Rest In Peace: Louise J. Esterhazy.
As W Magazine leaves the fold of Fairchild Publications and becomes a ward of Conde Nast, there was an early casualty. Doyenne Louise Esterhazy was terminated. She had a most productive and cutting run as John Fairchild’s fictional social and fashion critic.
Fairchild was the scion of WWD who created W. He is long retired from day to day publishing, but kept a hand in voicing Louise’s outrages. W has been a bad fit in Conde Nast, as it must compete with the larger and more commercial Vogue. With a far smaller fashion, beauty and social universe, there are far fewer ad pages to go around. Also, W chose to compete with the likes of In Style and other celebrity magazines that fit into contemporary lifestyles. That cheap and tinny world was not a good one for Louise. How do you make fun of people who parody themselves?
I worked for Fairchild in the early seventies and often Louise irked me. Yes, we all had a hand in feeding Louise tidbits, but sometimes she could become tiresome. John Fairchild’s humor was dry and deadly, and he was often critical of the late Jim Brady’s humor, which he called “gallows.”
Back then, editors were assigned Sunday stints where we showed up and sat in the newsroom just in case a breaking news story occurred over the weekend. One summer, I combed through reams of wire copy that basically featured corn and pie eating contests in the Midwest. No retailer or dress manufacturers died, so no phone calls had to be made. I was bored out of my mind.
To fill my time, I wrote an 8 page obituary of Louise, pointing out some of her family’s history. This included the sale of French military secrets to the Germans that led to the Dreyfus affair. I waxed poetic for some 2,000 or so words of fanciful pseudo history and left the typewritten sheets on my desk.
The next day, a very serious copy chief by the name of Boyd Wright came to my desk red in the face carrying a pasted up and edited copy of Louise’s obit. The damn thing was about four to five feet long and had been transmitted by fax to the offset printer in Vineland, New Jersey. Some enterprising slug on the copy desk had gone to my desk, thinking I forgot to file my story and had done so for me.
I never knew if John Fairchild was the one who killed the story or not, but every time he passed my desk for a week he would break out in his distinctive giggle. I am glad some editor caught the faux pas and Louise lived on. But in a society that has little social grace and very little fashion talent, I guess it was time for old Louise to be put out to pasture. She will be sorely missed.