The guests whirled into New York’s posh Four Seasons restaurant at 10 p.m. sharp, hoping desperately that someone would recognize them. Flash cameras flickered like fireflies whenever “somebody” arrived—a somebody like Sen. Jacob Javits or his wife, Marion, who swept in separately with pop artist Andy Warhol; historian Arthur Schlesinger and his towering blond wife, Alexandra; columnist Jimmy Breslin and his wife, Rosemary, displaying his-and-her girths, and, of course, the celebrity of the moment, Italian film director Bernardo Bertolucci. Shirley MacLaine flew in from London, and former Sen. Eugene McCarthy strolled in around midnight, looking characteristically distracted.
It was a very New York party, given for one of Manhattan’s culture heroes, Norman (Aquarius) Mailer. In a burst of egotistical largesse, Mailer had decided to invite 600 guests to give a 50th-birthday party in his honor. To induce them into spending $50 a couple, Mailer revealed on the invitations he would make “an announcement of national importance (major)” and that the proceeds would go to something very mysteriously unexplained as “The Fifth Estate.”