For these two gala planners, TIFF has already begun
Humanitarian relief group’s benefit regularly draws wattage, both society and celebrity sort
“We’re ordering McDonald’s,” announces one of Toronto’s more glamorous PR pros when I shuffle into her extra-fashionable house, tucked away near Casa Loma, on a cul-de-sac shrouded in shrubbery that’s Lagerfeld-worthy.
“Would you like something?” follows up Natasha Koifman, her eyes Bambi-bright and her hair falling down in artful tussles.
One can’t say no to Mickey Dee fries, now can we? Paging Uber-Eats.
High-low is something clearly not lost on the social media powerhouse and founder of the eponymously named NKPR, standing here in a space that’s a cubist glass structure wedged into an older coach house with a red-bricked roof, attached at one point to a house that was once residence to long-gone rail magnate (and party animal) William Mackenzie.
In a home that is now a vision in black and white — contemporary Bel-Air, if you will — complete with a pang-causing collection of photography (see: the Bert Stern original of Marilyn Monroe in one room), she’s surrounded by a phalanx of assistants, pinging out to-do lists.
Sometime later, when our guilty grub has arrived and Koifman has changed into a plunging Zuhair Murad gown she’s picked out for the Toronto Star shoot we have planned, I notice the choice diamond on one of the fingers ducking into a packet of fries.
On her own to-do list of late, as it happens: get engaged.
“Congratulations!” trills Suzanne Boyd, joining us soon enough at the house. The striking-as-ever editrixabout-town — set to co-chair, with Koifman, one of the Toronto International Film Festival’s biggest galas happening next month — is as eager as I am to learn about the marry-me compact, made only weeks back. “We were walking down Hudson St. (in New York City),” the woman with the fries and the ring starts to say, weaving a story she’s gotten used to telling. She and her live-in partner of the last year, Anthony Mantella — a race-car driver and construction scion — were passing by Marisa Perry Atelier, when he announced that he’d spotted the ring that he said was “the one.” They went in and got it. Just like that: they were engaged.
“I didn’t think it would . . . but it does feel different,” muses Koifman about the idea of making it official. Married once before, she also has a son who just graduated from law school.
The woman famous for only wearing black then adds, playfully: “I’m only getting married in black, though.” Noted. Meanwhile, there’s another, more pressing engagement on her mind: the Artists for Peace and Justice benefit that Koifman is orchestrating on Sept. 10. Joining her, as she did last year, is Boyd: two ladies active on the Toronto scene gifted with the ability to put some oomph into their philanthropy.
In aid of a non-profit organization founded by Academy Award-winning filmmaker Paul Haggis — one with an eye toward addressing issues of poverty and inequality in countries around the world, particularly Haiti — the annual $2,500per-person black-tie regularly draws wattage, both the society and celebrity sort.
In 2016, for instance, the biggest name was Sean Penn. This year, I’m told, Ben Stiller is co-hosting and the special honoree will be singersongwriter Jackson Browne, with many other names, such as Susan Sarandon, expected. Past events have attracted everyone from Olivia Wilde to Alexander Skarsgard.
Where to? The gala, for the first time, shifts to the Art Gallery of Ontario.
For both chairs, it’s personal. Boyd, who’s of Creole descent and was reared in the tiny island nation of Dominica, tells me she’s always felt an affinity with the Haitian culture. Moreover, her own mother narrowly missed being on the island during the tragic 2010 earthquake through a series of divine circumstances. Koifman, meanwhile, has been devoted to the APJ and its work in poverty-stricken Haiti since she helped launch this tentpole TIFF event nine years ago.
And while the latter has had the opportunity to visit the country a few times, she and Boyd travelled together there for the first time just last year, to take in the ceremony of the first graduating class of a school that APJ helped to build. Clearly, it was an experience that only helped to further a bond that is now 20 years old.
“I just developed such an emotional connection to the cause,” Boyd says. “Natasha inspired me.”
Being two of the alpha-est ladies on the Toronto scene — both unabashedly ambitious and not afraid to trade on their glamour, inevitably targets of whatever slights that combo will sometimes spur — I take the opportunity to ask each woman about the other.
Boyd, who currently tops the masthead at Zoomer but made her first mark in the city as the game-changing editor of Flare, turns to Koifman and laughs, “I can’t imagine a time I didn’t know you!”
She goes on: “She’s the kindest person — but kindness doesn’t mean not strong. Natasha is selfmade, especially in an era where everything is evolving so much, in terms of PR and media, and how content gets out. Making things sings for her clients on social media! In terms of this gala, it’s all just coming from such a deep place and it’s only to help.”
Koifman’s turn: “I have such admiration for Suzanne. She works hard, is dedicated . . . but what I really appreciate is that she has a point of view. It’s important. In a world where we are distracted all the time, she’s almost a compass. I value that so much. We all need those people in our lives who’ll give it to us straight.”
Boyd, who’s every bit the news junkie as she is a classic fashionista — one of the most informed people about politics I’ve ever met, honestly — parses the idea of the modern woman who is as cerebral as she is fierce: “It used to be that fashion was the F-word of female empowerment . . . like, how could we take you seriously when you like a heel?”
“But fashion can be really empowering and I don’t mean that in the Ivanka Trump sense,” she continues. “It’s not just about marketing . . . but how you look, how you feel. For us, fashion can also be a calling card.”
It certainly seemed to be the case when our APJ gala photo shoot went down around Koifman’s storybook pool. The extra-tall Boyd — matching Koifman by donning a dusky, voluminous Rick Owens gown — struck a pose, as her cochair climbed on top of a pool chair to get aligned, height-wise. Together, they looked like two high-fashion doves.