For most college grads, this is the toughest jobmarket in years, but Chelsea Clinton, whodoesn’t finish up at Oxford until the spring,has already lined up a gig. Sources tell us that theformer First Daughter has been offered a position withMcKinsey, the powerhouse consulting firm. “Iknow she had an interview and got a good offer,”one Chelsea pal tells us. (Neither McKinsey norClinton returned calls by press time.) Sources say herstarting salary is probably about $65,000.
Earth to Junior Vasquez—your friendshipwith Madonna died a long time ago. We hear thatMadge hit the roof when she heard Vasquez wasdistributing his mix of her new single, “DieAnother Day,” and had her suits fire off acease-and-desist letter. Madonna’s rep tells usthat Vasquez did ask for his work to be sanctioned asan authorized remix but got rejected: “He wasexploiting a song that did not have the approval of Madonna’s management.”Vasquez’s rep insists that the D.J. neverdistributed the mix and has played it only a handfulof times. The two haven’t spoken in about sixyears, ever since Vasquez used snippets of a messagethe singer left on his answering machine for his clubanthem “If Madonna Calls … ” That’s okay—Vasquez ispulling a couple more divas out of his hat. He’srecorded a ditty called “Crack Is Wack,”which includes sound bites from WhitneyHouston’s interview with DianeSawyer. “It’s pretty sweet,” afan tells us. “It’s mixed with‘Diane, let me tell you one thing … Crack iswack.” He’s also done a dance mix of thetheme song of Anna Nicole Smith’s realityshow; it’s titled “It’s Me.”
Just days after Harrison Ford and JoshHartnett were slightly bruised in a car accidentduring the filming of a chase scene in their upcomingaction-comedy, Hollywood Homicide, directorRon Shelton was thrown another curveball—avisit from the cops. “I was shooting inHollywood at an old motel, and the real LAPD camechasing a real murder suspect right through ourset,” Shelton told us last week. “Ourlocation manager thought we were parking our cop cars in the wrong lot, so he came running over to us in a panic, but then he discovered it was a real chase.
When Safilo, the sunglasses-manufacturing company,offered Gwen Stefani and Gavin Rossdalesome free sunglasses, the rock-star newlyweds sentback a typed list of 100 pairs. “They knew thatsome styles were not yet available,” a rep forthe two wrote in an e-mail to Safilo, “so theylisted everything they liked.” The rep wasthoughtful enough to stipulate that Stefani“doesn’t like mirrored lenses” andthat she was hoping to get her shades before herupcoming trip to England. Safilo sent along ninepairs.
Mario Buatta is warning friends who have signedup to teach at the Learning Annex that they had betterget it all in writing. The Prince of Chintz, who hasmade bundles decorating for Barbara Walters, S. I.Newhouse, Mariah Carey, and Billy Joel,claims he’s been shortchanged by the adult-edoutfit. Buatta says he was promised 15 percent ofticket sales for an October lecture and was furiouswhen his ultimate take turned out to be only $280.Though he says 82 people attended his decoratinglecture, the Annex told him last week they countedonly 64. Also, the Annex at first claimed he had beenpromised only 10 percent, then, after he complained,threw him an extra $150. Even worse, Buatta says, healso paid for a dinner with an Annex staffer after thelecture: “I ended up making, I think, $5.”For his part, Annex director Steven Schragisinsists fourteen people asked for refunds because theclass was “such a bad experience,” andBuatta got paid for what the Annex collected fromstudents: “We ended up losing money on this.”
NO FEAR: Socialite Nina Griscom—whorecently split with her plastic-surgeon husband,Dan Baker, after her embarrassingly publicaffair with married sugar baron PepeFanjul—raised eyebrows last week whilegetting cozy with a dark, handsome man at Joe’sPub during a performance by RenéRisqué & the Art Lovers. The two sat in theVIP section, wearing matching FUCK FEAR stickers ontheir T-shirts.
BISTRO BUZZ: Rumorhas it that Keith McNally,of Pastis and Balthazar,will open a German Jewish restaurant, tentativelynamed Schneider’s, on Rivington Street thissummer.
With Deborah Schoeneman