Thursday, June 16, 2005
Zahn Has Close Encounter
Source: NY Daily News CNN anchor Paula Zahn had a close encounter with Pale Male at Michael's restaurant yesterday. Make that Pale Stout Male.
I'm not talking about the famous hawk that was briefly evicted from his ledge at Zahn's Fifth Ave. apartment building, courtesy of Zahn's husband, the co-op board president.
I
'm talking about Roger Ailes - the pugnacious Fox News chairman who's been waging a private war against Zahn ever since she bolted from Fox four years ago.
"How are you?" Ailes asked, looming over her table and pushing his hand toward the woman who scorned him.
"Oh, hi-eeeee!" the blond Zahn exclaimed as she looked up at her nemesis and quickly grasped his mitt.
Ailes - who angrily fired Zahn, comparing her unfavorably to "a dead raccoon," and sued her agent when she accepted CNN's job offer in September 2001 - had a lunch appointment with Court TV Chairman Henry Schleiff.
Zahn, who anchors the prime-time CNN show "Paula Zahn Now," was lunching with media consultant Joe Armstrong.
Initially, Ailes didn't notice Zahn when he arrived at the restaurant and schmoozed with me.
When I alerted Ailes that Zahn was sitting right next to us at Table 3, four feet from Ailes' usual corner berth at Table 4 - he flashed a look of alarm and headed into the midst of the dining room to confer with Michael's general manager Steve Millington.
I'm told that Millington, thinking that Ailes and Zahn wouldn't want to look at each other while they ate, directed Ailes to Table 18, a safe distance away.
Ailes sat there for a minute but then thought better of it and claimed his usual table right next to Zahn.
"You can pretend we're not here," Ailes suggested.
Zahn gave him an icy smile.
"Oh," she purred, "we don't have to pretend anything."
# posted by ATN @ 10:34 AM 
