Mrs. Astor Regrets Read online

  Mrs. Astor Regrets

  The Hidden Betrayals of a Family Beyond Reproach

  Meryl Gordon

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Table of Contents

  ...

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Contents

  Prologue: Trial by Tabloid

  1. The Astor 100

  2. A Little Night Music

  3. Disaster for Mrs. Astor

  4. "I Married a Terrible Man"

  5. An American Romance

  6. White-Glove Philanthropy

  7. The Perils of Charlene

  8. The Painting Vanishes

  9. The Treacherous Codicils

  10. "I Didn't Know It Would Be Armageddon"

  11. Blue-Blood Battle

  12. The Art of Shunning

  13. A Wonderful Life

  14. Family Plot

  15. The People v. Anthony Marshall

  Epilogue: A Sunset in Maine

  ...

  Acknowledgments

  Notes

  Bibliography

  MARINER BOOKS

  HOUGHTON MIFFLIN HARCOURT

  Boston • New York

  First Mariner Books edition 2009

  Copyright © 2008 by Meryl Gordon

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

  For information about permission to reproduce selections from this book,

  write to Permissions, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company,

  215 Park Avenue South, New York, New York 10003.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Gordon, Meryl.

  Mrs. Astor regrets : the hidden betrayals of a family beyond reproach /

  Meryl Gordon.

  p. cm.

  Includes bibliographical references and index.

  ISBN 978-0-618-89373-7 (alk. paper)

  1. Astor, Brooke. 2. Socialites—New York (State)—New York—Biography.

  3. Philanthropists—New York (State)—New York—Biography.

  4. New York (N.Y.)—Biography. I. Title.

  CT275.A847G67 2008

  974.7'043092—dc22 [B] 2008034893

  ISBN 978-0-547-24798-4 (pbk.)

  Book design by Melissa Lotfy

  Printed in the United States of America

  DOC 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  To Walter

  Now more than ever

  To my parents

  Adventurous, passionate, supportive

  Contents

  Prologue: Trial by Tabloid [>]

  1. The Astor 100 [>]

  2. A Little Night Music [>]

  3. Disaster for Mrs. Astor [>]

  4. "I Married a Terrible Man" [>]

  5. An American Romance [>]

  6. White-Glove Philanthropy [>]

  7. The Perils of Charlene [>]

  8. The Painting Vanishes [>]

  9. The Treacherous Codicils [>]

  10. "I Didn't Know It Would Be Armageddon" [>]

  11. Blue-Blood Battle [>]

  12. The Art of Shunning [>]

  13. A Wonderful Life [>]

  14. Family Plot [>]

  15. The People v. Anthony Marshall [>]

  Epilogue: A Sunset in Maine [>]

  Acknowledgments [>]

  Notes [>]

  Bibliography [>]

  Prologue: Trial by Tabloid

  WHEN GOD CREATED TABLOIDS, that Tuesday after Thanksgiving was surely the kind of day he had in mind. On the morning of November 27, 2007, New York City's two leading practitioners of that irreverent style of newspapering were thirsty for blue blood. Though the New York Times maintained judicious restraint, both the Post and the Daily News bannered the latest twist in the most talked-about high-society scandal in years, the saga of the late Brooke Astor and her only child, Anthony Marshall. She was, of course, the glamorous socialite and philanthropist who had transformed herself, thanks to cranky Vincent Astor's charming fortune, into a beloved philanthropist and influential American icon.

  Her son, a clubbable war hero, former ambassador, and award-winning Broadway producer, had been transformed at age eighty-three from the epitome of WASP rectitude to a handcuffed suspect facing an eighteen-count indictment. Tony Marshall's fall from grace was abetted by his mother, his son, his attorney (who was charged in the same indictment), and the tabloids (which were just doing their thing). Charged with grand larceny, falsifying business records, conspiracy, and possession of stolen property, Marshall was looking at the specter of a quarter-century behind bars. "BAD BOY," scolded the News. "CROOK ASTOR," snarled the Post.

  The headlines referred to his alleged scheme to swindle his mother's millions from her favored cultural institutions (including the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the New York Public Library) into his own accounts. But the case was always as much about family as it was about money. It began sixteen months earlier with the seismic jolt from charges by Tony Marshall's son Philip, a college professor, who alleged that his 104-year-old grandmother had descended from Park Avenue splendor to gentrified squalor (despite eight squabbling servants). Taken up with lynch-mob ferocity by the tabloids were such allegations as Tony's seemingly selfish refusal to allow his mother to visit her country estate, his inexplicable sale of her favorite painting, and the claim that Mrs. Astor (yes, Mrs. Astor) was spending her declining days lying on a dog-urine-stained couch.

  So began this upper-crust reality soap opera. Here in a nouveau riche age was America's true aristocracy, the arbiters of society, the twenty-first century's link to the New York of Edith Wharton and Henry James. But in this world of emeralds and Astors, things were not always what they seemed. Resentments seethed just below the surface, and ambition was cloaked in polished manners. The hired help, from the butler to the social secretary to Mrs. Astor's nurses, would be drawn into the fray, testing their loyalty and discretion.

  Past and present intertwined during the final reels of the Brooke Astor story, harking back to her failures as a mother and to the girl she had been, a teenage bride married off to a dashing millionaire whose acts of violence would haunt her for more than eighty years. This family drama involved a son whose mother, father, and succession of stepfathers left him with no sense of how a loving parent might behave. And then there was the money, nearly $200 million, a ruthless American fortune built on the lust for fur pelts and Manhattan real estate.

  At 7:58 A.M., Tony Marshall arrived at the Manhattan district attorney's office at One Hogan Place to turn himself in. White-haired and courtly, he wore a dark, well-tailored suit with his Marine Corps tie and clasp, clinging defiantly to these symbols of accomplishment and propriety. In the grim squad room on the ninth floor, Marshall was given paperwork to fill out—the business of being arrested. With its fluorescent lights, beat-up furniture, stacked water-cooler bottles, and jail cell with rusted metal bars, this setting must have seemed a harsh rebuke to a man accustomed to antiques, fine art, and regularly freshened floral arrangements.

  In the upper reaches of society, it is not enough to acquire wealth; it must be protected from interlopers, some of whom are family members. As a young man in his twenties, Tony Marshall made his first court appearance, nearby in another Foley Square building, when his biological father unsuccessfully sued him in an effort to wrest away Tony's trust fund. Brooke Astor had been taken to court over money as well, battling to protect her full share of Vincent Astor's millions and fend off claims from one of her husband's aggrieved family members.

  But these squabbles had been mere civil matters, quarrels among family members without the involvement of the authorities. Tony Marshall was handcuffed when detectives escorted him downstairs for his mug shot and fingerprinting. The latter proved surprisingly complica
ted. Modern fingerprinting machines are not calibrated for aging digits, which leave indistinct markings. Several attempts were made before the detectives finally resorted to the ink method. Back in the squad room, Marshall was offered a nutrition bar, orange juice, and a banana, but declined. A member of the Knickerbocker Club, the New York Racquet Club, and the Brook Club, on a normal day he would have been lunching among the city's elite.

  By the time he was paraded in full perp-walk fashion across the street to the courthouse at 111 Centre Street, his face was ashen and his hair disheveled. Here was another photo opportunity in the unrehearsed spectacle of New York, seized on by the mobs of cameramen and journalists who had been staking out the building for six hours, eager to capture Tony Marshall's downfall in time for the news at five. A news vendor hawking a stack of newspapers yelled out, "The rich stealing from the rich, find out what happened." Spying the defendant, the vendor cried out, "Mr. Marshall, why did you do it? Do you have anything to say?"

  Walking slowly into the courtroom, Tony appeared to have aged dramatically in just a few hours, the portrait of Dorian Gray. His alarmed wife, Charlene, hurried up the aisle and wrapped her arms around him, covering his face with kisses. As she ran her hands through his mussed hair, Tony wiped tears from his eyes. Grasping his arm in support, Charlene walked down the aisle by his side, repeating, "We'll be okay, we'll be okay." Moments later he joined his lawyers at the wooden table and faced Justice A. Kirke Bartley, Jr., a former prosecutor known for trying mob boss John Gotti.

  Rising to her feet as the hearing began, the prosecutor Elizabeth Loewy solemnly told the judge, "Despite his mother's generosity when she was well, he used his position of trust to steal from her." Handed a copy of the indictment accusing him of fraud, conspiracy, and theft, Tony Marshall read through it slowly, as if having trouble comprehending the words. When asked to respond to the charges, he whispered, "Not guilty."

  Three months earlier, at the age of 105, Brooke Astor had passed away at her Westchester country home, Holly Hill. For nearly a century she had presented herself to the world as a woman with a good-natured and witty persona, keeping her secrets and sorrows at bay. But as her life began to draw to a close, her dreams grew more vivid and disturbing; imaginary intruders pursued her. In her last year, she was dangerously fragile and afflicted with a Merck Manual of ailments. A voracious reader and the author of four books, she had lost the ability to speak in full sentences but could still communicate using gestures or facial expressions. Each morning the nurses would hold up a choice of outfits (mostly from Eileen Fisher) and Mrs. Astor would point to indicate her preference. "She could make her will known," says her social worker, Lois Orlin. "If she didn't want something or she liked something, you could tell." Even near the end, keeping up appearances still mattered, as she clung to her sense of dignity.

  As Brooke drifted through the days, gazing idly out the picture windows at the trees and gardens of her estate, her staff devised ways to remind her of the glory of her life and past good times. A favorite tactic was propping up on a lectern the photo album with pictures from Brooke's one hundredth birthday party. "She really loved them," recalls her physical therapist, Sandra Foschi. "She looked in closely." The staff paged quickly past the photographs of Tony and Charlene, fearful that Mrs. Astor might find the sight upsetting. Sometimes Brooke would smile in recognition of the faces of her friends. Other times, overcome with memories, she would weep. "It was very emotional for her," says Foschi. "She would tear up, she would hang her head down. It brought great joy but also great sadness."

  Perhaps her reaction reflected change and loss. But maybe in some corner of her mind she sensed the troubles that were tearing apart the family that she had come to care about too late.

  1. The Astor 100

  THE SMALL WHITE NOTECARD was a whisper of understatement, its simplicity suggesting how unlikely it was that anyone would forget this particular invitation: "Mr. David Rockefeller expects you on Saturday, March 30th for Dinner at 7 P.M. The Playhouse. Black Tie." The New York Times later took the unusual step of printing both a partial list of invitees to this evening at Kykuit, the sprawling Rockefeller estate in Pocantico Hills, New York, and the names of those who had sent their regrets. Those unfortunates who had not made the cut were faced not only with the original humiliation but a second reminder in a very public place.

  The luster of the evening stemmed from the honored guest and the occasion. Brooke Astor was celebrating her one hundredth birthday on March 30, 2002. Thanks to Vincent Astor's largesse, she had made herself indispensable in New York's five boroughs, using his foundation's millions to help revive the New York Public Library, create a serene Chinese courtyard at the Metropolitan Museum, underwrite an expansion at the Bronx Zoo, preserve historic Harlem houses, and endow innumerable worthy causes.

  She had married well, but her real accomplishment had been taking a storied but fading American name and adding luster to it, rebranding the Astor image with a newfound glamour and respect. "She took on the Astor Foundation and made it something to be proud of," says Viscount William Astor, the head of the British branch of the family and her cousin by marriage. "She did a lot for my family's name and reputation in America."

  The daughter of a Marine Corps general and a status-obsessed southern belle, Roberta Brooke Russell was bred to ascend to the highest ranks of society. Her ambitious mother, Mabel, tutored her in the art of flirtation, pulled her out of Washington's Madeira School for fear that she was becoming too intellectual, and married her off at the age of seventeen to the heir of a New Jersey fortune, John Dryden Kuser. "Mrs. Russell was a very material-minded woman," says Louis Auchincloss, the novelist, who knew both mother and daughter. "She spent her life in the Marine Corps without any money at all. She wanted to set Brooke up, certainly persuaded her to do it."

  That early marriage produced, in 1924, Brooke's only child, Tony. But Dryden Kuser turned out to be an alcoholic with a dangerous temper and a penchant for adultery. He left his young family for another woman, and Brooke headed to Reno in 1930 to obtain a divorce. Her second marriage, to Charles "Buddie" Marshall, a socially connected stockbroker with middling financial means, was more successful. The former first lady Nancy Reagan recalls, "Buddie was the love of her life." But at age fifty, Brooke was suddenly widowed and went on to beat her Social Register contemporaries at their own game.

  A mere six months after Buddie Marshall's funeral, in November 1952, Brooke received a marriage proposal from Vincent Astor. Whether she chased him or he set out to win her remains a matter of dispute, although Brooke admitted later that her primary motivation for her marriage in 1953 was financial security. "She always said Vincent was difficult. I don't think she ever loved him," says Barbara Walters, a close friend, recalling Brooke's account of the marriage. "But she did respect him and did her best to make him happy."

  When the moody and possessive Astor died at age sixty-seven, a mere five and a half years later, Brooke Astor was left with a famous surname, an intense desire for liberation from a claustrophobic existence, and a trust fund of more than $60 million. Luxury was hers for life. Her forty-two-person staff included a social secretary to manage her schedule, a French maid to choose her wardrobe, a chauffeur kept busy day and night, a French chef to create delicacies for her dinner parties, a butler, and seven gardeners, all to attend to her needs on Park Avenue and at her country homes in Northeast Harbor, Maine, and Briarcliff Manor, New York.

  After a lifetime of being an accessory to men, she hungered for meaningful work and the chance to be valued on her own merits. With the well-endowed Astor Foundation, she shrewdly turned herself into a celebrated philanthropist and a sought-after social arbiter. The ability to dispense millions made her popular and powerful, and Mrs. Astor reveled in her long-running starring role, savoring the accolades.

  "She always wanted to be in the limelight," says Philippe de Montebello, the director of the Metropolitan Museum, who fondly recalls Mrs. Astor's regal need to b
e paid her due. "At a cocktail party, if you were paying too little attention to her, she noticed and she let you know. She would regularly arrive one minute late at all our board meetings to make sure that everyone noticed the grand entrance." Brooke Astor was a narcissist, but a beguiling one, admired and admiring, good-hearted in her deeds and her public persona. "She was terrified of boredom," de Montebello adds. "So she arranged not to be bored."

  Mrs. Astor—an instantly recognizable lady in white gloves, an ornate hat, pearls, and a diamond pin—became a symbol of aristocratic beneficence over the course of four decades. No stranger to Harlem and Bedford-Stuyvesant before gentrification, she supported programs for summer education for Puerto Rican teenagers, gave money to Catholic Charities to maintain a residence for the elderly, and paid for equipment for the Knickerbocker Drum and Bugle Corps. Instead of just writing checks, she went out to see how her money was being spent and to meet the recipients. Her involvement in a cause was the equivalent of the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval. "It always really helped to say the Astor Foundation is one of your backers," recalls Peg Breen, the president of the Landmarks Conservancy. "The reaction was, 'If Brooke Astor thinks this is a good idea..." Howard Phipps, the veteran president of the Wildlife Conservancy, adds, "Once Brooke began giving major grants to the zoo, others followed. We named an elephant after her, and when baby Astor died, she was very upset."

  At night Mrs. Astor turned her home into an elite salon where big ideas were discussed and connections were made. Bending the rules with her guest lists, she mixed the school chancellor with a curator, society ladies with an up-and-coming movie producer, an acclaimed writer with a Wall Street upstart or a venerated politician. Vernon Jordan, the civil rights leader and Clinton confidant, recalls meeting her in the early 1970s; soon he was a regular at her table in an era when Park Avenue dinners were not integrated. Mrs. Astor did not require a Mayflower genealogy or an eight-figure bank balance. The ticket to admission was being accomplished, interesting, and fun. "The worst thing she could say about someone was, 'He was a dud,'" recalls Linda Gilles, the executive director of the Astor Foundation, who often got the morning-after report from Mrs. Astor about her dinners. "The best thing was, 'He's got plenty to say.'" Mrs. Astor expected amusement and witty banter with cocktails. Her dutiful son was a quiet fixture at her larger parties. Brooke would sometimes complain that he was "boring," although he was widely perceived as conducting himself with aplomb. As Nancy Kissinger recalls, "Tony was always very nice and polite to me, a good conversationalist."