Jack Valenti, the Hollywood lobbyist who died last month, was the public face of entertainment industry prudishness. So people might be surprised to learn that the longtime Motion Picture Association chairman once played an X-rated party game with none other than Madonna.
This Time, This Place, a soon-to-be-published memoir of Valenti's years in Lyndon Johnson's White House and at the MPAA, recounts a risqué dinner party producer Dino De Laurentiis threw in Cannes to celebrate the release of Madonna's film Truth or Dare. (Though originally scheduled to be published June 12, Random House "just got the book out as quickly as we could" after Valenti passed away on April 26, says a spokeswoman.)
In keeping with the theme, Valenti and the other guests—who included directors Luc Besson and Roman Polanski and French actress Emmanuelle Seigner—conducted their own game of Truth or Dare.
"Some of the questions (well, to be honest, all the questions) were just plain sexual," Valenti wrote. "When the questioner across the table came to me, I prayed a tidal wave would hit the restaurant." No luck: Asked to describe his most bizarre sexual encounter, the diminutive ratings czar equivocated with a vanilla story about a teenage hookup with an older woman.
At least he was able to enjoy the view. "Madonna—and I swear I am not making this up—was wearing high black boots almost to her knees, very short black shorts clinging to her fabulous legs, and a black bra that left her flat midriff exposed.... It was one hell of an eye-popping outfit."
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