Billy Cross, Michael James, Julia Child, Simone Beck: Casa de Billy Barcelona: May 17, 2009

I arrived back in Barcelona a few days ago. Only here until next week. Wednesday, May 20th to be exact. I did not mean to come back to Barcelona. I was acutally. after my birthday celebrations in Miami, on my way back to Mexico City and Cuernavaca. But because of the flu scare I decided to wait a little bit to see how the crisis played itself out. So, I came back to Barcelona for a week.

Tomorrow, the 18th of May would of been the 59th birthday of my ex-boyfriend and business partner for 20 years; Michael James. His full name was Michael James Vlamis. He was half French (mothers side) and half Greek on his fathers side (thus Vlamis). But he was known professionally, as a chef and cookbook author and food writer, as Michael James. He died from complications from AIDS on the 25th of July, 1993.

I met Michael in September of 1972. At the time he was working for Simone Beck the co-author with Julia Child of Mastering the Art of French Cooking. In 1968 Michael had written to Julia Child and told her that he wanted to be a chef. She wrote back to him and told him to go to France, especially since he had family living in Paris. (part of his mother's family). So he showed Julias letter to his parents and off he went to France. They thought it would be just a 3 months sojurn to France. He was a student at the University of California at Berkeley where his father was a professor. His mother was shocked at the idea of a child of hers becomming a chef. For her being a chef was not an acceptable vocation for someone that came from a family"like us".

But off Michael went to France. One of his aunts was Editor in Chief of the French edition of House and Garden Magazine. Her name was Francoise. She welcomed him warmly and loved the idea that he wanted to become a chef. She took him with her to the Club Gastronome de Paris. During a luncheon she introduced him to Mme. Simone Beck who was Julia Childs French partner.

He was asked to call on "Simca" as she was known to her friend, the next day. Michaels' French was perfect since he had been speaking it since he was a young boy. Obviously, his native language was English. Plus, he knew how to write and had a classics education at one of the finest universities in the world, U.C. Berkeley.

Michael was the perfect assistant for Simca as she wanted to start writing a new book in English (which she spoke fluently, but did not write fluently). So, she asked Michael to go to work for her.

In 1972 he was on a book tour with her for the publisher Alfred A. Knopf. They came to San Francisco. I was working for Alice Waters at Chez Panisse in Berkeley. I worked as a barman upstairs. One thing led to another and Michael and I became lovers and in December of 1972 I moved to Paris to live with Michael. We lived in Paris and in the south of France at Simone Becks estate, Bramafam, near Mougins, inland from Cannes.

After a while, with some difficulty, "Simca" realized that I was Michael's boyfriend and I was not going to be easily kicked to one side. Simca had lot's gay male friends. The cookbook author Richard Olney being one of them. But her first marriage was to a closeted gay man and that marrige was never consumated and after a short while she divorced him. The great love of her life was her second husband, the wonderful, smart, charming and totally heterosexual Jean Fischbacher. Simca had accepted that Michael was gay but she had hard time (in the beginning) to accept that he had a long time companion. Me. But within the first year that I was with Michael she accepted me totally and for the next 20 plus years I never had a problem with Simca.

Julia Child, however, was another kettle of fish. She had a very complicated relationship with Simca. In the beginning there were three authors of Mastering the Art of French Cooking. Julia, Simca and their 3rd partner Louisette Berthole. Louisette was with them only on Mastering Vol I. Vol. II was Julia and Simca. But after Vol I was published Julia decided to get rid of Simca and publish Vol II without Simca. Well, lucikly they had a contract and Simca hired a lawyer in New York to defend her rights. Simca told me that Julia told her that it was Paul Child, Julia's arrogant and neurotic husband, that wanted to get rid of Simca. Simca never bought that version. And from that moment on she never trusted Julia. She loved her as a sister, but she never trusted her with money and business dealings. Simca was very smart when it came to money and business. She came from a very successfull family that owned vineyards, wineries and realestate in Paris, Normandy and in Cannes. Her family also owned the company that made Benedicine Liquor.

When Michael and I started the Great Chefs of France Cooking School in the Napa Valley of California, in 1974, our first visiting chef was Simone Beck. Julia was furious. The school had attracted a huge amount of press. It was billed by the press (not by us) as the Most Expensive Cooking School in the World. It cost 1,500 US dollars for 5 days. Including lodging. Simca, Michael and I and the students all stayed at High Tree Farm, the 9 acre estate that we had rented in the Napa Valley near the small town of Rutherford. It was a glorious place. It had a total of 9 bedrooms with baths, guesthouse, staff quarters, flower gardens, herb gardens, stables for 6 horses, tennis courts and a beautiful swimming pool and garden that had been designed by Tommy Church one of the foremost garden designers of his time. We had 12 students that came from all over the world. CBS evening news with John Chancelor covered it live from New York. Craig Claibourne of the New York Times did a major article on the school. It was a great success and much fun.

But Julia did not feel the same way about Simca's (and our) success. After the piece aired on the national evening news she called us up. She was furious. She got all three of us on diffeent extension telephones and told us that she had to protect Simca from being associated with homsexuals like us, etc. etc. Simca finally had to tell Julia "shut up". She said, " I appreciate your concern about me but I trust Michael and Billy and we are having great success her in the Napa Valley. Finally, Simca gave Michael and I the "hang up the phone" sign and she had it out with Julia ; one to one of the phone. I only heard Simca's side of the conversation. But after Simca was off of the phone she was pissed off. She said that Julia was jealous of our success and because she had not made the decision to come and teach at the school. Actually, Michael had asked Julia to come with Simca and to teach at the school and she declined. She was too busy. Also, we paid Simca, 10,000 dollars for 5 days plus 2 round trip first class airfares from France. Julia had told Michael that she did not work for that small amount of money. We decided, with Simca, to immediately accept Julia's comment and we did not offer to raise the offer.

It was almost 5 years before Julia agreed to teach at our cooking school in the Napa Valley. She accepted 10,000 dollars for the week. I have heard and read comments of many people saying that Julia never accepted money for the public thinigs she did. That was definitely not my experience. Everything was always first class around Julia. As it should of been. Hotel suites,flowers, limousines, hairdresser, make-up artist, etc. She told us she never wanted to teach with Simca. Simca taught for one week, then left the Napa Valley and went back to France and then a month later Julia arrived and taught for a week. Julia was very insecure around Simca. Most of the ideas and most of the recipes for those
Mastering the Art of French Cooking books came from Simca, and in the beginning, Lousiette Berthole.

But it was mostly Simca that would find the recipes, test them and send them onto Julia to adapt to the American kitchen. Simca was a visionary and loved to experiment. Julia was pragmatic and dogmatic. In the end Julia ruled.

Eventually Robert Mondavi offered us a deal to take the school to the Robert Mondavi Winery in Oakville. We had gone to Robert Mondavi in 1973 (as we had gone to all of the major winemakers in the Napa Valley) and asked if he would become a sponsor of the Great Chefs of France Cooking School and he flatly said no. But through that experience we became lifelong friends with Margrit Biever, his Director of Public Relations and the woman that would become the second Mrs. Robert Mondavi. To this day I cherish my friendship with Margrit Biever Mondavi.

But Julia always held a grude against Michael and myself. Also, she had very outdated and strange view points about gay men. She told Simca that she thought that many gay men were involved in S and M sex and that they secretly wore leather clothes when they went out looking for sex. I don't know who Julia knew that was gay but obviously she had gotten to know or observed some "leather queens".

When Julia finally came to the Napa Valley to teach at our cooking school we had a problem. She had several gay men that worked for her. Principally, Bob Johnson, her lawyer. Well Bob had a boyfriend by the name of Hal, that Julia despized. Julia did not like Hal because he was gay. She did not know that he owned a gay sex club in San Francisco called the Cauldron, in the Folsom street part of town. It was a pretty sleezy gay sex club. Hal was a smart and sweet guy that figured out that his "niche" in the gay sex scene was to paint the walls of his club black and he bought about 15 claw foot white procelain bath tubs and put them around the club. Each bathtub had a pin spot that shined on the tub. Normally the kind of spot to illuminate a beautiful arrangement of flowers in a hotel lobby. But this light illuminated a naked man sitting in the tub while 5 or 6 men would stand around and urinate and masterbate and ejaculate on him.

Julia also had a couple of production assistants that were gay that worked for her on her tv show. All in all she arrived with 3 or 4 gay men that worked for her plus her long time companion and assistant Rosemary Mannell and an assistant named Maggie.
Rosemary Mannell was a wonderful person. Everything that Julia was not, Rosemary was. Rosie always had a smile on her face. Very smart,very kind. I think she worked for Julia for mayber 30 years. Rosemary protected Julia. But unlike some of the other people around Julia (including Paul Child) she did it with a great deal of kindness and in a friendly manner. Eventually, Rosie got sick. She had to retire. Later on she developed Alzheimer's. She also had very little money. Catherine Brandel and a group of Rosie's friends put together some money to help take care of Rosie. They asked me to donate; which I did. They asked Julia, her long time friend and employeer to donate. She declined. Catherine told me her response to the request to help Rosie financially was to Catherine: "you know dearie we don't do that kind of thing". I had heard that many times from Julia over the years. Julia, many times, spoke in the plural form "we". "We" was the way that she would sometime refer to Julia Child. It was a little bit like the way the Pope speaks. I remember I was producing a live cooking event for Julia in Phoneix, Arizona to benefit the Phoneix Symphony. A local tv show had asked if she would come to the station and be interviewed. She said to me " you know Billy. We don't go to them (meaning the media), they come to us". That is also the time, after a long day of work that she cracked open a bottle of booze and poured us a drink and as she flopped down in a big easy chair she turned to me and said " Well dearie, better a little alkie than a little druggie". That was Julia.
Eventually, Rosemary Mannell, after all of those years with Julia, died in poverty. After Rosie was put in an institution I never heard Julia mention her name. But Julia kept on going.

Bob Johnson, Julia's lawyer called me about 2 months before their arrival and said "Look Billy, we need your help. All of our boyfriends want to come up to the Napa Valley for the week and hang out with us but we can't let Julia know or she will have a fit". So I went out and rented a house for the "boyfriends". They were never allowed at the Robert Mondavi winery, where the classes and dinners were held. But we hired a wonderful chef and a staff to cook and take care of the "boyfriends". Michael and I, and many of our staff (many who were gay men ) would put in a 12 hour day at the winery and then in the evening go over and spend part of the night enjoying the company of the gay men that silently and quitely lived with their lovers behind Julia's back. We took care of Bob Johnson and the other gay men around Julia because we were embrassed that she did not care enough about them. She did not recogize the whole of them. It is as if Julia had the ability to pick what she needed about people and then toss what was left over, like garbage, out of the window.

Fast forwarding into the early 80's. Bob Johnson, his boyfriend Hal, and all of the other gay men that were around Julia, died. Bob died about 1986. They all died of AIDS. Never a peep from Julia. I sent her a letter sending my concolences about the death of her lawyer Bob Johnson. Never a response.

In 1982 Michael James was diagnosed as being HIV positive. As we walked out of the doctors office he turned to me and said " we will keep this to ourselves". If Julia ever finds out that I am sick she will turn on us again. So until 1990 we kept quiet about his HIV status. Which lots of gay men did. But then he decided that he needed to "come out of the closet about having AIDS" and he did. In a big way. He started giving speeches all over the USA and in France about AIDS and HIV and how not to get it and how it felt to be infected, etc, etc.

In 1992 Michael and I decided to celebrate our 20th Anniversary as a couple and 20 years of The Great Chefs of France Cooking School. There was a committee that sponsored the event. They were all women whom we had known over the last 20-25 years. The list of sponsors of the event were accompolished women like: Margrit Biever Mondavi, Alice Waters of Chez Panisse, Catherine Brandel of Chez Panisse, Rick O'Connell, famous California Chef and cookbook writer, Jeannette Costeiu from Miami, etc, etc,. Michael asked me to ask Julia to be on the committee. For some reason, Julia and I had maintained a distant but somewhat friendly relationship. We would talk on the phone a couple of times a year. We would see each other at certain wine and food events. I even produced some cooking demonstrations for her to benefit various charities. I was invited to go see her and her husband Paul in Santa Barbara. Michael was never invited. I think that Julia had a certain respect for me because I was not afraid or intimidated by her. I respected her talent and what she had done to bring the importantce of good food to America. Also, she knew that I knew that she hated gay people. And I think that possibly, in some way , she needed to say to herself , "well, I may not like gay people but I have Billy Cross as a friend" " they can't say I am completley anti-gay".

So, when it came time to ask Julia to be on the committee for the Celebration dinner that was to benefit people with HIV and AIDS it fell to me to ask her. I sent her a letter. I had learned a long time ago to always address letters to Julia not as Julia Child but as Mrs. Paul Child. She liked that. I sent off a letter requesting the use of her name for the committee. No response. Finally, I called her up on the 'phone. I asked her straight out if she would let us put her on the committee. Her comment; straight out, was: "Dearie, you know we never get involved in these kinds of things". That was it. Done.
We had the event, it was successfull and fun. The San Francisco Gay Mens Chorus came to the event that was held in the Napa Valley. About 300 guests came and friends and chefs and winemakers from all over the world attended. It was great.
Within 1 year Michael was dead.

A memorial in his honor was being organized in San Francisco. A couple of days before the event a producer from Peter Jennings office at ABC News in New York called and asked if they could do a live feed from the service and could they interview me. I was inclined to say no; but I felt I owed it to Michael to make a few comments.
They inteviewd several of the over 600 people in attendance. The live feed lasted about 5-6 minutes. I am glad I allowed them to do it. I still have a copy of the piece and every few years I pull it out and remember.

A week later a simple 3-5 notecard arrived from Julia. It said, "I saw Peter Jennings piece on Michael's memorial. So sorry he died." Love, Julia.
That was it.

When she died I was living in Mexico City. I followed the wishes of her niece who suggested that people get together and have a dinner to celebrate Julia's life. I cried and cooked for 3 days and invited a large group of friends to celebrate Julia's life with me. I kept thinking that I was going to ruin the food by letting my tears fall into the batter for the genoise. Like the beautiful kitchen scene in the brilliant book by Laura Esquivel, "Like Water for Chocolate" But it all turned out well. Some of the people I invited had never heard of Julia Child. But like many Mexicans they were respectful of my need to have them with me during this meal to honor Julia and to allow me to share my joys and sorrows.

Like all of us, Julia was flawed. Sometimes her flaws were very painful to me personally and to other people that I knew. But in the end I am grateful for her to lead me to Chez Panisse where I met Michael and Simca and to lead me to a life in "La Belle France" and the Napa Valley and Mexico and now to Barcelona.

Thanks Julia, may you rest in peace. And I think it is important to say that I forgive you. You had your own demons and , again, like all of us, you did the best you could.

love,
Billy