The Chapel of Love

What, Me Worry?

The Right Stuff

These days, movies like dumb and Dumber and Billy Madison trumpet a social philosophy that thumbs its nose at intellect and accomplishment. Faced with such an onslaught, people who consider themselves well educated can feel terribly isolated. This situation wreaks special havoc when Princetonians and other Ivy Leaguers play the dating game.
Often, they find themselves looking for love in all the wrong places. For example, one man from a class in the 1970s recounted his searches with a mixture of bemusement and horror.
"I had letters from highpriced call girls after I placed an ad in New York magazine," recalled the man, whom we'll call Bob. "In an ad that listed my phone number I said I was looking for women who were well educated. I had people screaming at me, asking what kind of elitist I was."
Ever the optimist, Bob decided to try the Right Stuff, a New York City-based singles program. Founded three years ago, the Right Stuff limits its members to graduates of the Ivy League, the Seven Sisters, MIT, Stanford, Duke, Northwestern, the University of Chicago, Oberlin, and a handful of other highoctane schools. Through the Right Stuff, he contacted and met numerous women, then had a date with one who seemed especially compatible. Three weeks later they had a second date, and "we've been going out since then," said Bob, who with his new companion spent two weeks traveling through Europe.
The Right Stuff counts 65 Princetonians (37 women and 28 men) among its 1,600 members, according to cofounders Paula and Dawn, who ask that their last names not be used. After disappointments with pricey dating services and chancy singles ads, the Tigers we talked to are basically pleased with a group that considers intellect a positive trait. Paula and Dawn ask members for witty blurbs to promote the Right Stuff. One recent example: "A chance to date people who know The Barber of Seville isn't a unisex hair salon." A sixmonth membership costs only $60, about the price of a nice dinner and a pint of Ben & Jerry's.
Bob and several others spoke about their experiences with the Right Stuff, on condition that their identities be kept vague. So let's call them Bob, Ted, Carol, and Alice. We also spoke with Barbara, a nonPrincetonian who has dated Ted since meeting him through the Right Stuff. They are all professionals living in cities and suburbs, primarily in the Northeast.
The Right Stuff requires members to provide proof that they really graduated from the specific schools, says Paula. Members submit a short profile, maybe 30 words, and a longer biography. The long form asks about degrees, marital status, religion (optional), and children, with questions about a good relationship, important traits in a companion, socialpolitical views, and a description of "a perfect Sunday."
Upon joining, a new member receives profiles of all other members of the opposite sex, while existing members get a profile of each new member, who is identified by a number along with his or her city, school, year of graduation, and (usually) age and height. Reflecting the malefemale ratio of the Right Stuff, 40 to 45 men join each month and 60 to 65 women.
After reading the profiles, members can then request the longer biographies of people who sound interesting. Each costs $3. The biographies indicate whether the person wants to be contacted by phone or mail.
The Right Stuff's approach offers members a degree of selfselection they do not find in other programs. A typical comment comes from Carol, a graduate from the 1970s who lives in a state capital not known for its deep thinkers. "I've pursued the Right Stuff because of the factor of education, which would suggest intelligence," she explains of her involvement. "It's not that easy to find that sort of thing. I can only go so far with guys with pickup trucks."
The approach wins high marks for simplicity and discretion. With hectic professional lives and, in some cases, children, these people lack the time for leisurely looking. They like a program that eliminates at least some of the variables and gives them a mechanism for learning about other people in a controlled manner.
"It's legitimate, highquality, and efficient," notes Ted, who graduated in the 1950s. "It's my experience that women think it's a safe place to be, and that's very important. You can take it in stages. I like that part."
Members read the profiles and biographies carefully. Alice, who once had a less-than-positive experience with respondents to a personal ad she placed in a New York City magazine, says, "The people represent themselves realistically and without distortion. The service doesn't get the people on the fringe who misrepresent themselves."
Our sources looked for different tip-offs in the statements, factors they found positive or negative. The educational level is high across the board, so variations come in the personal details and preferences, both stated and implied. Carol and Alice both look for tall men, and Carol quips, "Sexy and intelligent-I don't ask for much." Ted avoids responding to any statement indicating a woman prefers Jewish men, since he's not Jewish. Women with outdoor and athletic interests, however, appeal to him. He also looks at geography and ages, passing on women under 40.
"There are things I automatically can sense about people," adds Bob. "A woman who said she really hated liberals and homeless people gave me a clue that dinner conversation would be either conflictual or silent." He also found a certain sameness to statements from women in New York; they envisioned Sundays with The New York Times and a trip to a flea market. "They were so similar it sounded like the intellectual equivalent of holding hands and walking on the beach," he muses.
The Right Stuff allows for a gradual process of acquaintance. It starts with several phone chats, followed by dinner if the vibes are right. Madcap Manhattan weekends? Not on the first date, not with this crowd. But sometimes a spark strikes and disrupts the cautious pattern. Carol realized one man was "special" as soon as she read his biography. The feeling was mutual; he drove a long way to visit her four times in two weeks. She once mentioned her favorite place was a river area south of her town, and he immediately drove them there for a walk.
"That's the kind of person he was," she says.
And then . . .
"He was telling me about his amorous history since his divorce. I could see he hadn't worked things out with one exgirlfriend. She came back and he had to try it," she says wistfully. "He was the fish that got away."
On some occasions two Princetonians contact each other. That happened to Alice, who once connected with a natty Tiger who arrived for a date sporting Reunionstyle attire. "He had an orange sports coat, which was pretty garish. He said he was going to wear a straw hat but he didn't," she recalls. That was their only date.
As they participate, some of the people can see patterns. Barbara, Ted's occasional date, is a high energy executive for a major corporation, and as such considers herself an expert at scoping out voices and résumés. She's liked the men she's met, but Barbara has had some unsettling realizations about the social habits of the modern American male. She asserts, "I have been very frustrated in that nobody has called me. I would initiate and they would follow up. It didn't feel right to me in the beginning, but I had to get over it. I have been very disappointed by the lack of initiative by men in getting things going. Ted was the exception. He was very good at following up."
Overall, Bob, Ted, Carol, Alice, and Barbara are basically pleased with the Right Stuff. They do see room for improvement, especially in the geographic mix of members. They are heavily concentrated in Boston, New York, and California, severely limiting choices for members outside those areas and raising the problems of longdistance relationships. The age selection presented problems for Alice. She says, "There seem to be a lot of men who are too young or on the older side. They are in their 20s and 30s, then it skips to the 50s."
Like Ted, Barbara is stymied by the ethnic mix of the lists. She complains, "There are a lot of Jewish people. My theory-and it's a positive-is that Jewish people are aggressive. They know what they want and they go for it. They also have a tendency to say they are interested in other Jewish people."
The Right Stuff's Paula is aware of the issues of geography and ethnic mix. She can't change religious preferences, but the Right Stuff has tackled the challenges of longrange relationships. Thus, the service started a quarterly newsletter called On the Move. It lists members open to longdistance relationships, along with where they frequently travel and where they are willing to go.
The advertising also aims to get a broader geographic mix. The Right Stuff places ads in publications in Chicago, California, Philadelphia, and Washington, D.C., and in the alumni magazines of the schools whose graduates it targets.
The refinements improve a product that already pleases its members. Bob and Alice have recommended the Right Stuff to friends, and everybody keeps checking those monthly mailings. Notes Carol, "A guy recently wrote to me from somewhere in this area, so it's happening now and then. Anything can happen-a lot of it is chance."

Van Wallach '80, a freelance writer who lives in Westport, Connecticut, wrote about the Center for Jewish Life in the paw of last April 19.