King Of Clubs

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"We weren't investing in a nightclub," says Ed Sparks. "We were investing in Patrick."

Today, 20% of Lyons's business comes from hosting private parties and other special events -- none more special than the Harvard 25th class reunion bash at Metro/Spit. On a warm night in June, Lyons beams as the long row of buses pulls in from the Boston Pops -- Harvard '58 concert at Symphony Hall. Inside the club, video director Joe Verange and company have added some special touches to the $500,000 worth of state-of-the-art hardware at their command. Programmed to go along with a night of late-'50s dance music is a video show featuring such period fare as Leave it to Beaver intercut with shots from the 1958 Harvard class yearbook. Lyons, cooly preppy in blue blazer and rep tie, mingles easily with the cream of Ivy League achievers. Although they might not appreciate the strange social flow that has carried them from Harvard Yard to Symphony Hall to Spit, they aren't about to ignore the good times, either. The place, as they say, is hopping.

Standing on the sidewalk in the shadow of Fenway, john Spooner, Harvard graduate, author, stockbroker, and one of Lyons's elosest liaisons to the Boston business establishment, reminisces. "First time I met Patrick," he says, "all he could talk about was enrolling in the Harvard Business School. The B-school was the green light at the end of the dock for him.

"This will sound corny," he adds, "but people around here see in Patrick what I like to think of as 'America,' in the best sense. I'm talking about a poor kid who never went to college and who now stands to make an absolute fortune, and without screwing anybody in the process, either. He's the one person I know with desperate ambition whom I genuinely like. You know [the book] What Makes Sammy Run.? Patrick is an uncynical Sammy."

Spooner and Lyons make curious soul mates. One is Harvard trained, the other learned his craft on the job and in the streets. Yet when they first sat down to talk, they took to one another instantly. Part of their affinity lies in the fact that both men are great traders in information as well as commerce. Lyons is always quick to cite his preeminent position in what he calls the Boston Matrix: the network of radio stations, press and electronic media, retailers, advertising agencies, record stores, and power people who in large measure set the cultural and commercial agenda for Boston's under-30 set. Spooner moves in overlapping and highly useful circles of his own. In handling more than 3,000 clients at his Shearson/American Express Inc. office -- clients ranging "from cab drivers to company presidents" -- he brokers their talents to one another as adroitly as he manages their portfolios. And Spooner clearly thinks that Lyons -- friend, client, confidante -- is major talent.

"If Patrick is a genius as a manager," he avers, "it's in his ability to delegate authority to people he can trust. And I mean really trust, right down to the smallest detail. If you're his plumber, you're responsible for all his plumbing -- until the pipes burst and flood him out. Same for his electrician, interior designer, accountant, attorney, whatever. His people would walk through walls for him."

Lyons, in turn, confesses he has learned much from Spooner about operating what he calls "the Rolodex of the mind."

"John's taught me how to profit from a wide range of contacts," he says. "I like having lines out. As a matter of fact, I like having favors owed me much more than I like owing other people. It's not a material thing. I live well, but money isn't my motivator. If it was, I wouldn't be turning 500 people away from Metro on a Friday night."

He returns to the party and his role as Harvard host. Inside are several hundred men and women who, now in their mid-40s, are fulfilling the promise their bright educations brought them. Lyons has a promise he wants to fulfill, too: to be running a $50-million entertainment empire by the time he is 35. For this night, anyway, each of them is living the same fantasy. Tonight, each one is king of the world.

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