As a samba band tunes up onstage at Joe's, a sunglasses-wearing Ralph Lauren model named Zofia jumps up on a table near the D.J. booth. "God, do I adore Coerte, he is so wise," she announces, narrowly avoiding the approaching gang of Felske's high-school buddies, who smother him with bear hugs and painful-looking noogies. "This dude," gurgles the beefiest one, grabbing him by an Armani lapel, "was so popular with chicks in high school that cheerleaders from the other team were asking for his number."
Sipping an Amstel Light with three or four undone shirt buttons revealing dark tufts of chest hair, Felske runs a hand through his white-blond, shoulder-length locks before jumping onto a conga line between Mark Bavaro and Daniela Pestova, his five-foot-eleven stature greatly diminished by their hulking figures. He leans in close and confides, in utter mock seriousness, "I'm the Mad Hatter."
Over the din at da silvano a few nights earlier, felske takes gulps of San Pellegrino and looks over the crowd -- David Duchovny, Helmut Lang, and, to his delight, Robert De Niro eating penne with his family at a corner table: the perfect setting for what he wants to discuss.
"See, the most important businessmen, bankers, film producers, and studio heads don't know squat when it comes to women," says Felske, winking indiscreetly in De Niro's direction. That's what Word is about: the Faustian bargain struck between a film writer struggling for credits and a 50-year-old studio head trolling for dates. It's a relationship not unlike Felske's with Ted Field, the fiftyish head of Interscope Records, who is rarely seen without a woman hovering around legal age ("Ted has no problem getting dates," Felske retorts, denying widespread buzz that the character is based on Field). Not to mention Felske's friendship with Mickey Rourke, with whom he lived for five months while rewriting Rourke's boxing movie, Homeboy. "I only got respect once he realized that I could get him pretty girls," says Felske.
After dinner, Felske suggests a trip to Lot 61 -- "I hear it's the hot joint" -- but I beg off. He asks if I have a boyfriend, and walks me home. Running his fingers through his mane concernedly, he has one last thing to say before stepping off into the night: "So, what's going on with my hair?"
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