ELAINE’S, the East Side saloon to which Mayor Rudy refuses to go – though it’s just around the corner from his gal pal’s place – will be a hot bed of anti-Giuliani sentiment Monday night when former NYPD Deputy Commissioner John Timoney is honored there.
Timoney, now police chief of Philadelphia, is the subject of a laudatory profile in the June issue of Esquire, so editor David Granger decided to invite a few of his old pals around to the haunt Giuliani tried to place off-limits to Timoney, then-Commissioner Bill Bratton, and their partner in crime-busting, Jack Maple.
Timoney will be toasted by Public Advocate Mark Green, Rudy’s sworn enemy and the Democrat who has the best shot at succeeding him in City Hall. A lot of people here and in Philly think Green will tap Timoney as his police chief if he becomes the next mayor.
There have been stories that Mark’s first choice would be Bratton, who is still viewed by NewYorkers as the man who had the most to do with turning the crime statistics around. But Green has heard that Bratton (who has also been wooed by mayoral hopefuls Peter Vallone and Alan Hevesi) may be weighing a mayoral run of his own – possibly on an independent Republican ticket, the way John Lindsay did.
Bratton, who starts a big new job in the private sector next month, is tight-lipped about any ambitions he might have for City Hall. But a lot of people think he’d be a great candidate and that if he appointed Timoney as his top cop, we would be back to the heady days before Giuliani fired or forced out the finest of the Finest.
With these players assembled, along with Tom Wolfe, Manhattan District Attorney Bob Morgenthau, attorney Barry Slotnick, celebrity private eye Bo Dietl and Frank and Malachy McCourt, Monday night at Elaine’s is going to be like one of those smoke-filled rooms in the good old/bad old political days.
Ivana has yachts of fun
WHILE the second Mrs. Trump, Marla, is reduced to selling her jewelry, the first, Ivana, continues to live in the style to which The Donald got her accustomed. She has her yacht, the Ivana, in Cannes at the film festival, and is entertaining like there’s no tomorrow.
Last night, she and swain Roffredo Gaetani continued the “Million Mom March” theme with a party for “Stop the Violence,” to which Melanie Griffith and Antonio Banderas and a host of other stars were invited.
Tonight, Ivana’s doing a benefit for the American Foundation for AIDS Reasearch (AmFAR), with Elizabeth Hurley and Elton John topping the list of guests.
Ivana and Roffredo will then come ashore and hop a plane for New York en route to the University of Pennsylvania, where Donald Trump Jr. will be graduated on Sunday from his father’s alma mater, the Wharton School of Business.
Looking MMm-MMm good
ALSO gracing Cannes is the glorious Catherine Deneuve, who hasn’t lost a thing at age 56. Catherine, who is going around in the $1 million Marilyn Monroe earrings created by Harry Winston, says when she wears them, she feels Monroe’s spirit in her.
Catherine’s latest film, “Dancer in the Dark,” a prime contender for Sunday’s Palm d’Or, apparently suffered a touch of the Monroes in the making.
Director Lars van Trier says that it was so difficult working with co-star Bjork, the spacey Icelandic pop diva, that he destroyed two television sets in frustration.
For a good Cos
GIVEN the battering he’s taken in the tabloids, the last thing beloved comedian Bill Cosby needs is to expose himself to the media. But Bill and his wife, Camille, want to honor their murdered son via the Hello Friend/Ennis William Cosby Foundation, so they are willing to step into the spotlight Tuesday night at Cipriani’s on East 42nd Street.
It’s the first fund-raiser for the foundation, which will support a Fordham University program to improve the teaching of young people with learning difficulties. Alan King is emcee, Oprah Winfrey is a patron, Lou Rawls will entertain, and such guests as Ed Bradley, Marcey Carsey, Johnnie Cochran, David Dinkins, Cicely Tyson and Ahmad and Felicia Rashad will hear Stevie Wonder unveil his “Song for Ennis.” (For ticket information, call 212-564-6367; ext. 11.)
Fake-‘n’-bake eatery (M, S)
DIRECTOR Joan Chen knows Manhattan foodies will do anything to be ahead of the dining curve, so she wasn’t surprised when passers-by tried to get a table at the TriBeCa restaurant that she and set designer Mark Friedberg created for their new film, MGM’s “Autumn in New York.”
The August-release movie stars Richard Gere as a celebrity restaurant owner, and Wynona Ryder, whose character thinks she has the recipe to change his life. Chen reports that the eatery was so realistic, people were walking up and insisting that they had a reservation.
Golf mag’s in the fore
NOW that he has his new Maximum Golf magazine on the stands, editor Michael Caruso can enjoy the launch party Tuesday night at the Central Park boathouse. In keeping with the News Corp. publication’s aim of covering the non-fogy side of the royal and ancient sport, the bash is more MTV than USGA. Donald Trump and his caddie Melania Knauss, swinging supermodel Kylie Bax, radio duffers Mike Francesa and Chris “Mad Dog” Russo, and hard-driving Isaac Hayes will join members of the public in a $1 million contest to score a hole-in-one on a floating green in front of the boathouse, all for the benefit of Bob Tisch’s “Take the Field” group, which maintains sports facilities at New York City schools. (Full disclosure: News Corp. owns The Post).