The Air Mail Archive: Every weekly issue

Issue No. 239

February 10, 2024

TIME’S UP

Time Inc., once the publisher of the recently collapsed Sports Illustrated, was a bastion of journalistic excellence—and unlimited-expense-account excess. Why did it all turn so ugly?

SONGS FOR THE MOTHERLAND

The Kremlin has promised a competition to rival the Eurovision Song Contest in yet another attempt by Putin to turn one of Russia’s industries into a propaganda pawn

NEWS FLASH

The Messenger’s staff knew the eight-month-old, multi-million-dollar news site’s owner was arrogant and its business model shoddy at best, but even they couldn’t have predicted its sudden, violent downfall

Issue No. 238

February 3, 2024

TRIALS AND TRIBULATIONS

The gruesome murder of Jennifer Dulos, and the subsequent suicide of her accused husband, Fotis, rocked Connecticut. Now Fotis’s mistress is on trial—and might be the last hope for solving the crime

AN EMBARRASSMENT OF RICHES

Dmitry Rybolovlev, a Russian oligarch and one of the world’s richest men, accused Sotheby’s of helping to bilk him out of $380 million for the Salvator Mundi. Phoebe Eaton takes stock of his spectacular loss

SWAN DIVE

With Answered Prayers, Truman Capote thought he had written the Great American Novel. But its first installment, a skewering of his glamorous friends published in Esquire, put him on the fast track to social suicide, writes Sam Kashner

Issue No. 237

January 27, 2024

BIBI’S GUN

Benjamin Netanyahu’s wife bursts into secret government meetings, abuses her staff, and is involved in choosing Israel’s senior military chiefs. Yossi Melman and Dan Raviv ask: Is she a controlling diva or a wily political animal?

BONES OF CONTENTION

Yale’s most powerful secret society, which counts George W. Bush and Stephen Schwarzman as onetime members, is becoming less rich and less white—to the frustration of some of its rich, white alumni, reports William D. Cohan

LEGAL TENDER

Once idiosyncratic law firms such as Paul, Weiss have become soul-less, multi-national profit machines, writes Jeffrey Toobin, with partners cycling through firms faster than players through the George Steinbrenner–era Yankees

Issue No. 236

January 20, 2024

BAD SPORTS

The Ivy League has been willing to take strong stands on the issues of the day. But when Jewish athletes asked the schools to condemn anti-Semitism, they were met with silence, reports Johanna Berkman

CAPITAL CRIMES

Why did Netanyahu disband Israel’s elite anti-terror-financing task force when it knew Hamas was being sent hundreds of millions of dollars with which to build tunnels and buy rockets? Jennifer Gould follows the money

POST MORTEM

John Arlidge reveals how a TV drama forced politicians to focus on the Post Office scandal rocking Britain, in which hundreds of innocent people were accused of crimes they didn’t commit

Issue No. 235

January 13, 2024

FAME AND MISFORTUNE

When Ronald Reagan’s shooter revealed he’d attempted the assassination in order to impress Jodie Foster, the actress’s world descended into madness. Nancy Jo Sales talks with Foster about her fight for a normal life

MINORITY REPORT

Aggressive anti-Israel rhetoric among the Black community is prompting a number of Jews to respond in kind. David Christopher Kaufman cuts to the core of the simmering Black-Jewish hostility

SPANISH INQUISITION

A tell-all from an alleged ex has driven Queen Letizia of Spain and King Felipe VI’s William-and-Kate-esque marriage to the brink of tabloid hysteria, reports Joseph Bullmore

Issue No. 234

January 6, 2024

BARKING MAD

The only thing more difficult for agents to manage than celebrity pets—yes, somehow petfluencers are a thing now—is their drama-queen owners

SEXIST BEAST

Vladimir Putin is a misogynist at heart, but when it comes to punishing the women who defy him, he’s perfectly willing to give them the same treatment as male dissidents such as Alexei Navalny

THE GALLIC WARS

#MeToo has finally come for Gérard Depardieu, and ramped up France’s generational divide, with even President Emmanuel Macron taking sides

Issue No. 233

December 30, 2023

GRAFFITI WARS

Despite being directed by George Lucas and starring Harrison Ford, American Graffiti was almost killed by Universal Studios. Instead, it turned into a smash hit and paved the way for Star Wars

THE BEST OF THE WORST

It’s been a year of men, and women, behaving badly. But who was the vilest? From Elon Musk and Marjorie Taylor Greene to Donald Trump and Prince Harry, we hand out the Attention Whore of the Year Awards

STAR POWER

Little is known about the Michelin Guide, besides the fact that it deals in stars. Adam Hay-Nicholls uncovers its nebulous criteria—and reveals its plans to branch out into hotels

Issue No. 232

December 23, 2023

HELLO, GOODBYE

When Robert Altman re-invented the noir detective movie with The Long Goodbye, he needed a leading man who could capture the 70s Zeitgeist—and found him in a floundering Elliot Gould

FAKE IT TILL YOU MAKE IT

The world’s greatest art forger has been imprisoned twice. Now he’s going straight, selling his own work for tens of thousands of dollars, and offering wealthy patrons backups to their collections

BURNING MAN

How Serge Bromberg, the “Indiana Jones of lost film,” known for his obsessive restoration of Henri-Georges Clouzot’s masterpiece Inferno, ended up behind bars

Issue No. 231

December 16, 2023

SHOOTING THE MOON

While riding high off his Purple Rain superstardom, Prince decided to swap his guitar for a director’s chair. The result, Under the Cherry Moon, was panned by the press, perhaps unfairly

NO JOKE

Jews have often turned to comedy in the face of persecution. But the Israel-Hamas war is beyond any realm of humor, says a former Saturday Night Live writer

LARVAL TRUMP

Charles Leerhsen was Donald Trump’s ghostwriter in the 1980s. He dishes on the frustrating, unyielding, and surprisingly pitiable man he used to work for

Issue No. 230

December 9, 2023

AN IVY LEAGUE OF ITS OWN

Harvard’s administration is teetering as anti-Semitic attacks, pro-Palestinian die-ins, and accusations of hate speech rock the campus. Johanna Berkman reports from Cambridge

RUSSIAN HOARDS

Andrew Ryvkin reveals that the greatest heist of the 21st century is taking place right now, as Russia plunders Ukraine’s museums, galleries, and historical sites of their gold and relics

DEATH IN VENICE

In Italy, the murder of a female student has resulted in protests up and down the country. Elena Clavarino asks: Will a rising generation be able to stop violence against women?

Issue No. 229

December 2, 2023

BATTLE OF THE SEXES

In the weeks before Hamas terrorists murdered 1,200 Israelis and kidnapped hundreds more, Israel’s largely female border guards sounded the alarm—and were ignored by their all-male commanders

A DUPLEX LIFE

Alice Mason, who just turned 100, was not only a New York social force; she was the real-estate agent for everyone from Marilyn Monroe to Jimmy Carter. She was also hiding a major secret

PRESENT PERFECT

Our Holiday Gift Guide for Women is here! Shopping for the discerning woman who has everything? Ina Garten, Kaitlin Phillips, and Lauren Hutton are here to help

Issue No. 228

November 25, 2023

PLANNED PARENTHOOD

Jensen Davis investigates the brutal, cultish parenting program that teaches evangelical Christians how to beat their children into submission

SOCKS AWAY!

Our Holiday Gift Guide for Men is here! Inspiring, carefully curated, and just glorious ideas for the menfolk in your life

THE GODFATHER OF FILMMAKING

As a young film-school graduate, Francis Ford Coppola helped open the film-studio gates for Scorsese, Lucas, and Spielberg

Issue No. 227

November 18, 2023

DESPERATELY SEEKING BARBRA

Barbra Streisand’s memoir is full of glitz, glamour, and name-dropping—spanning 992 pages. Thanks to AIR MAIL’s exclusive, unauthorized index, you can now zip right to where you need to go!

CAVEAT EMPEROR

Ridley Scott’s Napoleon is Barbie for men, writes Air Mail’s Co-Editor Alessandra Stanley, a glorious toy-soldier fantasy that ignores the emperor’s feats of statesmanship, including what he did for Jews

SOMETHING FISHY

When the hot, young art dealer Alberto Fis branched out into the high-end-sushi-restaurant business, the result left a bad taste in everyone’s mouth, reports Elena Clavarino, in a story of omakase, impersonation, and fraud

Issue No. 226

November 11, 2023

London Feels

Our special issue is devoted to that ever changing constant that always punches above its weight

It Brits

Our list of the 25 young Londoners reshaping the city in their image

See You Next Tuesday

Only one word separates the U.S. from the U.K., explains Hannah Betts

Issue No. 225

November 4, 2023

Next-Gen Woes

Imagine trying to understand one of the most complex geopolitical issues in all of human history through TikTok. That’s what millennial and Gen Z progressives are trying to do, says Kat Rosenfield

TRIALS OF HIS LIFE

Roberto Saviano, the exiled author of Gomorrah, looks at his fellow countryman the filmmaker Pier Paolo Pasolini, who was persecuted for his art and his sexuality

VOCAL FRIED

Sam Bankman-Fried’s biggest gamble so far—and he gambled a lot—was taking the witness stand this week. Whether due to ego or desperation, it couldn’t save him from the jury’s definitive verdict

Issue No. 224

October 28, 2023

UNDER THE IRON DOME

In Israel, people are acting normal, but there’s no hiding the fact that the country is at war. Sirens are sounding, pictures of hostages are everywhere, and hundreds of thousands of reservists have been called up

ARTFUL DODGERS

The dynastic, art-dealing Wildenstein family are in peril of losing something almost as cherished as their vast fortune: their secrecy

IMMORTAL BELOVED

Cazzie David is seeking inspiration from the world’s longest-lived communities to ensure she makes it to 100. But how can she live long and prosper when she’s trapped in L.A.?

Issue No. 223

October 21, 2023

TALES FROM THE CRYPTO

Jacob Silverman reports from the trial of Sam Bankman-Fried, where the revelations of excess ($1.3 billion in celebrity endorsements!) and incompetence (no C.F.O.!) just keep coming

LOSING THE PLOT

A creator of the hit Israeli TV thriller Fauda reveals what happened after the show’s writers predicted the terrorist attacks that rocked the country

ZERO DARK HINDSIGHT

With another war looming in the Middle East—and the Taliban now propped up by the West—Lynne O’Donnell reflects on how little politicians learned from America’s intervention in Afghanistan

Issue No. 222

October 14, 2023

THE CON, THE GRIFT, AND THE TWIST

It’s a story as old as the Internet: an exotic beauty rips off an unassuming man of apparent means—until, suddenly, he turns on her, and it’s impossible to tell who the bigger grifter is

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

The Mossad was thought to be one of the world’s most sophisticated intelligence agencies until last Saturday’s attack on Israel. The ongoing question rattling Israelis: How did Hamas outwit them?

RUMOR CAMPAIGN

Jeffrey Toobin digs into R.F.K. Jr.’s troubled past and finds that the conspiracy-theorizing presidential hopeful once tried to frame two innocent men for murder

Issue No. 221

October 7, 2023

KISSING COUSINS

In eastern Paris, a 200-year-old religious cult’s nearly 4,000 members all hail from one of only eight families, relying on incest and ironclad secrecy to remain alive

WELLINGTON’S WATERLOO

In Florida’s ritziest horse town, the only people more competitive than power players’ show-jumping daughters are the real-estate developers who want to take it over

WITNESS PROTECTION

In the latest installment of his series on the Idaho student murders, Howard Blum tracks down a victim’s grief-stricken father as the alleged killer’s trial is postponed

Issue No. 220

September 30, 2023

NADINE (IS IT YOU?)

Introducing the second Mrs. Bob Menendez, the gold-loving, Chanel-wearing, Beirut-born bombshell the senator met in a New Jersey IHOP

MEN’S SEX AND THE CITY

Why is it that boyfriends and husbands think many times a day about the Roman Empire? Flora Gill looks at the rise and fall of the male mind

TO LASH A THIEF

Rédoine Faïd, the bank robber and jewel thief who daringly escaped from prison twice, is now on trial in Paris. But he is still a flight risk

Issue No. 219

September 23, 2023

Laws of Nature

From Sacramento, Alessandra Stanley suggests that the only way to really stop global warming is through litigation … and lots of it!

Fighting Words

From New York, Tom Wolfe’s daughter remembers her father as being gentle and amicable, except when it came to literary battles with his “Three Stooges”: John Updike, John Irving, and Norman Mailer …

Writing Wrongs

From Vermont, Kat Rosenfield reveals how Bennington College—the alma mater of Bret Easton Ellis and Donna Tartt—is being torn apart by a spat in its legendary writing program …

Issue No. 218

September 16, 2023

A Man In Full

From New York, Peter Stevenson and George Gurley recount the life and times of Tom Wolfe, the great chronicler of American social mores who, five years after his death, is roaring back into the public consciousness

Page Burner

From Scandinavia, Guy Walters argues that the recent spate of Koran burning in Norway, Sweden, and Denmark isn’t necessarily a sign that those countries are growing less liberal

Elon Agonistes

From Billionaires’ Row, Elon Musk biographer Walter Isaacson reveals the source of the entrepreneur’s “demon mode,” and his journey from being bullied in the playground to being bully-in-chief of X

Issue No. 217

September 9, 2023

Remembering Jimmy Buffett

From Margaritaville, the late King of the Parrotheads is recalled as a man who loved life and lived his songs, by friends including Bono and Tom Freston

Dress Code

From New York, James Wolcott takes a walk on the wild side with a history of drag, from Warhol’s hot messes to the current vibe shift against cross-dressing and gender-bending

Hard Times

From the newsroom, Adam Nagourney reveals how The New York Times dealt with the world-shaping events of 9/11—and how those events in turn shaped the paper’s future

Issue No. 216

September 2, 2023

Hot Water

From Nantucket, Clara Molot reports on the climate activists who gate-crashed a fundraiser for Massachusetts governor Maura Healey and were physically threatened by the liberal donors in attendance

Singing the Blue

From Virginia, Diana B. Henriques says that liberal critics of Oliver Anthony’s MAGA-beloved hit country song, “Rich Men North of Richmond,” have got it all wrong

Desperately Seeking Sinatra

From New York, New Journalism legend Gay Talese recalls going deep into Frank Sinatra’s shady inner circle, in part two of our exclusive excerpt from his new memoir

Issue No. 215

August 26, 2023

Forest Grumps

From California, William D. Cohan reports on the drama at Bohemian Grove, the ultra-secretive, all-male campground beloved by Bill Gates and Clarence Thomas

Hunting Ol’ Blue Eyes

From New York, literary legend Gay Talese describes the painstaking reporting involved in his most acclaimed magazine piece, “Frank Sinatra Has a Cold,” in an exclusive excerpt from his new memoir

Barb-arians at the Gate

From Hollywood, Stuart Heritage contemplates the truly terrifying consequences of Barbie’s box-office success

Issue No. 214

August 19, 2023

Up, Up, and Away

From the editors’ desk, Graydon Carter and Alessandra Stanley unveil AIR MAIL’s reimagined Arts Intel Report, our one-of-a-kind resource for the discerning world traveler

Death and Taxes

From New York, Johanna Berkman chronicles how the financier Leon Black thought he could avoid paying more than $1 billion in taxes—with the help of his friend Jeffrey Epstein—in part two of her exclusive investigation

Dirt Digger

From the courtroom, Jack Crosbie reveals the identity of Sam Bankman-Fried’s private investigator, whose previous clients include O. J. Simpson, Ghislaine Maxwell, and John Gotti Jr.

Issue No. 213

August 12, 2023

Below the Law

From Washington, D.C., Jeffrey Toobin reveals how a midlife crisis transformed the lawyer Kenneth Chesebro, a mild-mannered “nerd among nerds,” into Co-Conspirator 5, the mastermind behind Trump’s fake-elector plot

Death of a Master

From Hollywood, Graydon Carter hymns the protean originality of the late filmmaker William Friedkin, who could be exceptionally charming, or charmingly cantankerous, depending on the day

Nocturnal Animals

From downtown, Jake Malooley unveils an eye-opening oral history of After Hours—the black comedy that revived Martin Scorsese’s career—featuring Griffin Dunne, Catherine O’Hara, and Scorsese himself