Diana Ross: Three Crazy New York Nights

I Couldn't Throw It Out
Season 2, Episode 19 - Diana Ross: Two Crazy New York City Nights

Michael Small:
In 1983, after a major event in New York City, I called a few people to get their reactions. Here's what I heard from Andy Warhol.

[Recorded interview begins]

Andy Warhol:
It was the most exciting thing in my whole life.

[Recorded interview ends]

Michael Small:
And here's what I heard from Steve Rubell, who was famous for his Studio 54 nightclub.

[Recorded interview begins]

Steve Rubell:
It was almost like the A-bomb hit.

[Recorded interview ends]

Michael Small:
And this was the reaction from the humorist Fran Lebowitz.

[Recorded interview begins]

Fran Lebowitz:
I had no intention of dying for this cause. It looked too dangerous.

[Recorded interview ends]

Michael Small:
But if you really want to know what happened when hundreds of thousands of people converged in Central Park, you gotta hear it from the three of us who covered that event for People Magazine. And then we'll explain how a year later, at 1:30 in the morning, we ended up dancing with the superstar who caused all the hoopla. So keep listening.

[song excerpt starts]

I couldn't throw it out
I had to scream and shout  
Before I turn to dust
I've got to throw it out
Before I turn to dust 
I've got to throw it out

[song excerpt ends]

Michael Small:
Hello, Sally Libby.

Sally Libby:
Hello, Michael Small.

Michael Small:
Well, today I have arranged to present you with two extremely special people.

Sally Libby:
Can't wait.

Michael Small:
The three of us were reporters for People Magazine. I shared with these two people some relatively close encounters in 1983 and 1984 with the one and only Diana Ross. You're into her, right, Sally?

Sally Libby:
So into her. I wanted to be her back in 1977 after seeing her at a concert in Boston. loved her.

Michael Small:
Well, good luck with that. We are going to revisit those Diana Ross moments today. But before we do, I want to mention that you, Sally, crossed paths with these people way back then also. So let's start with the standard reunion ceremony. Sally, I give you the one and only Alan Carter, also known as Alain Cartier.

Sally Libby:
Hi, Alan.

Alan Carter:
Hello, Sally. Good to see you again.

Sally Libby:
You too.

Michael Small:
Welcome, Alan. Along with Alan, we have the inimitable Lisa Russell, also known as All Kinds of Other Things.

Lisa Russell:
Hello, hello.

Sally Libby:
Hi, Lisa.

Michael Small:
Lisa, you're still working for People, aren't you?

Lisa Russell:
I don't work for the magazine directly. Within the company, there's a little division of old geezers from all the old magazines. And we put out what are called bookazines. So I'm actually sort of on deadline today.

Michael Small:
Okay, well, we'll talk fast. Alan, you had a career in television, I believe. Were you on TV or were you behind the scenes?

Alan Carter:
Well, I was both. If you blink, you missed me on television. In fact, some of my claims to fame include being an extra on As the World Turns, working with Julianne Moore before she was famous.

Sally Libby:
Wow.

Alan Carter:
For the last couple of years, I've been sort of behind-the-scenes, working in local news, which isn't really news. Car crash of the day. So I've been doing that. Websites, magazines, radio, you name it, I've done it. Jack of all trades, master of none.

Michael Small:
The way this began is that I found two folders in the boxes of everything I've saved. There were two separate Diana Ross events. All three of us covered both of them. We're gonna remember those events and decide, can I throw out the contents of these folders or should they be saved for the sake of history? I think the only place we can start is to wallow a little bit in Diana-mania. What highlights from Diana's career do you guys remember? Lisa, what about you? Any songs you loved?

Lisa Russell:
I suppose if I had to choose favorites, it would be the early Motown stuff. Frankly, her later stuff I couldn't take or leave. But you know, the old Motown stuff, when that comes on, who can resist that?

Michael Small:
And Alan, what about you?

Alan Carter:
Well, a little black kid growing up in Queens, New York, who had no idea about celebrity, who just watched TV and went, "You know, I'd like to do that someday." You know, of course, when the family would gather to watch her or the Supremes on like Ed Sullivan or a show like that, that was appointment television. I mean, we just would like all, you know, gather together and, you know, get the bag of chips and just sit there. I have been a fan for 50 years probably.

Sally Libby:
Yay. Let's hear it for that.

Michael Small:
Sally, what do you have to throw into the memories of Diana?

Sally Libby:
I think she had six number one hits. But all of those songs, prolific!

Alan Carter:
Pop, rock, R&B, soul.

Sally Libby:
I think we should say that she is 80 now.

Michael Small:
No, 79. Her birthday's in March. And the amazing thing is she was on tour this year at age 79. She even played Radio City Music Hall, which is very relevant to what we're going to talk about today. Anything else, Sally, you want to throw out there?

Sally Libby:
Very recently, Smokey Robinson just came out and told the tale of an affair with her while he was married, lasted a year.

Michael Small:
Yeah. She was very young when she had that affair with him. I think she was maybe only 20. Did you guys hear about that? Did you know about that?

Lisa Russell:
I did not.

Michael Small:
Sally's a source of salacious gossip, and the three of us worked at People Magazine. How does that make sense?

Alan Carter:
Really, thanks a lot, Sally. You know, back then, even now, there's so many affairs and they hated each other and they fought offstage. And the one thing Barry Gordy taught everybody was when you go out on that stage, you have to comport yourself in a certain way. I mean, now we know when people are fighting. And we know the gossip and we know all that stuff. They had affairs. If they hated each other's guts, you wouldn't know it. I think that's why Dreamgirls was so fascinating because it revealed the behind the scenes of what was really going on.

Michael Small:
I looked around and found Diana Ross quotes. There were some on her website and I thought Alan might find it interesting that one of her quotes from March, 2022 was, "'My best morning and night mindful meditation is hand washing the dishes.'" Are you skeptical?

Lisa Russell:
Diana Ross doesn't do her own dishes.

Michael Small:
Another quote that she had, she said, "'Criticism, even when you try to ignore it, can hurt." Bear that in mind, Mr. Carter. And she said, "I have cried over many articles written about me, but I move on and I don't hold on to that." I don't know if there are people here who are guilty of making her cry, but the three of us did contribute to a People Magazine cover story about Diana. And some people felt it was a little too mean. It was about a very memorable concert. And Lisa, the date of that event was...

Lisa Russell:
July 21st, 1983.

Michael Small:
Diana was 39 years old at the time, which seemed like an old lady to me then. Now 39 is a very young child to me. She decided to perform this concert in New York City's Central Park. And it was a big deal. She called it For One and For All. That was the name of the concert. The set was designed by Tony Walton. It had colored sails and flags and kites, and it took six days to build the set. There were 140 speakers in the sound system, 20 miles of cable. There were 275 stagehands and a 16-piece band. So this was not a small endeavor. And something that was rare at the time, there were these 32-foot TV screens, which blew our minds.

Sally Libby:
Now, everybody has one.

Alan Carter:
Yeah.

Michael Small:
And then she received money for selling the rights, which might've been as much as two million. And then she used some of the profits to build a playground in Central Park, which was not cheap. It was like $650,000. It was a very expensive event. To give you a sense of how huge an event this was, to remind you, the official estimate was that the crowd included 350,000 people.

Alan Carter:
When they said 350,000, I thought that was low. I passed that many on the subway.

Michael Small:
I think they raised it later. Now the consensus seems to be half a million.

Sally Libby:
I'm thinking about the population of the concertgoers in terms of race.

Alan Carter:
I wasn't like looking to count. I mean, even back then it was kind of like, she was known for being a crossover artist. She was one of the first crossover artists. Her crossover from almost day one was white audiences, obviously adored by black people and gay people took to her pretty fast too. She started in the late 60s where sort of, she knew that she had gay fans and she played up to it. A lot of the songs were, you know, wink wink about men and affairs and things she was doing and being your own person and standing up for what's right and, you know, standing up for your own freedom and your own right. And that stuff translates to the gay audience like nobody's business. You don't have to stand up and say, "I'm a gay icon." You just, you say the right words and you're gonna get a gay following. And she did. And she capitalized on it. So I'd have to say that night, you know, it was a sea of... White, black.

Michael Small:
It was a sea of everybody.

Alan Carter:
Yeah.

Michael Small:
But in New York, it's always a sea of everybody. So Sally, I would say it wasn't remarkable.

Lisa Russell:
Oh, I would actually disagree with that. It was a much more mixed crowd than, for instance, the perhaps even more well-remembered Simon and Garfunkel concert in the park. And that had been in, I don't know, I think like 81. And I was there. That was an overwhelmingly white audience.

Michael Small:
Interesting. Okay.

Lisa Russell:
Of the ones that had come before, Elton John had done one. This was the first one where a good percentage of the audience was black.

Alan Carter:
Yeah, I think Lisa's right. New York could be relatively segregated in its way, but not that concert, and again, this is something that the black gay guy observed pretty much immediately. "Oh, look, there's some of my people over there. Oh, there's some of my people over there. Oh, those are my people and my people." And I didn't go to a lot of places back then feeling like it was mixed. And then you had people who knew her from like '80 on, and then you had the people who knew her from the '60s on. So the crowd had 40-year-olds. The crowd had 20-year-olds.

Michael Small:
So this major event started with a press conference, and you covered it, right, Alan?

Alan Carter:
Yeah.

Michael Small:
Did you hear anything interesting?

Alan Carter:
At that press conference, she had just come out a little late, and she said, "I was having lunch." So of course, I, being the person I am, said, "You're so thin. Like, you actually eat lunch?" And this -- I'm not making this up -- I'm kind of almost wishing she hadn't said it. She said, "I get a bacon, egg, and cheese sandwich, but I take just one bite." And I thought, "Wow, like I wish I could do that."

Michael Small:
Was that your only question or did you ask her something else?

Alan Carter:
I did ask a couple of questions at the press conference and later on her people kind of came over and said -- well, I'll clean up the language -- but it was like, "Was the point of this to ask really hard questions?" And I said, "Look, you know, she's been in the public eye for 25 years, and I don't think people know the real her." And there's all this stuff about how she's, you know, mean and she's a diva. And she sat there so sweet and so nice. I'm thinking like, which is the real you? Because this is somebody who I don't think the public knows. And I threw a couple of questions at her that I thought would rattle her, and she couldn't have handled them any better or nicer. So...

Michael Small:
Do you remember what tough questions you asked her?

Alan Carter:
Well, I specifically was sort of weirded out by looking at the playlist and she was gonna sing something from Dreamgirls. And if you remember back at that point, she had been about a year and a half bad mouthing the show, saying it was a ripoff of her life and she couldn't believe they would rip off her life. And she thought it was horrible, they ripped off her life. Rip off, rip off, rip off. But she's singing a song from the show, a very famous song from the show, in her set. So I say, "Excuse me, Diana, I have to ask. You know, have you seen Dream Girls? Have you kind of come to make amends with the show?" "No." And I said, "Of all the songs you could sing and you have like 42 million songs, why would you sing a song from the show?" Quote, "I have friends in that show." And I just thought, I'm not getting anywhere with this question. So I just... moving on... But it just was weird to me like, you know. Then I realized, Michael. She was a master of publicity and a master of communication. She knew someone would ask and get some more controversy going about the show. And for that I thought, "Well, that was brilliant." And I literally remember thinking, "I love this woman. She's that good and that smart that she could sort of whip it around. Wow."

Michael Small:
Do you remember any other questions you asked?

Alan Carter:
I think I asked her, like, what song she was really tired of singing. And she said, "There's no song I'm tired of singing. I love everything." And at that point she was doing a lot of the, you know, I love life, I love love, I love everybody, you know. She didn't have a negative thing to say, period, about anything.

Michael Small:
Lisa, were you at, do you remember being at that press conference?

Lisa Russell:
No. Was I there, Alan? I don't think so.

Alan Carter:
I don't believe you were. You two did the work. I literally went to the parties and the press conferences. I didn't really go to take notes. I went sort of as a fan. Shouldn't say that too loud.

Michael Small:
So the most famous thing about this concert turned out to be the weather. Like the most horrible rainstorm that many people had ever seen. And Lisa, during all that drama, You were there in the press area, were you not?

Lisa Russell:
Yes, and I remember the rain, of course. About 20 minutes into the show, the skies just opened up, like, nutso rain. It was also blowing. It was like horizontal rain. So finally, it was Parks Commission and cops who said, we've got to shut this down, because this is now dangerous. And so she said the concert's going to have to end. And she stayed on stage while saying, like, "OK. Music's over, but everybody has to split." There was lightning out there too. And meanwhile, we're all standing there on metal chairs. So, yeah, I mean, we stayed around just because, I mean, that was the story. I do remember standing on this chair. I had taken off my red stilettos and I was wearing a white mini skirt with black polka dots. A journalist who had been behind me. told me in the rain, it had become completely translucent. Which I of course hadn't noticed. And I ended up dating him actually. So I don't know if the translucent skirt had anything to do with that.

Alan Carter:
And Lisa, by the way, this shows you what a big Diana Ross fan I am. She was soaking wet and I kept thinking, "My God, she's gorgeous, even soaking wet." And you know, I love you a lot, but didn't notice your translucent skirt.

Michael Small:
Alan, did you see any celebrities there?

Alan Carter:
I don't remember any celebrities there. I remember eeling from the time we walked in, I don't know why, just like dread. And I know that's weird because I was excited to see her, but just feeling like, "I don't know if I trust 500,000 New Yorkers in one place all at once." I'm looking up, going, "That looks like a rain cloud. Oh, I hope it doesn't. Oh no." And then you started feeling drops. I remember, I just turned to Lisa going, "I think it's raining." And she's looking at me like, "Oh, are you gonna, like, be the damper of this evening? Like, you know, here you go, you know. Then she feels a couple. And I remember you go, "Yeah, you're right. It's raining." And, boosh. Like the skies opened up and it was just like, "Wow, this is not good."

Michael Small:
And you know, there had been a terrible drought for like 10 days before this happened. So the ground was packed solid, dry, and then the rain hit it. And that's why the mud. It was like Woodstock. People were, like, rolling in the mud and the winds were supposedly up to 59 miles per hour.

Alan Carter:
Yeah. It was horizontal rain. Like, "Wow, this doesn't even come down straight. It's coming sideways." And I remember she had, like, was it like an orange, red kind of a jumpsuit on that was clinging and her hair was clinging and she just kept saying, "I'm beautiful. I've taken a long time to get here. I'm not going anywhere." And we're like, "I see lightning about to hit the stage. We're getting out of here." You know, I would have stayed. But yeah. Like Lisa said, they were like, "We gotta stop, we gotta close this down."

Michael Small:
Yeah, I was out with the regular people. It was just scary and a mess. And it was impressive to see her keep going out there. But it was also... maybe there were questions about whether it was kind of foolish, like it was dangerous for her to be out there with the lightning.

Sally Libby:
But she was telling people to go, right?

Michael Small:
She was telling people to go, but she stayed, which was a good thing, I guess, for her to do. But now... Did either of you go to the party afterwards?

Lisa Russell:
No.

Michael Small:
There was a party. She stayed till midnight and she had to watch a tape of the fiasco. I think it's just worth noting what Diana went through. I mean, this was a big deal for her. She invested a lot of money. The next day I called people who were there. The first person I called was Andy Warhol. And whenever I interviewed him, which was pretty often, he always told me that everything was great and wonderful and you'll hear that here too. But then he'd slip in a little something interesting, like the fact that the interview he did with Richard Gere for Interview Magazine didn't go well and had to be redone. Anyway, I know that two minutes of chit chat may seem long and the audio isn't great. But come on, it's Andy Warhol. So here's what Andy thought of the concert.

[Recorded interview begins]

Andy Warhol:
It was the most exciting thing in my whole life. We stayed till the end. We loved it.

Michael Small:
Were you under the tent?

Andy Warhol:
No, no, I stayed up on the bleachers where all the VIPs were.  I was the last one on there with Rob Lowe, the movie star.

Michael Small:
I was trying to figure out who else I should call for comments.

Andy Warhol:
Oh, Richard Gere was there. And Susan Sarandon.

Michael Small:
I don't know how Richard Gere got in without like having the whole place go crazy.

Andy Warhol:
Oh, I know. He wore his normal clothes. I mean, I had a big thing about him because we're doing him for the cover.  He's gonna give us another interview Because he gave us a hard time.

Michael Small:
Well, also, I guess, just can you give me some sort of quote about her performance?

Andy Warhol:
Well, I don't know. It's one of those lifetime things, when they do her biography. And you know, you could just see it in a big movie.

Michael Small:
I left feeling really sad, because I just felt like here was...

Andy Warhol:
Oh, we had the best time. We really did, because we couldn't get out at 81rst Street, we followed the crowd. We ended up down on 72nd Street. Then we went to Cafe Central, and we really had a good time. And then went back to the party. You didn't go to the party?

Michael Small:
Was the party at Gulf and Western?

Andy Warhol:
Yeah. It was really great. She was there. It was exciting. And they played the same tape again. It's different on tape. It sounded like a real show.

Michael Small:
Who gave the party? Do you know?

Andy Warhol:
I guess it was Paramount. It was in the restaurant up up at the top. Top of the Park.

Michael Small:
Did that go pretty late at night?

Andy Warhol:
Yeah.

Michael Small:
Was she there late at night?

Andy Warhol:
Yeah, she was great. Yeah.

Michael Small:
I was afraid that she was just going stage and cry and like...

Andy Warhol:
Oh, no, no no.  She was great. She was really... she looked great. She was terrific, God. Wasn't that magic?

[End of recorded interview]

Michael Small:
And that's when I was getting other calls, so I hung up on Andy Warhol.

Alan Carter:
Michael, think of it this way. You got the chance to tell Andy Warhol your 15 minutes are up.

Sally Libby:
Yay, I love that.

Michael Small:
The next call I got was from Steve Rubell. Andy told me that Steve helped organize the party after the concert, which is interesting, considering... that Steve was in prison two years earlier. He had a little problem with tax evasion at that very famous nightclub he ran called Studio 54. Anyway, here's a little of what he told me.

[Recorded interview begins]

Michael Small:
Did you get totally drenched?

Steve Rubell:
So drenched I can't... I took off all my shirt and everything.

Michael Small:
When you were trying to leave the park, did you go through any incidents?

Steve Rubell:
It was amazing because people were helping each other. We were running through the park and then one kid fell and everybody stopped and picked up the kid, a little kid. You know, considering it was almost like the A-bomb hit. You know, the people happened to have been very, very nice.

Michael Small:
Did Diana say anything to you that you remember or did she seem pretty upset?

Steve Rubell:
I love her. She's a good friend, so I have to preface everything I tell you about...  her spontaneous concern about everyone's welfare, you know, was unbelievable. Lightning was going right around so they had to switch microphones to take away the electric microphone. She's standing out there. I don't know any other superstar in the world who would have done that. It's a moment that I'll never forget.

Michael Small:
I wonder if she was in danger, I mean.

Steve Rubell:
Of course she was in danger, it was lightning all around. She was such a trooper. I mean, she would just say, "Okay." She'd sing a couple of lines and then she'd say, "You know, move out to your left." And if people were moving too fast, she'd say, "Come on, don't run. Everybody take your time. It's only rain." And then she'd sing a couple of lines of a song. I don't know if everyone realized that she wasn't singing really whole songs at that point. You know, she stayed backstage. She stayed back in the van back there. I was home an hour and she was still backstage. You know, because she just kept wanting to know that everybody got out of the park. She was really that nice. People pick on her all the time saying, you know, she left the people behind. You know what I mean? She certainly didn't leave the people behind last night.

[End of recorded interview]

Michael Small:
So then I also called Fran Lebowitz. Do you remember who she is?

Lisa Russell:
Of course.

Alan Carter:
She was on Letterman 100 times and wore the same shirt every time she went on.

Michael Small:
She's very famous for enjoying smoking and for not working on her writing. She kind of made an image for herself as a skeptical New Yorker or maybe acerbic is the right word or sardonic. Anyway, she lived up to all those words when she talked with me about the concert. Definitely a different angle from Steve Rubell. So I'm going to share a little bit of that with you now.

[Recorded interview begins]

Michael Small:
What did you think of the way she handled the whole situation?

Fran Lebowitz:
What do you want me to say? "What a trooper, what a pro?" I think that people like Diana Ross, you know, I mean people who are very big stars in show business, get enormous credit for doing what everyone else does anyway. What about the half million people who sat there in the rain and listened to her -- who had less to lose? What else could she have done? I know, I'm sorry, I can't enjoy joining the worshiping of this. I don't think she behaved badly. I'm not criticizing her. I thought she behaved... well in the sense of calming the crowd down. I do think that once it started lightning and she was standing there holding that microphone  was really reckless. I mean, just because I thought she really a lightning target.  That's why she asked for the cordless mic, I'm sure.  I feel that the reaction to her is that a typical sentimental show business reaction. You know, this was tailor made.  Get her off the stage? You never would have been able to get her off the stage.  Not in a million years would they have been able to get her off the stage. You have to stand there. If half a million people would come and see you, wouldn't you stand there? So you get wet. I got wet and I couldn't get half a million people in the park.

Michael Small:
I noticed that you definitely stayed very late and got very wet.

Fran Lebowitz:
I left at the first drop of rain and then I couldn't get out. I was in the tent because I had no intention of dying for this cause. It looked too dangerous. Actually at one point when I was standing under that tent, I asked Calvin Klein if he could fake a heart attack because I thought an ambulance would come. Because the ambulance came -- one of the guys who worked on the crew got hit in the head by a light. I said, "Calvin, this is the way out. Fall on the ground. An ambulance will come. I'll jump in the back and we'll get out."

Michael Small:
Are you going back tonight?

Fran Lebowitz:
No. As Voltaire said, "Once a philosopher, twice a pervert."

Michael Small:
Man, she is so funny. I love that quote from Voltaire. "Once a philosopher, twice a pervert." Lisa, that sounds like something I'd hear from you.

Lisa Russell:
I believe I had to go to the second show because, you know, we were doing a story on it. So, you know, Fran didn't have to go. But I did. Diana was doing her job, I was doing my job.

Michael Small:
Alan, did you agree with Fran or did you feel sorry for Diana Ross?

Alan Carter:
I remember feeling the first night in the rain, like, "Is she crying or is that the rain?" And I couldn't tell. And I just remember my heart going out to her because look, I was a fan and I'm trying to be an objective journalist and just watching. A fan sitting there watching. But I just remember thinking like, "Wow, all that planning and all that money and, you know, trying to do something good for the city, and this is just a disaster." But you know what? It's 40 years later and we're still talking about it. So, you know, in terms of a masterstroke of marketing and genius for publicity and getting your name out there, how many other people are we talking about 40 years after the fact, after a concert?

Michael Small:
That's true. Then the next morning, she was saying that she needed to do the concert again, which is ultimately what happened. But to get to that point, 500 people worked all night long to clean the park up enough so that they could have a concert the next day.

Sally Libby:
Was the next day sunny?

Lisa Russell:
Yeah, the next night was fine.

Michael Small:
But there was something else that went wrong that night. I don't totally get why it happened, but I think this is where something called wilding was invented.

Alan Carter:
That is correct.

Michael Small:
I was out in the audience, and what I experienced is that groups of kids would come running at us. And then they would turn and they'd run away and everybody would get scared and then everybody would run. And this whole huge crowd of people would run. Then they'd go, "Oh, it's okay." And we'd go back and then you'd see everybody running towards you. So then you'd run too. And then you'd go back. That's what "wilding" was.

Alan Carter:
The park had a reputation, obviously of being, you know, dangerous. That didn't help. And I don't know, race aside, people see a large group of black kids running at them and they think immediately something's wrong. And I think that just sort of perpetuated itself. Started, like, working on itself to make it even worse. And then there were people who were obviously grabbing chains and things and then that became more violent. The first night with the rain, I'm picturing people just soaking wet. And the night with the wilding, I picture Michael wetting his pants.

Michael Small:
Yes, you got it right, Alan. You know, I wasn't the most experienced city kid. And you know, hundreds of people would be running at me and I'd be like, "Oh my God." I'm here with my notepad trying to write down what they're wearing as they run at me, or whatever. It was scary. I looked up some of the statistics. They had a thousand policemen and 400 Guardian Angels, if you remember the Guardian Angels.

Sally Libby:
Oh yes, they dressed in red, didn't they?

Michael Small:
They wore red berets and they were trying to keep the peace. But according to what I think we put in People Magazine, there were 171 reports of violence, 84 arrests, five stabbings, and three babies were born during the concert.

Sally Libby:
And it wasn't even Labor Day.

Michael Small:
Oh, Sally.

Alan Carter:
You think about it now and you think -- and this is gonna sound very stupid -- but in hindsight, 40 years later, "There were only five stabbings?" Now that's where we've come as a culture, where at a concert that size, there'd be death. 40 stabbings, a shooting. Like that's where we've come. That there were only five stabbings -- (sarcastic) "Wow us!"

Michael Small:
Well, now that we've relived the ups and downs of that event, we get to another one. It was a little more than a year later in October of 1984, a Diana Ross concert at Radio City Music Hall. It was supposed to be an event that would have no problems and be a big deal, and we were covering it yet again. I was at the concert because I found my notes in detail. I was scribbling down, "Now she's wearing this. Now she's wearing that. Now she's wearing this." So clearly I was there. I don't remember it that clearly, except that I remember a piano rose out of the stage and there was a guy who was in jeans and a t-shirt. I think she said to him, "This is my big event. Why are you so dressed down?" He said, "Because that's the way I dress when I make music." And so she ripped off her gown and she was wearing jeans and a t-shirt underneath and stood by the piano and sang some songs. Were either of you there with me?

Alan Carter:
I was there with you. I think I sat next to Lisa again.

Lisa Russell:
Was I there?

Alan Carter:
Lisa is too humble to remember this, but she was like the big music person at the magazine. And I was always her "plus one" or always sort of tagging along as, "Can I come? Can I come?" "Fine." I wasn't working it, but I was there. I remember it visually.

Michael Small:
Did I tell that story right?

Alan Carter:
Yeah, yeah, you told it absolutely right. But from what I remember from this show -- 'cause I would love to hear her sing for five hours -- and she did, I want to say, it was an hour and maybe a few minutes. It wasn't even long. And she kept saying every five minutes, "I can't hear, I can't hear, my sound is bad. My sound." And I'm thinking, "You're at Radio City. It's like one of the biggest venues in the world and you're having sound problems." And she literally, like, ended the concert early because she was tired of, like, having problems with her sound. And I remember thinking, like, "I didn't pay for this. If I paid for this -- and people were paying hundreds of dollars -- and you did an hour??? Get back out there. What are you doing?"

Michael Small:
It's interesting, of the three of us, Lisa doesn't remember being there, Alan remembers it vividly, and I took a lot of notes. That sums up the three of us perfectly.

Lisa Russell:
In my defense, I covered music for a long time and I went to so many shows that they all, you know, at some point start to merge into one. I don't remember the piano coming up from the floor of Radio City, which frankly, you know, that's sort of a cliche move. But when you were mentioning the stripping down to jeans, and I think it was a tank top now that I recall... but I do somehow remember that thinking, "Oh, this is cheesy as hell."

Michael Small:
There was a party afterwards at the USS Intrepid, which is a World War II aircraft carrier that is 893 feet long, which is the length of three football fields. So you're picking a big venue to have a party. I would like to say that I have the press release from Bobby Zarem about the event. He was a publicist at the time. I held onto it.

Lisa Russell:
Why do you have that?

Sally Libby:
Why does he have anything?

Michael Small:
On this press release, it indicated who was at this party. Some of them I didn't see, but Dustin Hoffman, Eddie Murphy -- I spoke with. Lauren Bacall, Drew Barrymore, William Hurt, Bob Fosse. Diane Lane was there with her date, John Bon Jovi, who she had to introduce because everybody didn't know who he was.

Alan Carter:
So I say. Are you Bon Jon Bovi? And their song had just come out on MTV and he was wearing white leather pants. I remember that. You couldn't forget him in white leather pants. And I said, "I just saw your video this week. You guys are gonna be huge." And he goes, "Ya think? Really?" That was certainly a highlight. But also I think we need to skip to the fact that there was someone else there, Alan, who you were excited to see. Who was that?

Alan Carter:
Okay, so JFK Jr. who I- I had spent years reading in New York City tabloids that he's the hottest guy, blah, blah. But you know, what's the hype? I don't get it. Anyway, he walks past me at one point, he's about three feet in front of me, and I went, "Oh my God!"

Sally Libby:
Oh, he was like a Greek god.

Alan Carter:
Pictures don't do him justice. And I think I even like said, "Oh my God" audibly. And I think at this point, I've embarrassed Lisa to the point that she wants to disappear because I've just embarrassed myself so much.

Michael Small:
Because they were there together, by the way, Lisa and Alan were there together.

Lisa Russell:
I don't recall Alan's actual reaction, but knowing Alan, yes, I can imagine what it was.

Alan Carter:
Now in my mind, he was at the next sort of little table over there with these little sort of riser tables. And I remember him asking, "Do you have Sweet'n'Low?" And pointing at me. And I'm thinking, "Yeah!" I was kind of like on cloud nine at this party. As I used to joke with Lisa and you, Mike, "We're the only people here who aren't famous." And I do have a picture where I'm lurking in the background of Michael talking to Richard Gere, who I was probably stalking at the time, right? I'm sort of in the background holding a drink, looking like "I have to go talk to Michael after this."

Michael Small:
But, you know, my notes said he wouldn't talk to me. So I guess what he was saying to me is, "No comment."

Alan Carter:
Probably. But the picture captured him, like, being intrigued by you.

Sally Libby:
Well, he happened to be a good actor there, right?

Michael Small:
Sally, I was wearing my skinny tie in my $2 thrift shop sports jacket.

Alan Carter:
Any friend who's seen the picture calls it "Alan Lurking."

Michael Small:
Now Lisa, do you have any memories from the party?

Lisa Russell:
Oddly enough, I do remember coming down the gang plank to enter the party.

Alan Carter:
Tell them why.

Lisa Russell:
Alan and I were out on... he having spotted JFK Jr., we were sort of stalking him all night... And at one point we were on the southern open side of the ship as JFK was having a fight with his girlfriend, who at the time was that Christina woman. And they'd been together for two or three years. Anyway, they were having a fight and it was getting pretty argumentative and somewhat heated. And Alan and I kept trying to sidle closer and closer to them to see if we could hear what this was actually about. And then they saw us and walked away. But...

Alan Carter:
We thought they were fighting over which one of us they wanted to have sex with.

Michael Small:
Oh, yeah, right. What about your entrance? One of you told me a story about your entrance.

Alan Carter:
You remember the entrance because the entrance, we, I wanna say, we kind of embarrassed ourselves. Do you not remember this?

Lisa Russell:
We somehow got in the way of Ross's entrance, right?

Alan Carter:
Yeah. I'll make us sound ridiculous, but this is the true story. We were running about 10 minutes late. And of course she's always late, right? So like, we're not gonna be "late late". So I remember going, "Lisa, we gotta go. We gotta go, we're gonna be late." She goes like, "We're gonna be fine. We're gonna be fine." In our friendship, I was always like, "We have to get there soon." Lisa was always, "We're fine." And she knew. That's Lisa. Lisa knew the music business, but I did not. And I'm like, "We gotta go, we gotta go." So we were late, and I remember being sort of agitated. Well, the party is packed, and you can walk down this sort of gang plank and see the party's packed. And I'm like, "I knew we were gonna be late." And now we're trying to, like, scope out where we're gonna stand. So we're kind of slowly walking, the music blares up. Ba-dum, ba-dum, ba-da! You know, like. huge music and it's, like, you know, music swells. And people start applauding. I don't know why. Maybe it was youth. But I'm looking at Lisa like, "Are they applauding for us? Wow, who do they think we are?" I mean, wild applause. And I'm like, "Wow, that's so sweet that they're applauding for us." Well, I turned thinking, it's probably not for us. And Diana Ross is about five feet behind us. You know, the gown is swirling. And I'm like, "Holy shit." I look at Lisa. Lisa looks at me. We both like kind of jump off the gang plank. Like "exit stage left." Like it was just instinct. We just looked at each other, like, "Jump!" And we, like, jumped off. It was like two feet off the ground. "Let her have her moment." But we ruined her entrance coming into the party.

Sally Libby:
Wow, that's impressive.

Lisa Russell:
You know, frankly, I have a vague memory of this, but I honestly was wondering to myself, "Okay, was that a party for Diana Ross or Tina Turner?" I couldn't remember which.

Alan Carter:
We literally ruined her entrance and I kept waiting for the reporting the next day to talk about these two buffoons who walked in, ruining her entrance. But no, there wasn't a whole lot of reporters or press there. But we did ruin her entrance. If there's any videotape of it existing, it's us coming in and getting applause.

Michael Small:
And meanwhile, I was over at the food table taking my intricate notes. Again, once again, I was always taking intricate notes. These two were not. They had shrimp cocktail, they had smoked salmon on rye. They had chocolate fondue with fresh fruit. My notes said "The best food at an entertainment event that I've ever witnessed." But a lot of people commented later in the reporting that the tables were empty. That it was such a huge place. You know, at first they were all packed in one area, but as people spread out, there were a lot of tables. And Diana Ross herself commented and was, like, "Where is everybody?" Because people weren't sitting down to eat or whatever. While you guys were making your grand entrance, I was, of course, eating as much as I could.

Alan Carter:
What she didn't realize is she invited all these models and stuff, like the supermodels, I believe, were there. And, like, if you invite supermodels, supermodels don't eat. Put the food near the press area. Michael Small:
I was chasing all of them. I was trying to get quotes. You two were like, 'Free party!" But one interesting thing is that there was Fran Lebowitz again. After she was, like, very acerbic about the Central Park concert, she was there. I asked her if she was at the Radio City Music Hall concert. She said, "No. I was at home busy not writing." And then she looked around the boat and said, "At least it's less hostile than during the war years." And Steve Rubell was there too. I guess they were into the Diana Ross party thing.

Lisa Russell:
They had heard about the smoked salmon.

Michael Small:
Maybe that's it. And then this: I do remember that Diana Ross stayed till about 1 30 AM. It's in my notes. A lot of the celebrities had left and we were dancing to her music. And we danced with her, Alan.

Alan Carter:
Got to laugh at this one. I'm scared to go near the woman because first of all, not only have I ruined her entrance, I'm that guy who a year ago asked those obnoxious questions. So I'm just convinced, like, she hates my guts. So I'm like kind of trying to hang out near Lisa and I'm trying to get the celebrity scene and "Oh there's like this one from a TV show and this one's a big movie star." Then it's like the divas in the room, you know. The Motown people, the divas. And you're just like, "I don't know where to look." I don't think we got half the names of the celebrities who were there. This party is wild. And I'm just like, "This is amazing. This is so much fun. But they're all dancing on the dance floor. And I'm just like, okay, I'm gonna just hang back." Our colleague, David Hutchings, was fearless. He would say and do anything, do anything at any time. He goes over and he says, "Hey, come on. I wanna introduce you to Diana." I said, "No, we're not doing that." He goes, "Come on, let's go over." Just imagine  a picture of me, like, with my hand extended like this. And Diana Ross meeting me and smiling and me looking like I'm a kid from Queens. What the hell? And he goes, "Let's all dance." We went out to the dance floor. And I mean, I danced with Diana Ross for about 10 minutes.

Sally Libby:
Whoa.

Michael Small:
Yeah, me too.

Alan Carter:
And I remember thinking like, "No one will ever believe this. I don't believe this." And I'm just like... and this was before cell phones and cameras.

Michael Small:
She really liked dancing with David Hutchings, which made me kind of mad. 'Cause Sally, you remember my excellent dance moves from high school.

Sally Libby:
Oh yeah.

Michael Small:
I was using all of those.

Sally Libby:
Who is David Hutchings?

Michael Small:
He was another reporter for People magazine who we all love and he made everything more fun, including getting us to dance with Diana Ross. It was quite a night. This brings us to the point where we have to look at the things I saved and decide what to do with them. I need to go through these relatively thin folders, which were not taking up so much space, which would help me argue that I need to keep them. It says Diana Ross on the front and on the back it says, "Lisa. This is the Ross folder." Lisa, who I think must have been fact checking the story...

Lisa Russell:
Must have been.

Michael Small:
In case you didn't get that it said Diana Ross on the front, I gave you a special note so you wouldn't miss it. Inside we find a People Letters Report, People Magazine every week, we got a letters report of who wrote in. In this case, we got 81 letters about the Diana Ross Central Park concert. And I saved this, and I think there's good reason to save it. Look at her face. Lisa, why are you making that face?

Lisa Russell:
Mike, why are you saving a letters report from what year was this? 1980 something?

Michael Small:
1983.

Lisa Russell:
'83. This is absurd. You're just, what are your plans for this? You're gonna save it and do what with it? Make a podcast out of it, obviously. After you make a podcast out of it, really just recycle it, shred it, give it back to the earth. A letters report from 1983. You know, you only have to keep your taxes for seven years. You shouldn't keep this shit longer than that. So toss it.

Michael Small:
I feel like it's historical. It has historical value.

Lisa Russell:
In what possible way does a letters report from 1983 have historical value to anyone but you?

Michael Small:
Well, we know how people reacted to Diana Ross and her concert and her disaster, which we might not remember. It's these little things. When you're writing a history book, it's so boring to say Napoleon went here and there. But it's really interesting to say someone in Napoleon's army had beef stew for dinner.

Lisa Russell:
Okay, well, Napoleon famously said that an army marches on its stomach. So the beef stew would be good. But no one is gonna care about how People magazine readers reacted. An historian would look at the story itself. They're not gonna look at the letters report.

Michael Small:
There's a very excellent comment here that says, "Thank you, Michael Small. And staff..." And "staff" means the two of you, by the way. "...for once again, giving credit where credit was due. A very fine article." That's from Larry in Nashville, Tennessee.

Alan Carter:
Thank you, Larry.

Michael Small:
And then we did say a lot about all the conflict behind the scenes and we have this... "Why the bitchy article about Diana? She is an extremely talented woman who shares her God-given talent with us all. Of course, every gesture and word were calculated. She is a professional performer after all. Perhaps you could deem her worthy of praise if she appeared on an empty stage, dressed in polyester, lip-synched her records, and separated her audience according to race."

Alan Carter:
My mom wrote that.

Michael Small:
"And what's wrong with Diana being a shrewd businesswoman? It was quite shrewd of yourselves to slap Diana on the cover to sell your magazine and then tear her apart in the article." So Deborah wrote us that. She was not happy with us.

Alan Carter:
I don't remember those being very mean. I thought they were very nice, frankly.

Michael Small:
I can read you probably what she objected to because I have the article, of course, right here. It says, "Two melodramatic evenings of music and chaos, sun and lightning, selfishness and compassion, affection and violence, triumph and despair." And here's the cover with Diana singing on the cover. I didn't write a lot of cover stories. This was a cover story that I wrote, although I do have to say... Lisa, please say you'll be glad to know I saved my original version of the story, which I can compare with the final story. Do you have any reaction to that?

Lisa Russell:
Well, every writer has a reaction to editors. So for that reason alone, I could see you as the writer of the story, you would save that just to see what the editing process was like.

Michael Small:
Let's just say that the second half resembles my version a lot. The first half... had some finesse from an editor.

Lisa Russell:
That was very extremely common in the earlier days of People. I mean, you know, there was a whole lot of rewriting.

Michael Small:
I think this is wonderful evidence of how things get edited. And then I have, Lisa, you'll be glad to see this. I did have a press pass for the second day. So I have my press pass. Now, isn't that cool memorabilia that people would find valuable?

Lisa Russell:
No, I would not have saved this one.

Michael Small:
And then of course, oh, don't forget the cassette of Andy Warhol, Fran Lebowitz, and Steve Rubell. That's history right there.

Sally Libby:
Oh, yes.

Michael Small:
I assume that Fran is still going strong, along with her amazing wit. But six years after our phone call, Steve died of complications from AIDS. He was 45. And just four years after our call, Andy died after having gallbladder surgery. He was 58. To hear their voices on this tape. when we had no idea what was ahead, that seems very valuable to me. So I do not want to throw this out.

Lisa Russell:
Well, the cassettes are sort of different for me. I actually do have a box of old interviews that I've seen. When I start the Swedish Death Cleaning, I honestly don't know if I'll bother to keep them.

Michael Small:
Okay, I know what's going to happen. You're going to send the box to me. I'm going to digitize them. I have a machine for that. And you are going to do several episodes of I Couldn't Throw It Out.

Lisa Russell:
No, no, I'm not going to do that.

Alan Carter:
I'm Team Save. I'm a memorabilia collector, too. I have stuff from 30 years ago, people I met and things. Just because at some point I'm going to look back on those things and look and say, "Oh, I remember that. I went to that party. I was at that thing."

Michael Small:
That's what we did today, Alan.

Alan Carter:
Sometimes the memories... like, I would have gone to my grave saying that the wilding was the first night.

Michael Small:
Yeah. America would have suffered for you to go to your grave like that. Now, meanwhile, here's the Bobby Zarem press release: "Diana Ross's gala opening night concert, kicking off her record-breaking engagement at Radio City Music Hall to be attended by film, music, theater, television, and literary celebrities." Well maybe this should be thrown out because the last guest, the very last guest listed under the celebrity guests was a pseudo-celebrity at the time. Underneath. Lee Radziwill and Betty Comden. Donald Trump was at that party.

Alan Carter:
You know what, Michael, these are time capsules and I think you have to save that stuff because it's like even now, when would we have a concert of a famous entertainer and mention the audience's racial composition? We wouldn't. It's not the kind of thing that we even think about at this point, really.

Michael Small:
And when would Sandy Dennis be listed above Donald Trump?

Alan Carter:
Okay. in my book, every day of the week.

Michael Small:
Okay, so we had a Lisa "Toss it all", we had an Alan "Save it all". Sally, where are you at?

Sally Libby:
Oh boy, I'm usually a "toss it", but I say keep it. Because it might sell on eBay someday.

Michael Small:
I like how you're thinking. And these objects brought us back together with Lisa and Alan. They were my posse when we were at People Magazine.

Alan Carter:
That's where Donald Trump came up with "Grab him by the posse." Sorry, I had to.

Michael Small:
I love the fact that someone is out punning Sally because that needs to happen more often.

Alan Carter:
Sally and I are kindred pun spirits.

Sally Libby:
Absolutely. But I just wanna say to Alan and Lisa, I hope that (singing) "someday we'll be together again."

Michael Small:
I guess that is the final word for these Diana treasures and for our Diana memories. Thank you again, Alan and Lisa...

Lisa Russell:
My pleasure.

Michael Small:
...for easing on down Memory Lane with us.

Alan Carter:
I don't get to hang out with you guys enough. So that was great. Thank you.

Lisa Russell:
It was interesting to go back decades to when journalism was still fun.

Sally Libby:
Before we sign off, a reminder to everyone that you can find us wherever you get your podcasts or you can listen on our website at throwitoutpodcast.com  And you can get a reminder about our latest episodes on Instagram @throwitoutpod.

Michael Small:
If we whetted your interest in Diana Ross's very wet Central Park concert, you can relive both concerts in the movie version called Diana Ross, Live in Central Park, which is rentable on Amazon Prime Video for 20 bucks. And for those of you who really want to see that photo of Alan lurking behind me and Richard Gere, I posted it on our website, along with photos of all the treasures that I saved and Lisa wanted me to throw out. You can see it all at throwitoutpodcast.com. And that does it for another episode of...

Sally:
I Couldn't Throw It Out. Bye!

Lisa Russell:
Bye!

[Theme song begins]

I Couldn't Throw It Out theme song
Performed by Don Rauf, Boots Kamp and Jen Ayers
Written by Don Rauf and Michael Small
Produced and arranged by Boots Kamp

Look up that stairway
To my big attic
Am I a hoarder
Or am I a fanatic?

Decades of stories
Memories stacked
There is a redolence
Of some irrelevant facts

Well, I couldn't throw it out
I had to scream and shout
It all seems so unjust
But still I know I must
Before I turn to dust
I've got to throw it out
Before I turn to dust
I've got to throw it out

Well I couldn't throw it out
Oh, I couldn't throw it out

I'll sort through my possessions
In these painful sessions
I guess this is what it's about
The poems, cards and papers
The moldy musty vapors
I just gotta sort it out

Well I couldn't throw it out
Well I couldn't throw it out
Oh, I couldn't throw it out
I couldn't throw it out

[Theme song ends]

END TRANSCRIPT