MSNBC hosted a party at Manhattan’s Ace Hotel last night in celebration of Rachel Maddow’s first book, Drift, which tops the New York Times Best Sellers list this week.
“When we gave [Rachel] a show on September 9, 2008, we had never, ever won at 9 o’clock,” MNSBC president Phil Griffin (pictured here with Maddow and NBC News president Steve Capus) said during his toast. “Larry King was an icon — never, in our 12-year history. Rachel goes in there, she beat Larry the first day, the first month, the first year, the second year, the third year. And now, this is her first book, and boom! Number one.”
Maddow, who arrived at the event late because the taping of her primetime show ran over, said she could not have written “a real book, and not a collection of cable news observations,” without support and resources from MSNBC.
“I don’t exactly know why I deserve to have an employer this supportive of something like this, but I am very, very, very thankful. Also, they paid for this [party],” she joked.
Maddow, a cocktail buff, hand-picked the party’s drink — a “French 75,” which she said is named after a French artillery piece. TVNewser spotted Chris Hayes and Alex Wagner and in the crowd, as well as Dan Rather, Gail Collins, Sandra Bernhard and Andre Leon Talley.
More pictures after the jump.
Maddow and Dan Rather
Andre Leon Talley, Maddow, Sandra Bernhard
Paul Rieckhoff, executive director of of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, and Maddow
Photos: Heidi Gutman/MSNBC