DL Book Club: 'The Friday Afternoon Club' by Griffin Dunne
Just started it, and it's already juicy and fun. The prologue is about the night of Dominique's death and Griffin getting the call on two hours of sleep, still tasting cocaine in his throat. A few tidbits:
- Dominick Dunne's family grew up across the street from Katharine Hepburn's family. Despite their money and social position, they never spoke because the Protestant Hepburns didn't go for Catholicism.
- Dominick worked as a stage manager on the Howdy Doody show and would make Howdy suck himself off or pretend to fuck Howdy in the ass to get a laugh.
- Snobbish Dominick headed a group called Catholics Against Kennedy, but when they moved next door to the Lawfords and the Dunnes were not invited to a party featuring JFK and RFK, Dominick was green with envy.
- Young newlywed Elizabeth Montgomery was Griffin's nanny for a bit. She told his mother that baby Griffin's dick was bigger than her husband's.
- The Lana Turner murder happened around the corner from the Dunnes' Beverly Hills house. Dominick woke up in the middle of the night to see some of the spectacle, then went home and told his wife that Lana had stabbed her husband to death but that her daughter would claim responsibility to lessen the charge.
And we haven't even gotten to John Gregory Dunne and Aunt Joan Didion yet! Griffin is a fun writer.
Has anyone read this?
| by Anonymous | reply 9 | July 11, 2024 3:44 AM
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No interest? I'm farther along and it's pretty dishy:
- Dominick Dunne presented as bi at the end of his life but Griffin makes him sound gayer than a palm tree full of parrots. When Griffin wanted a collie to play with outside, his father got him two fwah-fwah French poodles and named them Oscar and Bosie (!).
- Dominick had had a Black and White Ball at their Beverly Hills house and spent a fortune on it. Truman Capote stayed all night and threw his own B&W Ball the following year in New York — leaving Dominick off the guest list.
- Dominick took Griffin to see The Boys in the Band at age 12. They waited until the lights went down to enter but Griffin remembers hearing gasps when the audience saw his tiny silhouette.
- Otto Preminger was tripping balls at a John Gregory Dunne party when he demanded a young Griffin sit with him all night: "You are the only pure soul at zis party!"
- Griffin and a friend stole his mother's car and went joyriding one night in the Hollywood hills. There was a huge roadblock with dozens of cop cars and he freaked, thinking his mother had sent out an alert. But he'd just happened on the Manson murders.
- Griffin was girl crazy but he had to know if he was secretly gay, so he went over to his father's house while Dominick was gone and his "valet" was there (the valet played the male stripper in The Boys in the Band). "Torey kicked me out of bed, not unkindly, after I'd let him do stuff to me and I'd done stuff to him, to no great effect. 'I hate to break this to you, Griffin,' Torey said as I put on my pants. 'I don't think you've got what it takes to be a homo.'"
| by Anonymous | reply 1 | July 3, 2024 1:06 AM
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[quote]But he'd just happened on the Manson murders.
I'm shocked he didn't claim to have been invited to the house that night like so many others have.
| by Anonymous | reply 2 | July 3, 2024 1:14 AM
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Personally, I'd kill to have Elizabeth Montgomery as my nanny.
| by Anonymous | reply 3 | July 3, 2024 1:17 AM
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I loved it. Here’s another takeaway: his mother invented the dance The Madison.
I was surprised Madonna only got one line.
| by Anonymous | reply 4 | July 3, 2024 1:18 AM
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I find it hard to believe LAPD or the LA sheriff’s department had the brains to set up a roadblock at the Tate homicide scene. They were worse than the Keystone cops.
| by Anonymous | reply 5 | July 10, 2024 8:45 PM
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SIX fucking threads on this book. It's probably more but I stopped counting after SIX fucking threads.
| by Anonymous | reply 6 | July 10, 2024 8:50 PM
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Liz Montgomery was a sexually liberated woman; I was surprised to hear things about her. She had affairs while she was married. But she’s okay with me…always loved her work.
| by Anonymous | reply 7 | July 10, 2024 10:05 PM
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[quote]When Griffin wanted a collie to play with outside, his father got him two fwah-fwah French poodles and named them Oscar and Bosie (!).
This is the gayest thing EVER.
| by Anonymous | reply 8 | July 10, 2024 10:13 PM
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Here you go OP, the best thread discussing Dunne and his book.
| by Anonymous | reply 9 | July 11, 2024 3:44 AM
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