Hanging Out With Ol’ Blue Eyes

We dedicate this style section column--the first part of it, anyway--to Frank Sinatra.

“Who’s more stylish than Frank?”

That’s Bill Zehme, author of the recently published “The Way You Wear Your Hat: Frank Sinatra and the Lost Art of Livin’ ” (HarperCollins). The Esquire writer went in search of Sinatrastyle via the three Fs--friends, family and fax. The Chairman himself hasn’t been big on in-person interviews since he sat down with Larry King in the early ‘80s. So you can imagine how pleased he was to see our man Zehme crash an intimate gathering after his 80th birthday bash.

Let us explain.

Le Sinatra had survived his televised birthday tribute at the Shrine Auditorium--he likes to be the one to do the singing--when he and La Sinatra decided to take some friends to the Four Seasons Hotel for an after-party. The only problem was the piano player was gone, fast asleep, but not for long.

Meanwhile, Zehme, who happened to be staying at the Four Seasons, told us he was coming home with his Sinatra birthday goody bag in tow. He sailed through the lobby resplendent in black tie.

“A guy says, ‘Sinatra party?’

“I said, ‘Yeah, it was great.’

“Right in the back, sir.”

“I’m thinking, hmmmmm. . . .”

Zehme follows the guy to the back, figuring that Frank and Barbara had invited a group of 30 friends he could infiltrate and then beat feet.

“The guy says, ‘Go in. You know what to do.’ And I guess he meant, ‘Go have fun.’ I wander in and I realize I’m in a room with 12 people--the Pecks, Robert Wagner and Jill St. John, Steve and Edie, Tony Bennett, Mrs. Sinatra and the man himself.”

Oh, yes. Did we mention that Zehme is difficult to miss?

“I’m 6-foot-5. It’s hard to blend in.”

Zehme sputtered that there had been some mistake and he turned to leave. Not so fast.

“The guy who waved me in said, ‘You said you were the piano player.’ ‘I never said I was the piano player.’

“Mrs. Sinatra was very gracious, but I was mortified. It was like I was stalking Frank. You don’t want to mess around with him.”

In that case, happy 82nd, Frankie. When is that, Dec. 12? For you, we’re free. Any time.

*

It was his first L.A. premiere, so please be kind.

“I’m particularly overdressed,” Atom Egoyan said a little sheepishly. He was in the requisite bicoastal black with an added touch--full-dress tie.

Of course, Egoyan had every reason to spiff up. The Canadian director was unveiling “The Sweet Hereafter” at the L.A. County Museum. Egoyan had just followed Alliance Films CEO Robert Lantos to the podium to introduce his elegiac movie based on a novel by Russell Banks. The Fine Line film, which scored three awards at Cannes, explores the aftermath of a school-bus accident in rural Canada, with Ian Holm starring as a lawyer courting victims’ families.

“People ask me, ‘How do you finance a film like this?’ I keep the finances within a certain budget. I give him the title and the final cut,” Egoyan said.

“Actually, I keep the final cut. That’s a big faux pas. I give him the final copy. Don’t quote me. Moving right along. . . .”

Oops.

Later, Egoyan contemplated his colleagues’ contribution to the Canadian zeitgeist. “James Cameron makes a film about a crash, David Cronenberg made a film about a crash. This is a crash as well. Of course, there weren’t lawyers around the Titanic.”

That we know of, anyway.

By the way, you read it right. Atom. Not Adam. Atom.

“My parents thought it was the beginning of the nuclear age and it was a funny thing to do. My sister was going to be called Molecule. At the end, they decided that would be too cruel. She’s now called Eve. It’s Atom and Eve.”

*

Everywhere you turned at the Race to Erase MS, there were Trump folk but no actual Trumps. Among them was Nikki Haskell of Ivana buddy fame. In another life, Haskell was also a Studio 54 monarch. In this one, she’s a diet candy queen whose queendom includes Starsuckers and Nikki bars.

She’s celebrating all of it in Aspen on New Year’s Eve with Ivana.

And Donald.

“Marla who?” she said, batting her eyelashes.

You may remember from a previous episode of As the Trumps Turn that Aspen was where Wife No. 1 and Wannabe Wife No. 2 had their showdown. So there’s a certain symmetry to it all.

“Donald told me the other night, ‘I don’t know why I ever divorced Ivana.’ He just got divorced and she just got divorced. They’re best friends. I bet somebody $100 that they’d get back together again.”

Also cruising the event at the Century Plaza honoring Tommy Hilfiger was Ivana’s doctor--embattled celebrity plastic-surgeon-to-the-stars Steven Hoefflin. Hoefflin is being investigated for allegedly fondling patients under anesthesia, and he’s fighting his accusers in court.

“Now that the truth is getting out, it’s better. No patients have complained. I have no malpractice suits. We’ve had hundreds of calls of support.

“If I told you someone next door to you was being accused of being a child molester, what would you think? It’s the rape of a reputation.”