• September 23, 1996
• Vol. 46
• No. 13

And Away They Went

What Did the Stars Do This Summer? Just About What You Did, but Moreso

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From PEOPLE Magazine

THINK ABOUT IT: WHEN YOU'RE RICH AND FAMOUS, WHY THE heck would you want to get away from it all? Nevertheless, the hankering for a hiatus seems universal. Those of us who can't afford it splurge for a week or two. And the stars? This summer, when they headed for the hills—or the beach or the boulevard—the siren song they seemed to be heeding was not the Macarena but instead that pretty little ditty from Camelot, "What Do the Simple Folk Do?" As Spike Lee, who biked on Martha's Vineyard, Mass., put it: "Just basic holidays."

No matter if they had to take the Concorde to get to their desired playgrounds. Once ensconced in some of the highest-priced real estate on earth, celebs, by and large, savored the classic summer pleasures. At Saint-Tropez, that Mediterranean port turned paparazzi heaven, you could have spotted Joan Collins dipping into a trashy novel or Brussels muscleman Jean-Claude Van Damme sunning. And perhaps Jack Nicholson was honoring his Jersey Shore roots when he browsed through women's cropped tops and miniskirts in Saint-Tropez, sporting the sort of chemise seen on Atlantic City's Boardwalk. Next year, if simplicity is still chic, he may even send his yacht to search for saltwater taffy.