The 4th of July To-Do List
LESSONS:
THE 4th OF JULY TO-DO LIST
IF you’re stumped about how to spend the the holiday weekend, follow the lead of Hollywood’s iconic silver screen goddesses
- Written By
- EVELYN CROWLEY
Between days spent lounging poolside or lobbing tennis balls on a pristine Bel-Air court and martini-fueled late nights at Ciro’s, it’s easy to imagine Hollywood’s iconic silver screen goddesses as experts on the subject of leisure. So if you’re stumped about how to spend the the holiday weekend, we suggest following their lead. Whether you swim with exotic wildlife like Tippi Hedren or fly-fish in a brisk New England stream à la Bette Davis, it’s sure to be a 4th of July worth savoring.
HEAD FOR THE OUTDOORS LIKE BETTE DAVIS
When the actress needed a reprieve from Hollywood, she would decamp to her New Hampshire cottage, Buttermilk, where you could have found her knee-deep in the nearest river with a fly-fishing rod, intent on catching that night’s dinner. VIOLET SAYS: Book a room at Twin Farms in Vermont for a weekend of hiking, fly-fishing, and cocktail hour croquet.
GO SWIMMING WITH A GOOD CHUM LIKE TIPPI HEDREN
One might think Hedren’s notoriously harrowing experience on the set of the Hitchcock 1963 thriller The Birds would have turned her off the animal kingdom all together. But in the early 1970’s, the actress, together with daughter Melanie Griffith and then husband, Noel Marshall, adopted Neil (pictured), the first in a series of live-in lions. Today, Hedren serves as founder and president of The Shambala Preserve, a big cat sanctuary in Acton, California. VIOLET SAYS: While it’s unlikely you have a pet lion or tiger at your disposal, a D. Porthault Cat Tigre Beach Towel makes an exceptionally chic substitute.
HOST AN ALL NIGHT BACCHANALIA LIKE JANE FONDA
In 1965, Jane Fonda threw a 4th of July bash at her Malibu beach house that drew together Hollywood icons (Gene Kelly, Lauren Bacall, Sidney Poitier, producer Darryl Zanuck) and the newest additions to Tinseltown (Jack Nicholson, Dennis Hopper, Natalie Wood). The festivities, co-hosted by her father and brother, included a performance by The Byrds and lasted until sunrise. VIOLET SAYS: Recuperate the day after your own beach bash with Fonda's engrossing autobiography My Life So Far. It will (almost) make you forget your champagne-induced headache.
INDULGE YOUR COMPETITVE STREAK LIKE KATHARINE HEPBURN
Hepburn and Spencer Tracy’s sparring in films like Adam’s Rib (1949) was Classic Hollywood at its finest. So it’s not surprising that the famously headstrong actress made a worthy opponent offscreen as well. She excelled at tennis, which she played every morning well into her eighth decade, and also could hold her own on the golf course. Then of course, there was Parcheesi, a game for which Hepburn’s mastery is said to have been unrivaled.
CURL UP WITH A GOOD BOOK LIKE DIANE KEATON
A voracious reader, the contents on Keaton’s bookshelf run the gamut from design and architecture tomes like Todd Hido’s House Hunting to Tina Fey’s Bossypants. The actress has also penned several books of her own including this year’s memoir, Let’s Just Say It Wasn’t Pretty, in which she muses on subjects like aging and beauty. VIOLET SAYS: A beach read with a royal pedigree, Helen Rappaport’s The Romanov Sisters is poised to be one of the buzziest biographies of the summer.
