More Empty Mansions updates!

Empty Mansions
by Bill Dedman and Paul Clark Newell, Jr.

I’m very excited to tell you that Bill Dedman, co-author of Empty Mansions: The Mysterious Life of Huguette Clark and the Spending of a Great American Fortune has agreed to an interview! If you’ve been following my blog, you know that I totally enjoyed reading this life story of the reclusive heiress Huguette Clark, co-authored by Dedman and Paul Clark Newell, Jr. Huguette Clark grew up surrounded by riches and spent the last twenty years of her life living in various hospitals in New York, by choice. Clark’s will was hotly contested.

Bill Dedman

Bill Dedman is a Pulitzer-Prize winning American journalist, an investigative reporter for NBC News, and co-author of the No. 1 bestselling book Empty Mansions: The Mysterious Life of Huguette Clark and the Spending of a Great American Fortune.

In 1989, Dedman received the Pulitzer Prize for Investigative Reporting for “The Color of Money,” a series of articles in Bill Kovach’s Atlanta Journal-Constitution on racial discrimination by mortgage lenders in middle-income black neighborhoods. (Thanks Wikipedia! – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Dedman)

Here are some of the updates I received from Bill Dedman:

Empty Mansions will be out in paperback on April 22.

Huguette Clark’s art collection is currently touring the world and will be auctioned by Christie’s in May and June. These works include paintings by Monet and Renoir which have not been seen by the public for decades. Here’s the link to the article describing this artwork: http://investigations.nbcnews.com/_news/2014/01/30/22513322-art-cache-of-recluse-huguette-clark-revealed-begins-world-tour-before-sale.

Here are three of the paintings to be auctioned:

Renoir’s “Woman with Umbrella”

“Water Lilies” from the series by Monet

Renoir’s “Girls Playing Battledore and Shuttlecock”

Details of the legal battle surrounding her estate are available at: http://www.nbcnews.com/id/38810137.

Here’s a YouTube video of Huguette Clark’s doll collection: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KRgWY2PdaDc.

Clark’s jewelry collection was sold at Christie’s in 2012 to help pay for the management of her estate during the dispute. Here’s the link describing her jewelry: http://investigations.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/04/17/11249129-sold-jewels-of-heiress-huguette-clark-bring-a-surprising-18-million-at-auction.

These cool emerald, pearl and diamond earrings were part of her collection.

And the biggest news is that there may be a film of Empty Mansions.   Hollywood director Ryan Murphy (creator of “Glee” and “American Horror Story”) has optioned the film. The news came out in this Deadline Hollywood article:  http://www.deadline.com/2014/03/empty-mansions-to-get-film-treatment/.

Still curious? Do you have anything you would like to ask Bill Dedman? I’ll be preparing questions in the next few days. Reply in the Comments section and I’ll include your questions in my interview.

Thanks for reading – come back again!