One dinner. Four journalists. And you. Whom do you choose?

sports:
frank deford
shelby strother
jim murray
wc heinz

 

George Plimpton and Dan Jenkins without question and likely Willie Morris and Damon Runyon.

 

This topic reminds me of the show the late Steve Allen used to do on PBS -- "Meeting of Minds." Each show would have a dinner consisting of four famous people from history. He'd have, say, Genghis Khan, Benjamin Franklin, Joan of Arc and Sigmund Freud. The "dinner conversations" drew, wherever possible, on the subjects' own writings (probably had to wing it with G-Khan, though). I thought it was TV at its best. Of course, today that concept is epitomized by "Cavemen."

Anyone else remember this show?

 

I remember it vividly. Invariably Mr. Allen's wife, Jayne Meadows, made one appearance each season.

I'd also like to add a name to my fantasy guest list. AJ Liebling. It shames me to have overlooked him.

 

I like that one.

 

Alan Coren
P.J. O'Rourke
Molly Ivins
Dave Barry

 

Journalists, alive:

Charlie Pierce
Jeff MacGregor
Scott Price
Gay Talese

Journalists, no longer with us:

Joseph Mitchell
David Halberstam (hurts to type that)
A.J. Liebling
Jim Murray

Writers, alive:

Tim O'Brien
Tobias Wolff
Nick Hornby
Elliott Perlman

Writers, no longer with us:

Graham Greene
John Steinbeck
Richard Hugo
Papa Hemingway

Ladies night:

Jhumpa Lahiri
Zadie Smith
Pam Houston
J.K. Rowling

One person I always wanted to tip a few back with, did, and ended up wishing I had not:

David Simon

 

I'm counting 21 as my date so that I could add Big Dog to my list. I knew something did not seem right.
I will just listen and keep the grey goose flowing.

 

Boom, we need to seriously do this thing. Or at least take the women to Serendipity for frozen hot chocolate during the holidays.

 

Frozen hot chocolate?

 

I thought for sure that would end with Jonesy.

 

I've spent more time thinking about this and I've decided to break this into two groupings:

• Newspapers: Jimmy Breslin, Red Fisher, Bob Woodward and Paul Zimmerman.
• Magazines: Dan Jenkins, Chris Jones, Gare Joyce and Michael Farber