Camille, Aidan, Mike and Megumi came too!
What becomes a legend most? Take Camille O’Sullivan. Take Aidan Gillen. Take Mike Scott. Take Megumi Igarashi. Last Saturday night at a party in a secret venue in Dublin, it was like the illustrious Algonquin Round Table in New York during its 1920s’ golden era — with Dorothy Parker, Harpo Marx, Tallulah Bankhead, Noel Coward et al.
Just as gilded, the party in Dublin was, it turned out, a testament to the modern age, modern manners and the modern relationship...
In a brown faux fur ankle-length coat, stunning Camille — who is one of my favourite torch singers of all time — was sitting at an adjoining table to her ex Mike Scott, who was wearing a cowboy hat and is one of my favourite rock-soul singers of all time, and with whom Camille has a young daughter.
In full Japanese costume was Mike’s beautiful wife Megumi, mother of Mike’s new-ish baby and a Japanese feminist artist of world repute.
An Irish actor of just as giant world repute (Game of Thrones, The Wire, The Dark Knight Rises) Aidan Gillen, in a jumper and jeans, was sitting with his partner Camille, who was sipping whiskey because she had a cold.
Mike and Megumi were heading to Dunne & Crescenzi on Frederick Street for dinner after the party. The great Gillen was jetting off to Toronto to film a movie the next morning.
Camille — who took the photograph in New York of Scott for the cover of the Waterboys’ brilliant new album, Out Of All This Blue — was gearing up to perform at the National Concert Hall on December 12 before preparing to star in The Rape of Lucrece at the Gate Theatre next March. So, to sum up: Camille, Mike, Aidan, Megumi are among the coolest, the most wonderful and the most engaging people with whom to spend an evening chatting about the world, art and everything else in-between. It was a wonderful night. How do I know this? Because it was my 50th birthday. Other attendees included Fine Gael politician Mary Mitchell O’Connor, cyber goddess Mary Aiken, PR heavyweight Rhona Blake, artist Guggi, RTE star (and editor of LIFE magazine) Brendan O’Connor, radio heavy-hitter Garrett Harte, local legend and Bono’s nextdoor-neighbour in Killiney, Louis Murray, designer Pauric Sweeney and top rock promoter Peter Aiken among many, many others. If I am comparing Dublin on a Saturday night to New York of the 1920s, I’m either losing my marbles or something must be stirrin’ in the air again. Pre0ferably the latter. Leo Varadkar was due to show up at the party but events around the corner in Dail Eireann made it slightly impossible (though Aidan, through his experience of playing Lord Baelish of King’s Landing in Game of Thrones, might have been able to teach him about the whys and wherefores of bloodsplattered political treachery).