Regine's is a recurring dinner and nightlife setting in the diary, where a guest list can turn a meal into a display of celebrity, flirtation, and social positioning. The venue’s evenings range from an awkward dinner with a separate table for unexpected guests to a party where Margaret Trudeau waits at the bar for photographers who have not yet arrived. Across these scenes, Regine's is not simply a backdrop: its hospitality, seating, and efforts to compete with Studio 54 become part of the social drama.

Dinners, Invitations, and Seating

On January 10, 1977, Bianca invited the diarist to a dinner Regine was giving for Florence Grinda. Catherine Guinness and Victor called to ask whether they could come; they were told to join for coffee. Andrea Portago had separately asked the diarist to take her, but because the invitation was not his to extend, he directed her to Bianca. Bianca welcomed her, hoping Andrea would arrive with her brother, Tony Portago. Andrea picked up the diarist with her brother, and they went to Regine's.

The scene made the venue’s social arrangements unusually visible. Bianca wore a strapless Halston dress, and South Americans occupied many of the tables. Catherine Guinness and Victor arrived during the pre-dinner drinks, ostensibly for “coffee,” but were seated at a small table apart from the others when dinner began. Victor pointed to the diarist’s table and asked for the same thing; he was told, “You’ll have to pay for it,” and agreed. The food was awful, and Regine was described as rude to Catherine and Victor. The episode presents hospitality as a matter of rank and access, negotiated in public through a table assignment and a pointed exchange.

Regine's also hosted dinners whose named honoree did not guarantee the host’s presence. At a dinner for Ira Von Furstenberg, Regine never showed up. The diarist spoke with Ira, who said she could be the best stage mother in the world; her son was handsome, though his father did not want him to act. Ira had long wanted to become a movie star and had appeared in films that never succeeded. The account shifts from the absent host to the guest’s ambitions and family, showing how the dinner’s conversational life could outlast its formal purpose.

Photography and Public Romance

Regine's became a particularly charged setting for Margaret Trudeau and Tom Sullivan. On February 23, 1978, the diarist saw them at the venue among other guests. Margaret kept in the background because she was still married and did not want to be photographed with Tom. A photographer claimed to have seen the pair having sex on the balcony at Studio 54, while he was himself on the balcony with a woman. Margaret eventually came over to speak with the diarist so she could be near Tom, and photographers took pictures. Catherine Guinness was unhappy because Tom was in love with Margaret. In this account, the restaurant’s social space is organized by the camera’s presence even when the person being photographed initially tries to avoid it.

The following evening, Catherine Guinness, Tom, and Margaret picked up the diarist at nine and took him to Regine's. They arrived before the photographers. Margaret sat at the bar, and the diarist observed that the absent photographers had missed what would have been excellent pictures. The entry links Regine's directly to the management of public image: a guest’s position at the bar matters partly because a photograph might turn it into a public scene. The diarist remarked that Studio 54 was making Regine desperate, a concise judgment that gives the venue’s rivalry a personal as well as commercial edge.

Celebrity, Flirtation, and Social Performance

A January 1977 dinner at Regine's brought together Warren Beatty, Jack Nicholson, Anjelica Huston, the model Apollonia, and Catherine Deneuve, for whom the party was being held. The diarist noted that Beatty and Nicholson looked older and heavier, and that Beatty was dating Iman. At the same gathering, Barbara Allen and Philip Niarchos sat with James Brady and a journalist from Women's Wear Daily. Coady, the journalist, complained about the guests, including the diarist, and Barbara later repeated his list of dislikes. He also hated the food. The dinner’s celebrity roster does not produce smooth glamour: its record is equally attentive to unflattering judgments, table-side behavior, and the quality of the meal.

At another evening, the diarist’s plans collided with the expectations of Diane von Furstenberg. She had invited him to be her date for a CBS filming, imagining that they would make an interesting television couple. He declined, saying he would be out of town, although he was not leaving until the next day. When he accepted an invitation to Regine's for dinner on Russian Easter, Diane overheard and challenged the explanation. He said he had made a mistake. The incident makes the dinner invitation a point of social accountability: accepting one invitation exposed the false excuse given for declining another.

The venue also held flirtation and spectacle in a looser register. On January 10, Victor handed out fake poppers. Regine said they smelled like feet; when the diarist explained that they were called “Locker Room,” she liked the name. Bianca giggled and carried on with Tony Portago over one of the poppers, appearing to make out with him before pulling herself together because she realized they could not behave that way in public. Fans later approached the diarist for autographs. He left with Catherine Guinness and Victor at about 2:30, and the Portago driver dropped them off. The episode moves from a private joke to a flirtation checked by public decorum and then to the diarist’s own recognition by fans.

Other encounters place the club’s social play in small, vivid exchanges. On February 23, someone mistook Andrea Marcovicci for Margaret Trudeau; the diarist turned around and discovered Margaret was there. Tom Sullivan, who had not realized she was present, was sad that he could not openly be with her. Later, a photographer’s story about the balcony at Studio 54 made the relationship more explicit, but Margaret’s approach at Regine's still had to negotiate marriage, photography, and proximity. The place repeatedly gathers people whose public presentation and private attachments do not quite align.

Competition and the “Back Room”

Regine's was measured against Studio 54 not only in its ability to attract guests but in its physical arrangement. On April 5, 1979, Paloma Picasso was at Regine's with her husband and a boyfriend, or possibly his boyfriend or their boyfriend, as the diarist wryly admitted he could not tell. When Neil Sedaka arrived with his wife and two young sons, Paloma fell in love with him. She recalled singing “Sweet Sixteen” in Portuguese and Spanish when she was ten in Argentina, then sang it for Neil, who was impressed. The anecdote makes Regine's a place where a celebrity encounter could turn on an unexpected personal performance rather than formal introductions.

That same entry notes that Regine had acquired a “back room,” an amenity everyone wanted after Studio 54 established the model and Xenon copied it too. The diarist judged Regine’s version too large, too plush, and too far from everything. The criticism is specific: the room possessed the visible markers of exclusivity but, in his view, missed the spatial intimacy and centrality that made the idea attractive. Regine's effort to reproduce the competing club’s feature thus becomes a compact account of rivalry through design.

A later visit after dinner at York’s further shows Regine's as a place where connections seemed to multiply quickly. The diarist and Catherine Guinness went there with Lloyd, an eighteen-year-old who claimed to know everyone. At Regine's he appeared familiar with the people around him; after the diarist introduced him to Regine’s husband, Lloyd was not charged. He told stories about his family and described his father as working for Roy Cohn, though the diarist suspected the work sounded more like debt collection. In these entries, Regine's repeatedly serves as a meeting ground where access, reputation, and performance are tested in passing, over a meal, a drink, a photograph, or an introduction.