulge the amount of spare time I had. For someone who had done three weekly magazines at Time – for me to do a monthly magazine, planned months in advance was something I could do in my sleep. Not to mention my most able counterpart Heinz Nellissen planted firmly right in the printing shop in Essen.

‘If you find us a candidate that is acceptable to Chicago, then we will certainly consider producing her.’ Freddy relented with Rainer and Heinz van Neuhuys nodding their assent.

‘I think we might be up to something here. Chicago will of course help you with the production and the expertise. We will make available one of our top photographers to work with you guys.’ Bob assured.

‘We absolutely will.’ Lee seconded. Those promises were comforting. If Freddy still remaining somewhat apprehensive, we were all in agreement that a local girl with the staples in her belly would indeed make it an authentic German edition.

No one was exactly betting on me really finding a Playmate candidate acceptable to Chicago. We parted feeling pleased at having addressed and agreed upon an important issue. Soon, everybody seemed to have comfortably sloughed it off and tucked it away in their subconscious.

That is, except me. I had work to do.

SISTER SITE

http://www.downdivision.com

Next Friday, December 7, 2012

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HUNTING FOR THE GIRL NEXT DOOR: If she indeed lives right next door, why can’t I just knock on her door? My next door neighbor at the time was good old Dr. Max Grenzman – a gynecologist. That certainly didn’t help. Or? Wait, how about one of his pretty patients?

Tags Bob Gutwilig, Franz Spelman, Girl Next Door, Heinz van Nouhuys, Hugh Hefner, Lee Hall, Playmates Definition, Rainer Wörtmann

Categories Uncategorized