Wednesday Morning Magazine Roundup

Pretty sensational cover of Vibe, with 50 cent, sharp in business suit and carrying an attaché case, standing in front of burning cars and buildings under the heading “Global Terror.” Fifty, it says, wants to be a “role model,” though he first has a few choice words on Dr. Dre, Chelsea Handler and Oprah. As it’s also Vibe’s “International Issue,” it offers “the best damn guide to music outside the U.S.” Highlighted with Bob Marley, Snoop Dogg, Usain Bolt and Tyga on top, we’re glad to see, is the wonderful Esperanza Spalding, so wrongly maligned for so deservedly winning the Best New Artist Grammy over Justin Bieber.

H really has a ravishing pic of Michelle Monaghan on the cover, making us want to rush out and re-rent Kiss Kiss Bang Bang.

Esquire’s Spring/Summer “Big Black Book” issue is out. “The Style Manual for Successful Men” covers clothes, knowledge, travel and “the best [fill in the blank] on earth.”

Time Out New York is full of “Free things to do” (games, burlesque, beer tastings, museums, jazz, etc.), not including, unfortunately, the “Amazing Indian food” heading that caught our eye.

Hard to say which is more scary about Interview’s cover, the black-and-white head shot of Lil Wayne, or the Paris Hilton byline for “Lil Wayne’s World.” One thing is definite: The picture of Felicity Jones on the contents page is way more appealing.

Rolling Stone begs a number of questions on its “Rihanna Strikes Back” cover. Kenny raises the main one: How appropriate is it—if at all—for “Pop’s Queen of Pain” to sing, to quote from the story, “songs about abusive men and the women who love them”—especially in light of the simultaneous media focus on her abusive ex Chris Brown? More questions: Why was “the never-before-seen Rolling Stone interview” done with Liz Taylor in 1987 never before seen until now? Why highlight the “Special Report” on “The Kill Team” of U.S. soldiers murdering Afghan civilians for sport in a box opposite the slinky Rihanna shot? And how quickly do we turn the pages to read “Britney Spears talks about her monster comeback”?

Vanity Fair goes back to the future with a buff Rob Lowe on the cover, “confessing” about “running wild with Charlie Sheen, Sean Penn, Matt Dillon, and the night he shared a bed with Tom Cruise” (snore). Taking second is “Here comes Princess Diana 2.0! Palace insiders on the Royal Wedding.”

Glamour, with Ashley Greene, Freida Pinto and Emma Stone separately gracing the “New-Stars Issue” covers, puts up “101 Ways to Look Hotter Now” as its mains story.

Leading off the celeb weeklies, “Inside Reese’s Wedding” fronts US Weekly, which also shows Rihanna speaking out about Chris and Bret opening up. OK USA maintains that Kim is “betrayed before the wedding” (said to be her “worst nightmare”). Star exposes Dancing With The Stars’ “Cover-up” (Extreme surgery! Cocaine & pills! Kirstie’s secret husband!). In Touch goes with those wonderful role models, the Teen Mom moms, and their “Addicted to Surgery” tendancies. Life & Style leads with the riveting “Baby Drama,” that is, according to Khloe Kardashian, Britney Spears and Kim Zolciak.

And that's enough drama for us this morning.

Monday morning magazine round-up

As expected, People fronts a young glamour shot of Elizabeth Taylor in its “Farewell to a Legend” coverage, with only “Reese’s Big Day Plans!” and “Courteney & David: Working it out?” in small print above the title. And American Media, Inc. is out with a “Liz Tribute to the Queen of Hollywood 1932-2011” collector’s issue.

Time’s Liz tribute is promoted in the upper-right corner, which has a decidedly unglamour shot of old Gaddafi and the question “What if he doesn’t go?”—answered inside by Fareed Zakaria.

Entertainment Weekly seems to have somehow missed the Liz boat entirely—but why not, when it has Robert Pattinson? Surely “Beyond Twilight,” wherein RPattz dishes on romancing Reese (who’s with him on the cover) in Water For Elephants, is more attractive. Inside, too, are the “summer movies we can’t wait for,” not to mention “the truth about the Kennedy miniseries”—hopefully, nothing but the whole truth.

The New Yorker has a cute cover drawing of a bunch of tourist animals (moose, fox, raccoon, etc.) reading tourist guides while waiting for a train at Columbus Circle Station—just around the corner from the cavernous Gottfried’s office (I was actually standing next to the animals the day the artist drew the illustration—but I’m not in the picture). The big story inside is “Chronicle of a death foretold,” about a prominent Guatemalan lawyer who predicted he’d be killed by the president—with the investigation into his death turning out to be stranger than anyone imagined. Two other stories concern “What’s next for the Middle East?”

Tyrese graces the cover of Jet, with the “The Temple of Tyrese” story detailing the actor-singer-author’s turning of Twitter into his pulpit. And finally, Billboard juxtaposes cover act Foo Fighters with The Eagles in its caption “Take it to the limit one more time,” which highlights the band’s new album Wasting Light and the promotional campaign behind it. Inside is “Warner Music: Behind the scenes at a bidding war,” along with a timely feature on Chris Brown and a “Music Education Special.”

--jim bessman

Gottfried's remembers Liz Taylor

The papers today are full of  “Liz—Hollywood goddess,” as The New York Post called Elizabeth Taylor on its glam cover shot.

But Liz—who hated the nickname—is but one of scores of household name publication patrons of Gottfried’s over the years.

“She came into the store once when my mother was there,” Kenny recalls. “We were at 600 Madison Avenue then, the building that Elaine in Seinfeld worked in—Pendant Publishing, on the show. Tiffany’s is there now.”

Kenny remembers a playful Liz exchanging patter with his father—who also worked at the family-run operation--and buying The London Times, since she and then husband Richard Burton were living nearby then.

The many other notable past and present clients of Gottfried’s include Jackie Kennedy (and her pal Michael Jackson), John Goodman, Elliott Gould, Alex Rodriguez, David Beckham and Michael Caine—who bought cigars as well as mags.

Wednesday Morning Magazine Roundup

Bad timing, TimeOut New York: “Your Winter’s Over—Raise A Glass! The Best Spring Bars” is out—except it’s a rainy, snowy day. But the cover feature still offers plenty to look forward to in rooftops, beer gardens, parkside spots, and most important, “10 must-try cocktails.”

Speaking of New York, National Geographic, besides its “The Genius of the Inca” cover, features “New York’s Miracle Park”—the High Line, of course.

Slow People week, apparently, since they’ve gone with “The Jolie-Pitts Big Happy Family!” with “New photos!” and “the latest on the kids.” The only other indication of contents is “Renee & Bradley—inside their split”—also the cover of OK-US, which actually reverses People in putting “Brad & Angie’s Twins!” up second.

From In Touch we clearly need to know that Scott has called off the wedding, Kourtney has exploded, and now it’s the “Battle For The Baby.”

Star has “Hollywood Stylists Tell[ing] All!” with the likes of J-Lo, Rihanna, LeAnn and Jen pictured. “Who duct tapes her boobs!” is one of the many vital pieces of info revealed—which will not be divulged here. Life & Style has “shocking new details” of  “Suri’s Twisted World” (again, we won’t divulge anything, except, maybe, she “plays with X-rated candy.” Okay, since you asked nicely, she’s also “still using a pacifier at age 4”).

Teen mom “Leah & Corey’s Wedding!” is the cover story of US Weekly, though our eyes wandered to the right margin, where “Kourtney Kardashian’s Flat Abs Secrets” was illustrated.

Bazaar’s “Shopping Issue” has lovely Courteny Cox on the cover, inside revealing why she and David split. On the shopping tip, it has “526 New Looks” (“Fabulous at Every Age”) with associated must-have bags and shows and best beauty buys. New Beauty likewise offers “10 new age-defying secrets” alongside how cover girl Jennifer Lopez stays sexy over 40(!).

Over at W it’s “The New Society,” i.e., “Couture Club—The Frocks, the Fetes, the Scene,” “Will & Kate—Inside the Royal Wedding,” “India’s Nouveau Riche” and “24-karat Lips.” But the “Double Edge” cover of Mia Wasikowska and Michael Fassbender, who “steam up the screen” in Jane Eyre, must be false: the long blade both are gripping bare-handed can’t possibly be real.

But Men’s Fitness “gets real” with cover boy Scott Disick, “TV’s Most Controversial Reality Star,” and offers “Our Ultimate Golf Workout.” Regarding golf, Esquire suggests that it’s time to “Forgive Tiger Woods,” though they would have a tough case in defending his continued poor play and bad sportsmanship. Otherwise, Matthew McConaughey looks sharp on the cover, though his black suit blocks out his name such that we had to look up the spelling!

Harper’s has an illustration of Mark Twain to accompany Lewis H. Lapham’s essay “Mark Twain and the loss of American courage.” Inside Zadie Smith expounds on “The Hereafter,” Luc Sante on “The Graphic novels of Lynd Ward.”

Globe’s “25 Favorite Celebs—Where are they now?” cover caught our eye, thanks to the prominently placed Adam West and Burt Ward—the real Batman and Robin. And happy to see Rose Marie, a child star as Baby Rose Marie but warmly remembered here for her roles in The Dick Van Dyke Show and Hollywood Squares, is still alive and kicking—at 87! Over at National Enquirer, we learn that the “payoff to keep mother silent” has failed, as “Oprah’s Mom Tells All!”—but please, we can say no more!

Meanwhile, “The DIY Revolution starts now” over at Wired, where engineer-turned-entrepreneur Limor Fried is pictured in a modern Rosie the Riveter pose to go with the “How to Make Stuff—24 awesome projects” cover feature. Nylon singles out Vanessa Hudgens among its “Stars of Sucker Punch” cover feature.

Zink offers “162 reasons to be Sexy” while authoritatively declaring “Men Are In”—prompting an audible sigh of relief here in the Gottfried’s office. Details gives us “The 15 Healthiest Snack Foods” as part of “The diet that makes you look younger,” while fronting “O Brother, Where Art Thou? Joe Jonas Goes It Alone” on the cover, with either apologies or royalties definitely due to the Coen Brothers.

And look to extensive Monday magazine coverage on the passing of the late, great Liz Taylor.

--jim Bessman

Monday morning magazine round-up

Most Monday magazines missed out on the Japan tragedy last week and are focusing on it now. Too bad, of course, that they’re out too soon to cover Libya.

Newsweek Japan coverage is included in an “Apocalypse Now” cover showing a giant cresting wave and also including tsunamis, earthquakes, nuclear meltdowns, refolutions and "economies on the brink" as apocalyptic events converging all at once. It also asks, “What the #@%! is next?” in further contributing to what one reader decries inside as the new Newsweek’s declining vocabulary standards. As for the “How Ignorant Are You?” test promoted atop the page, well, I didn’t take it.

Time’s “Special Report” centers on “Japan’s Meltdown” with a weeping woman on the cover, and leaves it at that. The Economist has an illustration depicting “The fallout” and suggests it’s “Time to support the Arab rebels.”

The New Yorker, too, front’s “Japan’s Crisis,” with its “Dark Spring” cover painting depicting a tree with flowers shaped like the international radiation symbol. Besides several Japan-related stories, the cover overlap highlights its “Style Focus,” consisting of “Clash of the makeup moguls,” “Louboutin’s shoe laboratory” and “Spanx for everything.”

New York has a bicyclist on its cover to go with its “Bikelash” theme concerning the city’s battle over bike lanes. “It isn’t about bikes vs. cars, or borough vs. borough—it’s about competing ideas of what, and who, a city is for,” the writer suggests, also wondering, “Is New York too New York for bike lanes?” Other features examine the assault on teachers from both right and left, and “The Real Housewives of Kensington Palace,” i.e., Kate Middleton.

Hollywood Reporter has "Jodie Foster Unedited" on its cover, Foster having just screened her controversial upcoming directorial effort The Beaver at the South By Southwest music/film trade conference in Austin. The film, which concerns a troubled executive who communicates via a beaver hand puppet, has been held back because of star Mel Gibson’s latest legal problems. The Reporter calls Foster and Gibson “the yin and yang of American pop culture” and digs into “her unusual film and devotion” to him. The issue also assesses the impact of Hollywood on the “Japan Crisis” and Facebook’s hand in the “Assault on Netflix.”

Leave it to Billboard to bring up Libya by way of “Behind the Gadhafi Gig Headlines—The Big Money is Back in Coporate Shows” (the story was generated by the activities of Beyonce and other superstar artists, who have lately come under scrutiny for playing high-paying private gigs for the Ghadafi clan). But the cover asks “Is the Music Biz Invited?”—and features a talk with Twitter co-founder Biz Stone in observing Twitter’s fifth birthday and its music business implications.

And with all that’s happening in the world, in case anyone’s still interested in all things Charlie Sheen, Entertainment Weekly investigates “the Future of Two And A Half Men.” But that’s inside. The cover story is Castle’s Nathan Fillion, “Geek God.”

--jim bessman

Wednesday Morning Magazine Roundup

Today's big magazine is likely to be Rolling Stone, what with a pensive and “Deeply Neurotic, Desperate for Approval—and Happier than Ever” King of All Media Howard Stern. Howard’s been hyping it on his show for the last two weeks, ever since Stone approached him for the cover feature. And since he loves the magazine, he gave it and writer Neil Strauss plenty of access, in fact, turn the cover page and there’s a second cover with a different Stern shot. Also inside is the “Spring Music Preview” highlighting the likes of Lady Gaga, Jay-Z & Kanye, Lil Wayne, Paul Simon, Foo Fighters and Fleet Foxes.

Vogue is big this week, too, thanks to Rihanna’s see-thru dress—a perfect fit to go with her take “On Fame, Family & How She Really Feels About Her Curves” (spoiler alert: she actually likes her body). Today’s Page Six in the Post includes an inside Vogue Rihanna pic, so it’s getting the push. Also inside  is “Secrets Behind the World’s Most Beautiful Bodies,” not to mention “Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen: Tiny Powerhouses Behind the Row.”

Playboy’s “Sex & Music Issue” has Hawaii Five-O’s Taryn Manning on the cover, and on the music side trumpets the legendary George Jones (“The Country Badass has no Regrets,” it proclaims), and also lists Cee Lo, Robin Thicke, Chromeo, R. Kelly, Bryan Ferry and Deadmau5. A more fully clothed but no less enticing Amanda Seyfried graces the cover of Elle and discourses inside “On Kissing Justin Timberlake and Falling for Costars”. Besides it being “The Genius Issue!” (signifiying, apparently, the style secrets of Joe Zee, Michael Kors, Jason Wu, and more!), the issue tallies 221 shoes, bags, jackets and jewelry to personalize your look in its “Fashion! Dress Up for Work” listing.

The “single, but not desperate” (whew!) Eva Longoria graces the cover of Allure and its “Get Gorgeous Skin” special, though I’m more interested in how the 11 women who took Allure’s “Anti-Aging Challenge” finished. Town & Country follows suit with its “Forever Young” cover feature and the timely “Medical Roundtable: Resetting Your Age Clock,”  along with “Timeless Style: The Women of Santa Barbara.”

Meanwhile, it’s the “Couples Issue” over at Marie Claire with Bradley Cooper and Abbie Cornish divulging their presumably much-sought stance “on kissing strangers.” The ish also offers a “Fashion Extravaganza,” “Sexy Spring Makeovers” and most important, “Love & Sex: New rules to bulletproof your relationship." GQ pictures bat-wielding Derek Jeter and details his “Swinging Years” while naming “The Most Obnoxious Sports Fans in America.” And if you haven’t had enough Charlie Sheen, the “inside story” recounts his “Porn-tastic Implosion.”

Fitness-wise, Shape shows Vanessa Hudgens “Sronger than ever!” and reveals “How she got there!” But I very much question its “Slim Without the Gym: No weights, no gadgets—just you!”—but hey, some of us need structure. Self allows us to “steal Kim Kardashian’s Surprising Secrets” under its “Keep Your Curves, Lose the Extra” heading, and further offers a “Special Step-by-Step Handbook” for dropping 10 pounds, as well as “23 Ways to Boost Your Energy.”

The lifestyle titles include Seventeen, with Victoria Justice’s “Real-life Drama” (in high school, she felt alone and isolated) and more important, “Get Your Dream Hair” (though that one, I’m afraid, is only in my dreams). Life & Style has a “teen mom exclusive” in “Two More Babies!”—which should be required reading.

And the celebrity weeklies are likewise earth-shattering with In Touch blaring “Bachelor Betrayed! The Real Story,” OK! presenting the “exclusive first look” at “Kim’s Dream Wedding,” Star’s “Breaking News” report on "Renee Betrayed by Bradley,” Us investigating “How He [Justin] Broke Her [Jessica's] Heart,” and People also documenting “The Bachelor Blowup!”

For what it’s worth, People also runs a small upper corner picture of a minor story, “Japan’s Tsunami: Hearbreak, Heroes & Hope.”

        

--jim bessman                  

Monday morning magazine round-up

“Earthquake 8.9,” to adopt the banner headline atop Newsweek’s title square, pretty much renders everything else in the magazine world insignificant. The cover shows a big photo of  floating devastation with no need for words, though it does flash the inside story “The Scary Tsunamis Yet to Come”—though we could have done without the “Shocking Photos of a Disaster” come-on.

Interesting that it also promotes “Charlie Sheen is Winning" by Bret Easton Ellis along with other inside stories on the bottom (“Gun Rage: 2,405 Shot Dead Since Tucson” shows someone there was on top in coming up with a good story concept). Interesting in that especially in light of Japan, Charlie Sheen at this point is really a mindless waste of time. Yes, he’s winning, but winning at what?  Think if all that energy he’s focusing on himself was channeled into helping someone else—let alone his own kids. And the fact that Newsweek put his picture alongside the story title—it didn't for any of the others—shows that the new Newsweek/Daily Beast connection is at least as concerned with sensationalistic fluff as life-and-death weekly news.

But Newsweek did beat out Time, which completely missed out on the earthquake and has a wordy art cover picturing its “Your Data For Sale: Everything about you is being tracked—get over it” cover feature. My esteemed private investigator pal Steve Rambam (the technical consultant for Kinky Friedman’s acclaimed mystery novels) has used the variation “Privacy—get over it” as the title for his lectures.

Just in time for the annual South By Southwest music trade conference in Austin, Billboard has a “Special SXSW Preview” to go with its cover feature on L.A.’s Odd Future Wolf Gang Kill Them All collective of young rappers, producers, skateboarders, filmmakers, designers and “general miscreants.” And I’m happy to see my talented buddy Ray Chew get featured inside for his new gig as musical director of American Idol.

Rachel Zoe graces the cover of The Hollywood Reporter’s style issue, with the inside story devoted to “the town’s most powerful stylist’s” so-called “Fashion Empire.” The trade has its Sheen feature, too--which is understandable—and talks to the lawyers for the star, Two And A Half Men’s co-creator Chuck Lorre (the main target of Sheen’s wrath) and Warner Bros.

On the strictly celeb front, Entertainment Weekly’s “Life After Lost” cover (the story’s about where the stars and creators of the show are at a year after it ended) seems itself lost in light of the real losses being suffered in Japan. More appealing is its feature on Daniel Radcliffe, who is easily maturing into a top grown-up star with his new Broadway role in the revival of How To Succeed In Business Without Really Trying.

Jet finds Nia Long “Fearless & Fine at 40” and poses the philosophical question, “Should college athletes be paid?” The answer should be yes if they want to be in Forbes’ cover story “The Billionaires Issue,” which tallies 1,210 billionaires in 54 countries. The ish also identifies “The Richest People on the Planet”: I checked. I wasn’t one of them.

And for you Vogue-aholics, Italian Vogue is in, and L’uomo Vogue has two covers, one with Stefano Accorsi, the other with Riccardo Scamarcio.

--jim bessman

Greetings from "Gottfried's Journal"

No doubt you've noticed a few changes here at Gottfried's in the last couple weeks or so.

First of all, our Web site is finally up and running! We're also on Twitter and Facebook, and we've started a special section on the site that we’re calling Gottfried's Journal—at least for the time being.

Like its name suggests, the Journal will be the place to go to read about what we’re doing at Gottfried’s. It will evolve as we evolve in an ever-evolving business climate.

Much of the writing will be done by me, Jim Bessman. I’m a veteran music journalist and a longtime friend of Gottfried’s. I’ll be communicating via the site and the Twitter page (please follow us!) the latest activities in the home office and the street.

Off to the side, I'll also do some blogging about things that interest me and hopefully interest you. My first blog—a remembrance of the first Ali-Frazier fight aroused by the hoopla of its 40^th anniversary Tuesday night--probably confused a lot of people and definitely annoyed at least two, one of whom, sniff sniff, called it boring.

She might have added self-indulgent, for it was most certainly that, too. Then again, that’s much the nature of all blogs, tweets, social networking: the poster/writer indulging himself/herself in communicating what he/she is excited about. Again, I hope much of it will be of interest to someone other than myself, and like everyone at Gottfried’s, welcome any and all suggestions.

--jim bessman

So for now, consider Gottfried’s Journal and the entire Gottfried’s site itself a work in progress—as we all make progress.

Wednesday Morning Magazine Roundup by Jim Bessman

 Spring is busting out all over—finally!—in today’s magazines.

Fader features rapper Wiz Khalifa on the cover, with the only other indication of contents being “Spring Style” at the top. Paper likewise promotes its “Spring Fashion’s Cult Classics”—with its cover going to indie mumblecore film queen Greta Gerwig.

“Spring starts here!” proclaims Martha Stewart Living, which then offers “158 ways to celebrate, decorate & refresh” plus “get your oven Martha Clean.” And speaking of clean, Essence, with Jennifer Hudson on the cover (“On being a working mom, wedding plans—and yes, her amazing 80 lb weight loss”) wants you to “Spring Clean your life,” for example, “Let go of what’s holding you back” and “Get the job you really want,” not to mention “Update your hair & nails.”

People StyleWatch has cover girl Lauren Conrad’s “Easy Style,” along with “476 Ways to Look Great Every Day” (what? They couldn’t come up with 477?), i.e., “Clothes you’ll live in, from cute tops to flirty dresses!” Also, “Spring’s Hottest Shoes (at every price!)."

Spring aside, Teen Vogue takes on another timely topic in “The Vampire Diaries’ Nina Dobrev kisses & tells,” though “Pushy Parents—how to get yours to back off” would really have been timely here 40 years ago. Also on the contemporary tip, is “Partying with the boys of GLEE.”

And what about the men? Men’s Health has “The Men’s Health Guy” UFC Welterweight Champion Georges St.-Pierre on the cover with his immortal quote “It’s not the most powerful animal that survives. It’s the most efficient.” In addition to a free “Ultimate Fighter Workout Poster,” the issue shows you how to “Build Muscle in just 2 weeks!” and offers “Your No-Sweat Cardio Plan,” though “Secrets of Strength & Calm” may be just as useful.

Men’s Journal, meanwhile, has Jake Gyllenhaal on the cover (he’s apparently “The barefoot-running, hill-attacking life of the fittest guy in Hollywood”), and a hill-attacking story of a different sort: “Golf Gone Wild—extreme courses, hi-tech gear and killer workouts.”

Finally, Bella plays both ends of the age game, with “Keeping up with…Kim Kardashian” the cover story, and “Jane Fonda defies age” the second lead. We’ll leave it up to you to decide who looks best—all things considered.

I remember "The Fight of the Century" by Jim Bessman

For fight fans of a certain age, tonight marks the 40th anniversary of "The Fight of the Century," that is, the historic first fight between Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier at Madison Square Garden.

It was the first-ever fight between undefeated heavyweight champions, with Frazier winning by unanimous decision after an explosive left hook dropped Ali in the 15th round (title fights went 15 rounds back then). Ali gamely got back up and finished the bout on his feet, after which both pugilists went to the hospital.

I would have been 18 on March 8, 1971 (if I'm doing the math right), but I do remember that night as if it were, well, 40 years ago.

I was a huge Ali fan from before he won the title in 1964 with his gigantic upset over Sonny Liston, and not many people can honestly say that they were fans of the brash braggart Cassius Clay way back then--let alone after he embraced the Nation of Islam immediately following that first Liston fight. Something about his personality and poetry and sense of clownish fun appealed to me--and that he could back up his boastful predictions.  Then, when he sacrificed the best three and a-half years of his career after refusing to be inducted into the Army at the height of the Vietnam War, he turned himself from great athlete/entertainer to courageous anti-war advocate.

The "Fight of the Century," between the two diametrically opposite undefeateds (Frazier was the classic puncher, Ali the boxer--and Frazier was a proud American with no political or religious controversies), was the most anticipated sports event of its time. And it was the only professional Ali fight I didn't see live, either on broadcast or closed-circuit TV.

I happened to be in Lincoln, Nebraska, visiting an aunt and uncle, and unable to get to a closed-circuit venue. So I stayed glued to a radio, where the best I could get was a reporter calling into the station after each round with a recap. The anxiety was excruciating, as was the gradual realization that my hero was going to lose.

Many years later I had the opportunity to become friends with the Ali camp, most notably Howard Bingham, his longtime photographer and best friend. But I also met Ali, his wife Lonnie, his trainer Angelo Dundee. I even met Joe Frazier after standing in line at Barnes & Noble to get his book autographed.

I'll always remember Ali hugging me after I told him, truthfully, that not one day passed that I didn't imagine him winning back the title, which of course he finally did in the "Rumble In the Jungle" of Zaire, when he beat the invincible George Foreman on the miraculous night of October 30, 1974. That one I did see on closed-circuit, back home in Madison, Wisconsin, at the Dane County Coliseum.

An odd thing happened to me that night. It was a small crowd, as Ali wasn't given much chance--in fact, some boxing experts were genuinely afraid that he'd be killed. But when Foreman went down in the eighth round, everyone in the pro-Ali crowd went up. And when I finally sat down again, overcome with joy, I was in another row.

To this day, it's the only time in my life that I ever levitated.

[For more on "The Fight of the Century," check out my account at examiner.com: http://exm.nr/i43dBk]

Monday Magazine Roundup: A Quick look at today’s most interesting publications

The “new” Newsweek—having now allied with The Daily Beast Web site (the site is slugged in the Newsweek banner)--debuts with “150 Women Who Shake the World,” and Hillary Clinton appropriately gracing the cover.

Time counters with Fareed Zakaria’s “Yes, America Is in Decline”—cover-illustrated with a foam hand pointing down.

The extraordinary fall of  designer John Galliano gets columnist Bridget Foley wondering about Dior’s future on the front page of today’s WWD, which also spotlights Haider Ackermann’s “breathtaking collection” from Paris.

Billboard features Latin super-act Mana on the cover, and comes up with four items at the top of new Sony Music CEO Doug Morris’s agenda.

New York is out with its Best of New York 2011 special double issue, covering food, clothes, kids, nightlife, repairs, etc. The New Yorker, meanwhile, leads with Tina Fey’s “late-night tips” and reports on the BP oil spill and the films of the great Iranian director Abbas Kiarostami.

Entertainment Weekly inevitably splashes “Charlie Sheen’s War” on the cover. On a less sensational note, Fortune focuses on IBM, and poses the question “Google, Nike, Amazon, Apple, Coke…Who’s Number One” in an issue devoted to “The World’s Most Admired Companies.”

Finally, the March issue of Paris Vogue has a free kids fashion supplement! U.S. Vogue, of course, has Lady Gaga and “Born This Way” on the cover, but here’s a tip: Check out Ashford & Simpson’s outstanding “Born This Way” on YouTube. They wrote it a few years ago for a musical, and it’s performed by Broadway’s Terry Lavell.