RON GALOTTI RATS OUT THE MAGAZINE BUSINESS

NEW YORK (AdAge.com) -- Say what you will about former GQ, Vanity Fair and Talk publisher Ron Galotti -- and there are those who will say quite a bit -- he's a man who knows how to go out with a bang. Mr. Galotti, who recently exited the Manhattan media and celebrity world for a farmhouse in North Pomfret, Vt., appears on the cover of next week's New York Magazine, dressed to the nines while knee-deep in a pond on his property. 6,000 word article An accompanying 6,000-plus word article from Bright Lights, Big City author Jay McInerney -- Mr. Galotti's pal -- lays out the publishing executive's life in lavish detail, including his loan-sharking and brothel operations while stationed in the Philippines with the Air Force, and the tragic death of his 4-year-old son, Nicholas, from his first marriage. Excerpts The following are choice snippets from the article: On his half-Italian, half-Jewish roots: "You don't know whether to steal it or try to get it cheaper." On the delicate relationship between himself, when he was publisher of Vogue, and the monthly's fashion advertisers: "Okay, we're having trouble with Giorgio Armani. Anna [Wintour, Vogue's legendary editor] isn't featuring enough of his [expletive] white blouses or something. Si [Newhouse, chairman of Conde Nast] says would I mind going over to Milan and kissing his ass, 'cause I probably know him as well as anybody. I reach into my pocket and pull out a tube of Chap Stick and I say, 'I kiss so much ass I go through two of these a week. And the trouble is, I'm starting to like it.' " 'Get hit by a bus' On corporate politics, when he was publisher of Conde Nast's Vanity Fair in the early '90s: "One day they came to my office to shoot a corporate film -- this is a film to promote the company, you understand. And they ask me what I want to see for the company's future. I said, 'I want to see [then Conde Nast President] Bernard Leser walk out of the building and get hit by a bus. I don't want him killed, just hurt so he has to go back to Australia or New Zealand or wherever the hell he came from." (Coincidentally, Mr. Galotti was fired from Conde Nast a few months after this incident.) On his hyper-aggressive reputation: "I was a killer for Si Newhouse. He didn't pay me to be nice." Sterling silver Swiss Army knife On being prepared, while briefly lost in the Vermont woods with Mr. McInerney: "Don't worry. I've got a Swiss Army knife with me. Of course, it's sterling silver, from Tiffany's." On what he learned from his early days in Peekskill, N.Y., where he raised chickens and earned a 4-H pin: "One chicken was born with a bent beak. In two minutes, the other chickens had pecked it to death. I learned right then, you don't want your beak to be bent."

RON GALOTTI RATS OUT THE MAGAZINE BUSINESS

Featured Stories