The TV show that rots young minds

How can I phrase it without sounding pompous? When very talented people dine together, it sometimes turns into a contest of wills and wits. Polite conversation, a French speciality whereby you say nothing in very many words, takes a back seat. When talent’s around, look for withering responses and brain-jolting verbal virtuosity. I recently spent such an evening with the actor Harvey Keitel and his wife, the director of Bugsy, Barry Levinson, and the birthday boy James Toback and his wife Stephanie. Daphna Keitel, an outspoken Israeli-born lady, set off the fireworks when she announced that Levinson’s son Sam, who created a TV series called Euphoria, was doing for young people’s morality what Bomber Command did for Dresden’s architecture (not her exact words but mine). Only worse. One can rebuild a city, but a young mind, once ravaged and corrupted, is a different matter.

Levinson, an intelligent man, defended his son’s abominable creation as best he could, but money talks in Hollywood and the lower the product sinks, the more money there is for its creator. The birthday boy, James Toback, changed the subject somewhat dramatically by announcing his long-ago intention to kill Levinson: ‘I can’t believe that he’s attending my 75th birthday, after I swore to myself I’d murder him.’ (Toback had written the screenplay of Bugsy and wanted to direct it.) After that things quietened down and we had a great evening. I sat next to Harvey and we reminisced. The first time we met, a long time ago, I asked him what a nice Jewish boy from Brooklyn was doing in the Marine Corps. ‘Why aren’t you in Wall Street screwing people?’ ‘Who is this guy?’ he asked no one in particular. ‘I like him.’ It was the start of a Casablanca beautiful friendship.