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The Last Playboy : the High Life of Porfirio Rubirosa, by Shawn Levy
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At one gilded moment, his fame was so great that he was recognized all over the world simply by his nickname: Rubi. Pop songs were written about him. Women whom he had never met offered to leave their husbands for him. The gigantic peppermills brandished in Parisian restaurants became known, for reasons people at the time could only hint at, as "Rubirosas."
Porfirio Rubirosa was the last great playboy: the roué par excellence, a symbol of powerful masculinity, ubiquity, and easy-come-easy-go money.
"Work?" he shot back at an interviewer, scandalized at being asked what he did with his days. "It's impossible for me to work. I just don't have the time."
His natural habitat was the polo field, the nightclub, the Formula One racecourse, the bedroom.
He had an eye for beautiful women, particularly when they came with great wealth: He managed to marry in turn two of the richest women on the planet. Rumor had him bedding hundreds of famous and infamous women, including Christina Onassis, Eva Perón, and Zsa Zsa Gabor, who gleefully posed for paparazzi after he had blacked her eye in a fit of jealousy on the eve of his marriage to another woman.
But he was a man's man, too, a notable polo player and race-car driver with a gift for friendship, chumming around with the likes of Joe Kennedy, Frank Sinatra, Oleg Cassini, Aly Khan, and King Farouk.
When above-board, heiress-type income was scarce, he diverted himself with jewel-thievery, shadowy diplomatic errands, and any other illicit scam that came his way.
Whatever legitimate power he wielded came to him from the hands of Rafael Trujillo, one of the most bloodthirstily power-mad dictators the New World has ever seen. A nation quivered at Trujillo's name for decades, yet Rubi flouted his strictures without concern, as if Trujillo's iron grip could never crush him. And he was right.
When Rubi died at the age of fifty-six, wrapping his sports car around a tree in the Bois de Boulogne, an era went with him -- of white dinner jackets at El Morocco; of celebrity for its own sake when this was still a novelty; of glamour before it was available to the masses.
In The Last Playboy, Shawn Levy brings Rubi's giddy, hedonistic story to Technicolor life.
- Sales Rank: #1045833 in Books
- Published on: 2005-09-20
- Released on: 2005-09-20
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 9.00" h x 1.19" w x 6.00" l,
- Binding: Hardcover
- 368 pages
From Publishers Weekly
Even readers who find the idea of a "playboy" somewhat questionable won't be able to put down Levy's biography of Porfirio Rubirosa (1909– 1965). For one thing, there's delicious gossip: the women he courted (Eartha Kitt, Zsa Zsa Gabor), the men he prowled with (Prince Aly Khan, Sinatra, the Kennedys) and the fabulously wealthy women he married (Barbara Hutton, Doris Duke). There's also the story of his infamous penis—Doris Duke described it as "six inches in circumference... much like the last foot of a Louisville Slugger baseball bat with the consistency of a not completely inflated volleyball." Plus, there's sports-car racing, polo ponies and nonstop nightclubbing. But Levy, film critic for the Portland Oregonian, goes beyond the glitz to see Rubirosa as a product of a particular time and place: dictator Trujillo's Dominican Republic. Like many Trujillo intimates, Rubirosa was well paid for his loyalty, not his labor. By the 1960s, when Rubirosa crashed his Ferrari in Paris's Bois de Boulogne, he was an anachronism—at that point, even wealthy men were trying to have careers of some sort. All Rubi knew was how to enjoy himself, so this bubbly bio is a perfect tribute. Photos.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
From Booklist
Porfirio Rubirosa is a name likely to be unfamiliar to anyone born after 1960, but he certainly made a name for himself in the 1950s--as a playboy par excellence--and his life story proves well worth the telling. Written in a breezy style perfectly suitable for conjuring Rubirosa's seductive personality and the steamy atmospheres that he created and in which he flourished, Levy's complete reconstruction of his life starts with his childhood in the Dominican Republic as the son of a military man turned diplomat. Rubirosa married a daughter of Dominican strongman Raphael Trujillo, later married a French actress, and then wed two fabulously wealthy American heiresses. He died (at age 56, in 1965) as he lived--zooming in a fast car; unfortunately, on this occasion, his car crashed, and he died before reaching a hospital. By the author of Rat Pack Confidential (1998), this biography is both an anatomy of shallowness and a compelling piece of social history. Jay Freeman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Review
“Fascinating . . . A compulsive read. Shawn Levy is one of our best popular culture journalist-historians.” (Lewis MacAdams, author of Birth of the Cool: Beat, Bebop and the American Avant Garde)
“Levy goes beyond the glitz to see Rubirosa as a product of a particular time and place…a perfect tribute.” (Publishers Weekly)
“A terrific story about a fascinating character.” (John Malkovich)
“Shawn Levy has written more than a good book—this is an irresistible read. Hollywood will soon come knocking.” (Douglas Brinkley, Professor of History and Director of the Roosevelt Center at Rulane University)
“A compelling piece of social history…written in a breezy style perfectly suitable for conjuring Rubirosa’s seductive personality.” (Booklist)
“As Shawn Levy amply documents in his bubbly, breathless and appropriately inconsequential biography, Rubirosa worked hard at having fun.” (New York Times)
“A fitting elegy for a forgotten boldfaced name and a thoughtful study of mid-20th-century Pan-American politics.” (Entertainment Weekly)
Most helpful customer reviews
42 of 46 people found the following review helpful.
Inconsequential Charm
By Rob Hardy
If you have never heard of Porfirio Rubirosa, that's no surprise. He died in 1965, and wasn't good at much of anything beyond having a good time, but at that he was extraordinarily good. His was a life of inconsequence, and perhaps inconsequential also is the biography _The Last Playboy: The High Life of Porfirio Rubirosa_ (4th Estate) by Shawn Levy. Inconsequential, but also glittering and amusing. The character Rubirosa made for himself was, Levy says, "nightclubber, cuckolder, kept man, gigolo, scene maker, skirt chaser, dandy." He was hardly a careful examiner of his own life, but when he explained why he did poorly as a student, he was exactly right: "The only things that interested me were sports, girls, adventures, celebrities - in short, life." His limited interpretation of what life was all about was similar to his limited principles. "It has always been one of my chief principles: I will risk anything to avoid being bored." He succeeded wonderfully, and this account of his life, written in a perfect breezy and joking style, is an entertainment that few will find boring.
"Rubi", as everyone knew him, was born in 1909 in the Dominican Republic, and served intermittently as a roving official for that country. He married five times before his death in 1965, to actresses and heiresses. How did Rubi manage to ingratiate himself to so many women, and get so much support from them? There are lots of answers. He was darkly handsome when such looks were thought fashionable and seductive (even leading to the famous backlash "Latins are Lousy Lovers" by Helen Lawrenson in _Esquire_ in 1936). He kept himself in good shape; he was a keen polo player. He was intelligent, capable with five languages, fluent in three. He genuinely liked women. "They want to be happy," he explained. "I try to make them happy." He was successful in these attempts countless times, at least in the short run. He liked women ideally to be beautiful and rich, but was able to spread his happiness with others who lacked such traits. Many simply found him irresistible when they could resist many others. "He wraps his charm around your shoulders like a Russian sable coat," said Hedda Hopper. He was extremely sociable, and made himself comfortable with such lights as the Kennedys and Oleg Cassini. A photographer noted, "He can meet you for a minute and a month later remember you very well." His partying consisted of heavy drinking that didn't seem to have deleterious aftereffects. When pal Sammy Davis saw him the next day after they had been carousing heavily the night before, he asked in astonishment how Rubi could still look and feel good. "Your profession is being an entertainer," came the reply. "Mine is being a playboy." It was his job, but he never found it work. A naive journalist once asked when he found time for work. "Work?" came the reply. "It's impossible for me to work. I just don't have the time." Those who sought to explain his charm in the most fundamental way found an old standby, crediting his success to his having a sexual organ of supremely massive size. It was talked about enough that its dimensions were even specified in Truman Capote's unfinished novel _Answered Prayers_, and waiters would call the largest peppermill in the house "The Rubirosa."
He was enormously famous during his heyday; Groucho Marx particularly liked making jokes that included his name, and few had to ask "Who's that?" The tabloids had a fine time, with headlines like "Cash Box Casanova" or, knowingly, "Who Donged the Ding-Dong Daddy?" He left no children, no good works, no legacy, no example to follow. He was, from many angles, a contemptible cad, but he was terrifically good at living his life as he saw fit. Many found him irresistible, and it may be a guilty pleasure, but this biography is irresistible fun.
26 of 30 people found the following review helpful.
An excellent, entertaining read
By Roberto
I decided to check this book out when I heard that John Malkovich had bought the movie rights. I was not disappointed. Mr. Levy tells a rivoting tale that provides a window into a world of celebrity, fame and debauchery. I didn't know much about Porfirio Rubirosa before I opened the book, but by the end I felt like we were old, barmy friends.
12 of 14 people found the following review helpful.
Where have all the playboys gone?
By Loves the View
Imagine? He fills your room with flowers. He changes his hotel room to be next to yours to "feel you through the walls." Maybe he sends a limo and escort to take you shopping for something special to wear for dinner. He's a great dancer. He's dashing on a horse or in a race car. The impeccable manners match his perfectly tailored clothes.
Why would you think that he represents a Saddam Hussein style manager of a Caribbean nation and its torture chambers? Why would you think he's an accessory to murder? a murderer? a jewel thief? a profiteer from passports sold to Jews desperate to escape Hitler? Now what is it he does with the fleet of fishing boats his 3rd wife gave him? He doesn't think about any of this, so why should you?
Levy does a great job of tracking Rubi down. It was an intercontinental life in 5 languages, but that would be the easy part, since facts (the ones that Rubi doesn't want anyone to know) are like the proverbial jello nailed to a wall.
In his last chapter Levy tries to opine on the meaning of it all and finds very little. What if Rubi had joined the Dominican resistance? (would never cross his mind.) The closest thing he finds to meaning is a Langston Hughes obituary noting Rubi's (possible) race, which no one had noticed before.
Rubi was a man of his time, but not all time. Why?
Where are the Rubis of the world today? Have divorce lawyers and pre-nups driven them out of business? Have the women lost their sense of romance? Rubi with Madonna? Paris Hilton? Oprah? Martha Stewart? They just don't seem so emotionally vulnerable. Maybe the playboys are still here, sub rosa (pun) in blue jeans, the veritable playboy next door. Or maybe our consciousness has been raised and no acting career can be built when you're seen with the rep. of a 3rd world strong man. Maybe men have become better attuned to women, such that Rubi's sweet nothings are not the tonic they once could be. Maybe drugs have sapped the energy needed to drink all night and play polo the next day.
I became aware of Rubi through my interest in Doris Duke. Levy cites the Mansfield book as the best bio of her. While Mansfield has put together the story, it needs a lot more sifting through. Levy's 3 chapters on Doris flesh out her story. I'd like for Levy go back to his notes, maybe team up with Mansfield, and pack in more research. Doris has (or maybe Doris is) a story aching to be told. The survivors, just like those of Rubi, won't be here forever. Levy, with this difficult work, shows that he's up to it.
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