Bob Mackie came to the Hamptons to share his life story

Bob Mackie was known for designing glamorous, sometimes over-the-top fashions for people like Carol Burnett, Mitzi Gaynor and, most notably, Cher. But when it came to his own clothes, he was far more subdued.

When Mackie — who died Monday at the age of 87 in Palm Springs, California — came to Guild Hall in 2024 for a screening of the documentary, "Naked Illusion," about his life and career, he wore a simple outfit — dark blue blazer, beige pants and yellow shirt. Perhaps a bit surprising for the man who created Cher's famous black sheer outfit with its spiky headdress that she wore to the Oscars in 1986. 

But Mackie himself was kind of a surprise to Amy Steinhaus Kirwin, chief public engagement officer at Guild Hall, who met him that night. "He was very real, very humble," she said. "He was very enthusiastic and really charming."

The event was a rare Long Island appearance for Mackie. During an interview with Newsday in 2024, when asked if he had visited the Hamptons, Mackie replied: "I have, but not a lot. It didn’t become my usual place to go." At the time of the Guild Hall event, he stayed with friends who lived near the theater.

After the screening of "Naked Illusion," Mackie spoke with writer-editor Derek C. Blasberg about his six-decade career and touched on many of the topics from the film including his three-year marriage to showgirl Lulu Porter; the AIDS-related death of his son, Robert Gordon Mackie Jr., who died in 1993 at 35, and his relationship with his partner, costume designer Ray Aghayan, who died in 2011.

Mackie never planned to have his life story played out on film, but, as he told Newsday, it just happened. "It's one of those things you don’t think about doing, but when someone asks you, you say 'Oh, OK.' I didn’t go after it — they came after me and I thought, well that’d be fun."