PR Magic Turns Stabbing Into Cute Foible Of The Rich
Former nightlife big shot and current honest blogger Steve Lewis reminisces today about his experiences with the clubland PR business. He starts out by saying, "When I used to hire PR it was for damage control." Not for strategic brand building outreach? Such a forthright man! Then he tells a story about a long-ago high profile stabbing incident that made its way onto Page Six; it sums up everything you need to know about spin, gossip, and the dangers of imaginary caviar forks:
Steve Lewis: When I used to hire PR it was for damage control. At one point Chris Paciello, who was an operator out of Miami, and I were talking in my VIP room and he and I had a very sketchy past, so I was being nice and he was being himself. Anyway he asked me for a phone number, which I went and got the phone number, and when I came back my room was empty. It turned out that he had stabbed somebody in my club. This is a true story. I went outside; I knew there was going to be cops all over. My PR, with my staff, they handled it. The next day someone said did you pick up the paper? And there on Page Six it said there was an argument between a famous Russian photographer, who was sitting next to Miss Russia, and Chris Paciello, and an argument broke out, and Chris stabbed him with a caviar fork. And the brilliance of it was we never served caviar, I don't even know what a caviar fork is. They didn't hide the fact that something had happened, they created this whole image of these fabulous people having this argument, and this little toy thing happened.
