100 New Yorkers of the 1970s Part 7

De Ruth's painting used to occupy him eight to 15 hours a day. Now he is down to about seven hours. He works very rapidly, with intense concentration. "I don't paint after the afternoon," he explains, "except sometimes sketching at night. You exhaust your juices by the time evening comes along."

One person he used to sketch after hours was actress Karen Black, who lived in West 68th Street just across from his apartment. Says De Ruth: "she would sit in the in the windowsill in her bra and slip. Then one day I called over to her, 'Would you like to get paid for this?' She rushed inside to get her gla.s.ses, and looked over at me, very surprised. She became my model for some time."

For a woman to be an ideal nude model, said De Ruth, "she should be gentle, as intelligent as possible, considerate, and somebody in the arts, or with the sensitivity of an artist. And she must be physically attractive."

How do the women who pose fully dressed for commissioned portraits compare to the professional nude models? "They work better than my models usually," says the artist, who has painted Ethel Kennedy, Eleanor McGovern, and the late Martha Mitch.e.l.l for _Time_. "They're much more concerned to partic.i.p.ate. I don't think it's necessarily something to do with vanity. It's much more curiosity. Because we never really know until the day we die what we look like. Because we vary so much from one time to another."

Ironically, Martha Mitch.e.l.l -- wife of President Nixon's infamous attorney general, John Mitch.e.l.l -- posed for De Ruth inside the Watergate Building during the height of her fame. "She had a certain peasant charm -- a charm of her own," he recalls.

A man who craves variety, De Ruth has for many years spent his summers at a studio in Ma.s.sachusetts. This past summer he began to teach painting in New Mexico -- something he has wanted to try for a long time. A pa.s.sionate skier, he travels to Austria each winter to pursue the sport that he learned as a child, then gave up until his mid-40s.

His other after-work activities? "I love to be in the company of women,"

says the artist with a radiant smile, adding that he prefers their company when he's not painting them.

The East Side, according to the artist, is "a city in itself. There's a sterility over there, at least for me. I just can't see myself without this mixture that the West Side is." De Ruth has been going to the same Chinese laundry for 28 years -- Jack's on Columbus Avenue. Another business he has patronized all that time is Schneider's Art Supplies at 75th Street and Columbus.

As the interview comes to a close, I ask De Ruth what advice he would give to an aspiring young artist. "Never be discouraged by anyone or anything," he says. Then, to balance his remarks, he relates an anecdote about an art student who asked Degas what he could do to help the world of art. Replied Degas: "Stop painting."

WESTSIDER MIGNON DUNN The Met's super mezzo

3-8-80

Don't look for opera posters, photographs or reviews on the walls of Mignon Dunn's Westside apartment. The Tennessee-born Metropolitan Opera star, one of the world's most sought-after mezzo-sopranos since the early 1970s, prefers to keep her two lives separate. She has no sc.r.a.pbooks and saves no clippings. "I look forward to what I'm doing tomorrow," she explains.

"I don't like those stand-up-and-sing roles. I loves to play wicked women.

But you have to make them just as human as possible," she continues, her gold jewelry jingling as she settles onto the sofa. Tall and attractive, with large, expressive features, Miss Dunn is hospitality personified as she talks about her life and career over a gla.s.s of wine.

This season at the Met she starred in both _Lohengrin_ and _Elektra_. In the spring she will appear in _Aida_ on the Met tour, and perform the role of Kundry in _Parsifal_ with Germany's Hamburg Opera. After that she plans some orchestral and opera concerts across the country. Long praised for her dramatic talents as well as her vocal skills, Miss Dunn has already signed contracts for performances into 1984.

Although a few noted operas, such as _Carmen_, _Samson et Dalila_, and _Joan of Arc_, have a mezzo in the t.i.tle role, most operas feature the higher-voiced soprano in the lead and a mezzo in a character role. "We may not have the main roles, but we have some of the best parts in _opera_," she says in her rich Southern accent, shouting the last word as if from an overflow of energy. "Not many of the roles I get today are angelic. It's often the 'other woman,' or the woman who causes the trouble."

Married since 1972 to Kurt Klippstatter, a conductor and music director from Austria, Miss Dunn has never had any children of her own, somewhat to her regret. But she and her husband frequently have their nephews and nieces staying for extended periods. "Our niece Evi, from Austria, is living with us now. She's like a little daughter, and I adore her. She's 18, and she's going to go to nursing school." Mignon and Kurt are a very gregarious couple who enjoy throwing huge dinner parties.

Mignon's cooking, like her singing, is international.

"I cook Austrian. I cook New Orleans. I cook some nice Italian and French things. I'm going to be in Paris later this year for six weeks, and I really seriously want to go to the Cordon Bleu Cooking School, and take at least a three-week course."

Around the late 1960s she was based in Germany for several years. There, says Dunn, many new operas are premiered each year, while in the U.S.

they are a rarity. "It all comes back to the fact that we don't have government subsidy. We have to worry about selling tickets. Opera is an expensive thing, and until we get this government support -- which people for some reason are afraid of -- we cannot be as experimental as we would like to be."

Brought up on a cotton plantation in Memphis, she entered her first singing contest at the age of 9 and spent most Sat.u.r.day afternoons in her girlhood listening with rapt attention to the Metropolitan Opera broadcast on the radio. Immediately following her high school graduation, she was auditioned by Met scouts and encouraged to go to New York. There, after several years of study, she won a national compet.i.tion that launched her career.

Dunn spent part of three seasons with the New York City Opera before joining the Met. It was many years, however, before her talents were fully appreciated there. "It only took me 11 auditions to get into the New York City Opera, and at least that many at the Met. So take heart, everybody,"

she says, laughing merrily.

She has made numerous opera recordings, including the role of Susan B.

Anthony in Virgil Thompson's _The Mother of Us All_ and Maddalena in _Rigoletto_. "I don't ever listen to my recordings," she says when asked to name her favorite. "I listen to the playbacks, when I can do something about it. But I don't listen to recordings afterwards because there's nothing that I can do about it, and I know I'm going to find a million things that I don't like."

Mignon and her husband recently bought a house in Connecticut, but they will keep their Westside apartment. "We have three acres," she says proudly. "I hope we'll get a couple of horses and I would love a goat. I love goats. They're so cute. I love animals -- we have a Great Dane and a Labrador -- and I'm very much into the business with the Animal Protection Inst.i.tute. Most of the experiments that are done with animals today: there's just no reason for it. ... I mean, I don't think we need another shampoo on the market, really."

Her voice rises with feeling as she pursues the subject. "It is really the slavery of today. People don't have any feelings for animals, and I'm just rabid. I really am. It is so _disgraceful_. Anytime anybody wants me to do a benefit for animals, just call me and I'll do it any day I've got free.

I would like to do more benefits. Actually, I'm hardly ever asked to, but if I were asked, I would do it."

EASTSIDER DOUGLAS FAIRBANKS JR.

A man for all seasons

7-14-79

Six times he has received an advance to write his autobiography, and six times he has returned the money because of the enormity of the task. The life of Douglas Fairbanks Jr. is too rich and varied to be condensed into a one-volume narrative.

The only child of Douglas Fairbanks Sr., America's first great matinee idol, he has acted in more than 75 feature films, produced 160 television plays and a dozen movies, performed in countless stage plays and musicals, made numerous recordings, written screenplays, published his articles and drawings in many of the nation's leading magazines, and given his time freely to at least 50 public service organizations. Ten countries on four continents have presented him with major awards for his diplomatic and philanthropic activities.

"One morning I woke up and said, 'I suppose I must have retired,'" notes the tanned, vigorous 69-year-old at his Madison Avenue office, from behind his huge antique desk with bra.s.s lions' heads for drawer pulls. But in our long discussion, it becomes obvious that he has never actually retired, either as an entertainer or as a force in public affairs. His office is fairly cluttered with mementoes of his world travels -- swords, statuettes, novelty lamps, old photographs, oversized travel books. The white-haired, melodious-voiced actor sits looking very comfortable as he tells about his ongoing stage career.

"My favorite type of work right now is doing plays for limited periods.

In 1940 I gave up stage acting, but in 1968 I did the first big revival of _My Fair Lady_, and since then I have been in several other plays. This summer I'm doing _My Fair Lady_ again in Reno for eight to 10 weeks.

... I didn't want to copy Rex Harrison, but I was prevailed upon by Lerner and Loewe to do this. I've known them since before they knew each other. They're going to make a number of adjustments for me. My other project, which is still in the planning stages, is a new Broadway show. But it's really too soon to talk about it."

On August 13, the cla.s.sic 1939 film _Gunga Din_, in which Fairbanks co stars with Cary Grant, will be shown at 9 p.m. on Channel 9 with a single commercial-interruption. His other hit films include _Sinbad the Sailor_ and _The Prisoner of Zenda._ He acted in his first movie in 1923 while barely in his teens, and in 1932 he was designated a star. He continued to make films until 1941, when he joined the U.S. armed forces and served for more than five years. Then he resumed his film career with much success before turning his hand to producing in 1952.

"Everybody misuses the word 'star' today," he explains. "Legally, it only means having your name above the t.i.tle. There's no such thing as a superstar. That's a term we have let creep into the language. Actually Charlie Chaplin may have been a superstar, but he's one of the very few."

He laughs and tells about another aspect of modern-day moviemaking that amuses him. "Very few of the great producers in the past paid any attention to credits at all. Now, they all like to get their names in the billing and in the ads, as big as the stars' names -- as if anybody cares who made the film!"

Asked whether his career was helped by having a famous father in the movie business, he replies that "the advantages were ephemeral. They were limited to people being polite and nice, but that wouldn't necessarily lead to any jobs. It usually meant that I would be underpaid rather than overpaid, and they would expect more of me. By the time I became a star, my father had already retired."

His stepmother Mary Pickford, "America's sweetheart," who died in May at the age of 86, joined with Douglas Fairbanks Sr., Charlie Chaplin and D.W. Griffith in 1919 to found United Artists. The following year she married Fairbanks, and together they virtually ruled Hollywood. Douglas Junior, who became close to his father only in his late teens, grew up in New York, Hollywood, London and Paris -- which helps to explain his love for travel and his endless quest for variety.

As the creative force behind the acclaimed TV series _Douglas Fairbanks Presents_, he produced an average of 32 one-hour films a year from 1952 and 1957. "My studio manager had a heart attack and my story editor had a nervous breakdown, just from the pressure of getting out these films. I thought I would be next, so I decided to quit," he says. "They were very elaborate productions. We used to have the scripts six months in advance.

Now, if you start shooting on Tuesday, you'll get the script on Monday."

Today, with his multiple business interests and philanthropic pursuits, he maintains a house in Florida, an office in London, and, since 1956, an apartment on the Upper East Side. He and his wife Mary have been married for 40 years and have three daughters, two of whom live in England.

His overall career, concludes Fairbanks, "does not have a single theme, because it's been so diversified. It's been a series of themes. Maybe it's cacophonous. The things I find most interesting don't pay a penny. But possibly all my activities blended together have something to do with a person who's got a lot of curiosity and energy and capacity to enjoy and appreciate life."

WESTSIDER LEE FALK Creator of The Phantom and Mandrake the Magician

5-27-78

Who is the most widely read author in the world today?

Not counting Chairman Mao, whose quotations are required reading for one-fourth of the earth's population, the honor probably belongs to a dapper, soft-spoken man in his early 60s who could walk from his Westside apartment all the way to Times Square without being recognized.

He is not a familiar figure on book jackets or talk shows because Lee Falk happens to be a comic strip writer. His two creations, The Phantom and Mandrake the Magician, are published in more than 500 newspapers in 40 countries. His daily readers.h.i.+p: close to 100 million.

"One of the few places in the world where my strips don't run is in New York City," says Falk, leaning gently forward in his chair. "They ran in the _New York Journal American_ for 25 years. That was the biggest afternoon paper in America until the newspaper strike, about 10 years ago. Then it folded, as did most of New York's papers; we were left with the _Times_, the _Post_, and the _Daily News_. But my strips do run in _El Diario_, the Spanish-language newspaper, and in the _New York News World_."