Having Less Than a Ball at Inaugural Party
In a dark corner of this half-filled cavern, Anne LaFianza is standing in her new ball gown, looking rather dazed. She has just watched President Clinton wave from 75 yards away, dance with the first lady to half a strain of “Into the Mystic” and tap inaudibly on a bongo drum.
This 11 minutes has cost her and her husband $300, not to mention the price of the tux and dress.
“I thought maybe they would mingle,” she says, her devotion to the freshly sworn-in president straining to mask the disappointment of her night to remember. “I guess maybe they can’t do that.”
And this, ladies and gentlemen, is the Inaugural Ball--one of 15 of them anyway, the one put on for the states of California, Alaska and Hawaii. It is an event sure to disappoint, except for the morning after, when you can tell all your friends you had the privilege of attending America’s closest thing to a coronation.
Upon setting foot in Hall A of the Washington Convention Center, it becomes clear that what’s wrong with this picture is that they call it a “ball.” You walk in with visions of George and Martha Washington dancing the minuet, of a tiaraed Audrey Hepburn lighting up the room in “My Fair Lady,” of sophisticated gentlemen in tails sipping Perrier-Jouet. And before you know it there you are, stuffed into a strapless black velvet number, chowing down on a turkey sandwich in a plastic box and chasing it with a Red Dog.
It’s like getting all dolled up and going to a hoedown. The music is too loud. The food is overpriced--if you can find it. It can take all night to get your wrap out of the coat check, and most of the conversations are merely stations inhabited by people desperately seeking somebody more important with whom they can be seen.
*
A man with horn-rimmed glasses and a sweaty face is hollering at California Lt. Gov. Gray Davis. The man isn’t angry; he’s just competing with the band. Davis can’t possibly hear this guy, but he’s running for governor in ‘98, so he stands there nodding and looking bored out of his mind. Old Horn-Rims doesn’t seem to notice.
The lieutenant governor’s rescue comes when he is broadsided by a teenager in a tux, launched by an eager father who wants his kid’s picture taken with somebody famous. Dad has given to Davis’ varied campaigns more times than he can count; Davis puts his arm around the kid and smiles.
All over the room, California’s political elite is mixing and mingling. There are assorted members of Congress, Jesse Jackson, Assembly Speaker Cruz Bustamante and Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. Gil Garcetti.
But really the big news is that Melanie Griffith showed up with husband Antonio Banderas. She is asked if she considers herself a policy wonk.
“I consider myself an American,” she says, but nobody notices because she is wearing this silver strapless thing.
A mariachi band strikes up a tune. A Latina who loves mariachi skittles over and requests a number. She makes the request in Spanish. They look at her like she’s speaking Persian. “We’re from Virginia,” they explain.
Rickie Lee Jones takes the stage. This is pretty good, but she doesn’t stay long.
*
There has been a lot of talk about California losing clout in the nation’s capital during this second term, now that Clinton doesn’t need those 54 electoral pearls anymore. If the ball is any indication, California has taken a big slide.
Over at the Arkansas bash, they’ve got Sheryl Crow, Michael McDonald and Michael Douglas--the traitors--on stage. At Tennessee, they had Hootie and the Blowfish and Gloria Estefan. And that ball was held at glorious Union Station. (It was supposed to be at the much less elegant DC Armory, but Vice President Al Gore--of Tennessee--took care of that in a hurry.)
“We are having a hard time getting people anybody would recognize,” a crew member for CNN’s “Show Biz Today” confides as she checks out the California crowd for somebody to interview.
“But Melanie Griffith was here,” somebody points out--again.
This is what is known in the trades as “ball-envy,” a burning desire to compare whatever you bought your way into with what everybody else got. (This is a very American tradition--covet something--lest everyone relax and enjoy the moment. The entire economy is based on it.)
Really, nobody has it worse at these things than the Clintons and the Gores. They have to hit all 15 balls--14 official events and one unofficial shindig--most of them representing several states so no one feels left out. They dance like it’s the first dance of the night, then make some euphoric remarks that by Ball No. 5 sound stale and rehearsed. For Clinton, of course, this all comes after staying up all night practicing the speech of his life, looking refreshed at the swearing in and waving pleasingly at the parade while little clowns run past scooping up whatever the horses decide to deposit on Pennsylvania Avenue.
“Truthfully, I like it better the second time around,” the president says after being asked for the 800th time how it feels to be inaugurated again. Nobody believes him. How much fun he’s actually having can be measured in minutes: He began his ball-hopping an hour late and finished 2 hours and 45 minutes early.
