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March 8, 2025
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No. 295
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In This Week’s Issue
REVERSE-NIXON

Might Donald Trump’s public dressing down of Volodymyr Zelensky have been intended to repair relations with Russia and put China on their back foot, Richard Nixon–style?

A ROYAL PAIN

Spare yourself the agony of watching countless hours of Meghan Markle on-screen—read our rundown of With Love, Meghan instead …

FIT FOR A KING

Two descendants of Louis XIV and a great-great-great-nephew of Napoleon believe it’s high time for France to revert from a republic to a monarchy—and that one of them should run it …

ELECTRIC SHOCK

Although Tesla’s target consumers used to be the liberal and environmentally conscious, Elon Musk’s recent far-right turn has his old devotees trading in their sedans and Cybertrucks …

FOR THEIR EYES ONLY

On the heels of the Broccoli family’s relinquishing of the James Bond franchise to Amazon, a 007 insider dishes on the casting of Timothy Dalton, Pierce Brosnan, and Daniel Craig …

THE YEAR OF MAGICAL WATCHING

While researching her book on Joan Didion and Hollywood, Alissa Wilkinson discovered the writer’s early, little-known, and highly irreverent movie columns …

ARISTO-CATS

More than 60 years after Luchino Visconti’s The Leopard premiered, young Italian royalty in the form of Deva Cassel—daughter of Monica Bellucci—stars in a new adaptation of Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa’s Sicilian epic …

BUT, WAIT, THERE’S MORE!

Andy Borowitz on Trump’s U.K. visit … a timely new book explores Europe’s influence on world history … our dispatches from the Vienna balls and the Rio Carnival … David Johansen, remembered … Geoffrey Rush’s favorite things … this month’s best mysteries … Who was this week’s biggest Attention Whore?

But First …
Issue No. 295

The View from Here Is Donald Trump doing a “Reverse-Nixon”? (It’s even worse than it sounds)

By George Pendle
Read On
Barry Blitt’s Sketchbook
Royal Follies

The Men Who Would Be King Although most of France has moved on from the Revolution of 1789, there is a pocket of French society that yearns for the return of a monarch. But who should it be?

By Saskia Solomon
Read On
Film and Television

Not Our Jam Of all the problems plaguing the new Netflix series With Love, Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex’s fixation on jam is only the beginning

By Stuart Heritage
Photo illustration by Chop Choppish Shop
Read On
Hell on Wheels

Wild Ride Tesla used to be the car of choice for virtue-signaling Democrats. Now, as liberals all over the world are unloading their “Swasticars,” will the Fox News set fill the void?

By Simon Mills
Read On
Air Supply

Spring Breakers

Whether your spring break is family-friendly or adults only, AIR SUPPLY is here to make it fabulous and flattering
Shop
Photo: Kourken Pakchanian/Condé Nast/Getty Images (Bahamas scene)
Guest Edit

Alison Loehnis’s Favorite Things The ad interim C.E.O. of Net-a-Porter and president of Yoox Net-a-Porter knows the luxury market. Here, she shares her go-tos

Shop
007 Woes

A Broken Bond Choosing the new James Bond is no longer in the hands of seasoned 007 casting director Debbie McWilliams but, rather, Amazon’s tech bros. What could go wrong?

By Jonathan Dean
Read On
T.G.I.S.

The Attention-Whore Index R.F.K. Jr. embraces the measles, Marco Rubio gets the needle, and Donald Trump causes more upheaval

Read On
Best
SPARKLE Graff It took only 6,000 hours and 2,305 diamonds to create Graff’s latest high jewelry masterpiece, but the Gift of Love—as this… WEAR Burberry The sublime coats unveiled by designer Daniel Lee at the Burberry show in London a couple of weeks ago were enough to… takeout Jōji Box For commuters rushing through Grand Central in search of a quick, quality bite, Jōji Box offers a Michelin-starred sushi… READ The Believer What about fly-fishing lends itself so naturally to literature? Consider the genre: Norman Maclean’s A River Runs Through It,… STAMP Ex-libris One of life’s greatest pleasures is collecting books—and one of life’s greatest tragedies is lending a favorite read to a friend, only for… READ Creep A young British writer’s real-life experience working as a house cleaner in London gave way to Emma van Straaten’s debut novel… SPARKLE Graff It took only 6,000 hours and 2,305 diamonds to create Graff’s latest high jewelry masterpiece, but the Gift of Love—as this… WEAR Burberry The sublime coats unveiled by designer Daniel Lee at the Burberry show in London a couple of weeks ago were enough to… takeout Jōji Box For commuters rushing through Grand Central in search of a quick, quality bite, Jōji Box offers a Michelin-starred sushi… READ The Believer What about fly-fishing lends itself so naturally to literature? Consider the genre: Norman Maclean’s A River Runs Through It,… STAMP Ex-libris One of life’s greatest pleasures is collecting books—and one of life’s greatest tragedies is lending a favorite read to a friend, only for… READ Creep A young British writer’s real-life experience working as a house cleaner in London gave way to Emma van Straaten’s debut novel…
Small Talk

King Charles’s Trump Card “Sorry, chap, you’ve got to take one for the team”: the monarch announced that he is downgrading Trump’s state visit to a Pizza Express lunch with Prince Andrew

By Andy Borowitz
Read On
Inside Story

Joan Didion, Movie Critic Among the opinions unearthed in her Vogue film columns? She didn’t care for Billy Wilder, had little time for classics such as Casablanca, and was bored by Sidney Lumet

By Alissa Wilkinson
Read On
Literary Classics

Princes, Palaces, and Pasta The Leopard, Giuseppe Tomasi’s sensual novel about the 19th-century Italian aristocracy—made into a movie by Luchino Visconti—gets a second reincarnation as a Netflix drama

By Lucy Hughes-Hallett
Read On
Listen

“Spermageddon” and the Male-Fertility Crisis On this week’s podcast, Linda Wells reveals what men need to do to increase their odds of becoming a father

Read On
Society

Let Them Eat Cake Europe is in crisis, but you’d never know it in Vienna, where the upper classes are preoccupied with balls of all persuasions

By Harrison Vail
Read On
Open Book

Journey to Italy Five years ago, a Roman photographer set out on his version of Goethe’s Italian Journey. The results of the tour, which took him from Naples to Ponza to Positano, are collected in a new coffee-table book

15
A garden in Castel Gandolfo, Italy, photographed by Manfredi Gioacchini.
Inside the Villa Farnese, in Caprarola.
Inside Museo Casa Mollino, the former apartment of the late architect Carlo Mollino, in Turin.
Another view of Villa Farnese.
Inside the Rocchetta Mattei, a fortress near Bologna.
A mural outside Villa Emo, in Fanzolo.
A sculpture at Villa San Michele in Anacapri.
Top, the stage of the Teatro Olimpico, a theater in Vicenza; above, the Grand Canal in Venice.
Inside the Basilica di San Francesco, a church in Assisi.
The view from Villa d’Este, on Lake Como.
Sculptures outside Villa San Michele.
The ceiling of Cappella di San Brizio, a chapel in Orvieto.
Inside the Giardini La Mortella, a botanical garden on Ischia.
A view of the Chiesa di Santa Maria della Pietà, a church in Calascio.
Inside Palazzo Spinola, a palace in Genoa.
Read On
After Dark

Livin’ la Vida Bloc-a Inside the exclusive soirée that kicks off Rio de Janeiro’s caipirinha-fueled Carnival celebrations—before merging with the city’s blocos, or street parties

By Elena Clavarino
Read On
Books
Clifford Krauss On

Remaking the World: European Distinctiveness and the Transformation of Politics, Culture, and the Economy

by Jerrold Seigel
Read On
Small Talk
“To find the body, we are sending out joggers, dogwalkers, and kids playing Frisbee to stumble upon it in a formulaic but gripping manner.”
“To find the body, we are sending out joggers, dogwalkers, and kids playing Frisbee to stumble upon it in a formulaic but gripping manner.”
Murder, They Wrote

Deadly Pleasures to Read and Watch Books on a female assassin team and a villain in a league of his own, plus the latest season of a hit British spy thriller

By Lisa Henricksson
Read On
Highlight
A model of Kyoto’s 18th-century Sa-an Teahouse, now being reconstructed at Japan House London.

Knocking on Wood

In December 2020, UNESCO added an ancient art form to its list of humanity’s intangible cultural heritage—“the traditional skills, techniques and knowledge for the conservation and transmission of wooden architecture in Japan.” The move was a response to a crisis facing the hallowed culture of Japanese woodworking. A quarter-century had passed since the country mourned the death of its greatest miyadaiku, or master carpenter of temples and shrines. READ ON

Read On
Close-up

Luca Pronzato The Parisian chef, a Noma alum, is merging fine dining and design with a new pop-up restaurant

By Elena Clavarino
Read On
Great Lives

The Godfather of Punk As the glam lead singer of the New York Dolls, David Johansen changed music forever

By Legs McNeil
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David Johansen and Jayne County, 1975.
The New York Dolls in Amsterdam, 1973. From left, Arthur Kane, Johansen, Johnny Thunders, Sylvain Sylvain, and Jerry Nolan.
The group outside Gem Spa, on New York City’s St. Mark’s Place.
Johansen, as Buster Poindexter, and Cyndi Lauper, 1989.
Top, Johansen at the opening of his art show “Saints and Sinners” at Ricco/Maresca Gallery, in New York City, 2003; above, with the New York Dolls onstage in Amsterdam, 1973.
Onstage with the New York Dolls in 1973.
With the New York Dolls, 1973.
The New York Dolls on the BBC music showcase The Old Grey Whistle Test.
Johansen in 1978.
Top, Joan Jett, Deborah Harry, Johansen, and Joey Ramone during a shoot for Punk magazine, 1977; above, Johansen and his wife Mara Hennessey at an anti-Trump protest in 2018.
Johansen in 2009.
The New York Dolls in 1974. From left, Kane, Nolan, Johansen, Sylvain, and Thunders.
Johansen serves as the marshall of Coney Island’s Mermaid Parade, 2005.
As Buster Poindexter, 1989.
Read On
Small Talk
The Perfect Ending

Geoffrey Rush

The Emmy-, Tony-, and Academy Award–winning actor answers 40 of life’s most pressing questions
Read On
Ruby Wright’s Sketchbook
My preferred après-ski activity is to sketch other skiers who have also forgone the slopes in favor of a sit-down. And I’m impressed by anyone who is confident enough to down half a bottle of champagne before attempting the final descent of the day.
Is Edited By

Graydon Carter and Alessandra Stanley

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Columnists

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OUR CHIEF OPERATING OFFICER AND CHIEF MARKETING OFFICER ARE

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In Memoriam

Peter Bogdanovich Duncan Hannah Douglas McGrath Richard David Story André Leon Talley David Yaffe

Issue No. 295
March 8, 2025
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Issue No. 295
March 8, 2025
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