Dansen, Strahan and White.

Between Kellan Lutz offering to get naked on stage and Ted Danson thanking Esquire for a wonderful evening, the 2012 GQ Gentlemen’s Ball was a boozy affair. 

Host Michael Strahan held the night together, laughing perhaps a little too loud but delivering just the right amount of charm one might expect from a 6-foot-5 former defensive lineman morning talk show co-host. He was all gap-toothed smiles when talking about his new gig on Live!,with Kelly Ripa.

“Kelly is so fun, so energetic,” Mr Strahan said of his miniature opposite.

Who’s been your favorite guest so far?

“Definitely Shaq ... seeing a seven-foot guy looking like Prince.” (Mr. O’Neil sang When Doves Cry on the show last week.)

The evening was in honor of a handful of gentlemen who have paid service to their country in some way. Willie Geist, a member of GQ’s advisory panel, nominated Corporal Aaron Mankin, victim of a roadside bomb attack while fighting in Iraq. Celebrity Ambassadors consisted of Adam Levine, Kellan Lutz, Shaun White and Ted Danson.

We stayed decidedly off-topic and asked each of them what his childhood ambition was.

“I wanted to play outfield for the Yanks,” said Mr. Geist, who's now straddling two jobs, the Today show and the “more opinionated” Morning Joe.

“This way, I can stay with my old family and get a new family too,” he told The Observer. How quaint.   

Mr. Danson expressed sporting tendencies, telling us he had wanted to be a basketball player before “stumbling” into acting.  

At least Mr. White—who recently had a very public wipe-out, arrested on charges of public intoxication and vandalism at musician Patrick Carney's wedding in Tennessee last month—fulfilled his dreams of becoming a sportsman with a rather successful snowboarding career, but we suppose if you’re signed at the age of 6, you stand a good chance. Describing himself when he was younger as a “crazy kid out of control,” we’re not sure he’s changed all that much.

Mr. Lutz, ambassador for Saving Innocence, a charity raising awareness of the sex trafficking of children, said that while his ambition was to be a chemical engineer, he fell into acting through lack of attention at home. Being one of six siblings, “I always felt like I didn’t have much attention and created attention in a fantasy world.”

With the paparazzi hot on his heels outside, there’s no need to fantasize now.

Anne Heche and James Tupper joined guests at the IAC building as Ms. Heche told The Observer her childhood ambition was to be a waitress, while Mr. Tupper wanted to be ”truck-driving poet.” An interesting pair.

Mr. Levine, Maroon 5 front man and ambassador for the Teen Impact Program at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, was also present, with girlfriend Behati Prinsloo, declaring how he was ”most nervous about cursing tonight, ’cos that’s not something gentlemen do.” We’re sure he made Ms. Prinsloo proud.

Currently starring in American Horror Story, he later explained how “the genre scared the shit out of me … to be totally honest, I wasn’t able to get through an episode … all of the horror movies I’ve ever seen have been a huge fucking mistake.”

After raising over $200,000 for charity, Esquire, er, GQ had much to feel good about.

Artist depiction of final exterior. (Alan Silverman)

The Public Theater, Lower East Side’s iconic Shakespearean play house, which emerged from its facelift on October 4, celebrated in a big way with a Block Party on Saturday, the first of an eight-week re-introduction “designed to engage the entire New York community.” 

The Observer took full advantage of the free pizza-flavored popcorn, while admiring the $40 million revamp that, amongst other renovations, has seen the lobby transformed into a public piazza as well as a new lounge, The Library.

Artistic Director Oskar Eustis explained how founder Joe Papp “believed that the theater belonged to everyone, and this renovation of our home building is designed to create a lively, welcoming center for people to meet, gather and celebrate.”

A foodie haven seemed to provide the perfect kick off to what we’re sure the Public hopes will be a destination hang out. Families kicked back with truck-tastic foods from the likes of Go Burger, Korilla BBQ and Valducci’s Pizza, and were treated to a sneak peek performance of Giant, Sybille Pearson and Michael John’s La Chiusa’s musical, and the world premiere of Here Lies Love by David Byrne and Fatboy Slim. Sasha Allen, of the Tony Award-winning Broadway revival HAIR, also made an appearance on stage.

No matter if you missed this one, with seven weeks worth of celebrations to come!

The audience, mainly female—go figure—responded with the obedient clinking, and subsequent sinking, of glasses that reverberated through Joe’s Pub at the Public Theater. And vagina was indeed the theme of the evening at These Girls, Glamour’s night of monologues by young ladies they’ve deemed the new generation of female voices.

It quickly became apparent that for all involved (Olivia Wilde, Leandra Medine, Rashida Jones, Zosia Mamet, Aubrey Plaza and Lauren Miller), this was a chance to have a real heart-to-heart—you know, girl talk—so far from their usual introverted selves.

“Tonight, these girls can be who they uniquely are fan-fucking-tastic,” exclaimed Gloria Steinem.

It was refreshing, we suppose, though The Observer did feel a tinge of sympathy for the few men in the audience. 

“I’ve had my fair share of interesting menstrual cycles,” read Ari Graynor, whose reading of Leandra Medine’s monologue was largely, and explicitly, preoccupied with periods (of the menstrual kind, we figure the grammar was spot on).

One in particular, nearly cost Ms Medine her place at college. The fact that Ms Medine did not perform the monologue herself suggested just how appropriate the title, Over Sharing is Underrated, was.

The guys shuffled awkwardly in their seats.

“Guys are raging against the independent woman machine,” read actress and Harvard graduate Rashida Jones, the next act to grab the men by the balls. Cue the high pitched whooping from the females in the audience.

There were more gender-neutral monologues, however. Actress and comedienne Aubrey Plaza recalled how she had spent her life running in front of the great wave of the establishment in A Million Life Opportunities, Zero Job Opportunities. She spoke about her inability to hold down a job when she was younger due to her only applying to the ones that sounded “funny,” like being the judge of a dog contest. She’d never owned a dog in her life.

Lauren Miller, wife of Seth Rogen, recalled entries from her teenage diary—a diary of self-loathing—in Don’t Talk Down to Me, I’m on My Way Up.

“I’m fat and ugly and have pimples—I will never be happy,” she read, before an entry admitting she wanted to move to L.A. and marry a movie star. Success!

We are a little less hopeful for Olivia Wilde, who, in “The Fabulous Olivialand,” proclaimed that everyone will stay married for only seven happy years, at which time his or her children will be ferried off to boarding school. After Ms Wilde briefly touched on her marriage, and recent divorce, from Tao Ruspoli (they married at the tender age of nineteen on a school bus), we began to understand her logic that love is better kept short and sweet.

But such is life and Ms. Wilde gushed over her new beau, funnyman Jason Sudeikis, who was in the audience.

“Seven years is too short,” Ms. Wilde decided.

Garfunkel and Oates, the mismatched duo, entertained us between monologues with their hysterical take on dating, before Alexa Chung appeared on the decks as Amy Poehler shouted “Vagina, vagina, vagina, vagina!” and the audience downed their drinks once and for all.

“Don’t stop eating,” joked Nicolo Maltini, the U.S. Ambassador for Antinori, as we were leaning full bore into an excess of food, wine and family on a regular basis, without trying too hard—the kind you find in Tuscany, Italian households through the city and its suburbs, or Olive Garden.

Quite frankly, we'd like to know how the prestigious winery—now in its twenty-sixth generation, tracing back to 1385—has escaped alcoholism/obesity and the dysfunction that we assume would accompany it.

“Italian culture is to have wine with our food at our home,” explained Allegra Antinori, who deals primarily with the hospitality side of the family business. Through the pop up Cantinetta Antinori at the Mondrian Soho Hotel, “guests can understand better our lifestyle"—which is to say a real booze buffet.

What you’d expect for $160 per head.

A likely crowd of guests from the wine world indulged in Tignanello 2001 (Antinori is famous for its red wines), including Michael Yurch, President of Sherry-Lehman. Mr Yurch explained how his job went beyond supplying wines to the palates of New York, like the time he provided a live goat to a Sheikh after successfully sourcing a rare bottle of Chateau Margaux for him.

Wine wills the weirdest things.

It was therefore somewhat grounding when Allegra’s sister, Alessia Antinori, spoke about the “family culture and philosophy” related to this great produce and to Cantinetta Antinori, “a little restaurant where people came to sample products from the countryside,” that originated, and still exists, in Florence.

It has expanded since then though with concessions in Vienna, Zurich and Moscow. The pop up event is the first time it touches down on American soil.

The first time, also, for Chef Lorenzo di Martino. “This is the possibility to breathe Antinori,” he explained, “everything we cook has a meaning—represents a moment in history.”

With the help of  Kim Wiss, from the Antica Estate in Napa Valley, the pair hope that, for the price tag, guests will experience Italian history in the form of “really simple, fresh, original recipes” that represent authentic Tuscan food, and some of the finest Italian wines, amongst mini olive trees and candle light.

Teetotals and dieters need not apply.

Dr. Schiller.

“Have you ever been handcuffed to a radiator?” A young man in a laboratory coat introduced himself to The Observer last Friday evening as we took our seats at the opening of the fall run of alternative singles night, Never Sleep Alone. Our reaction, or lack thereof, must have been transparent. “Sorry, I just need to ask you some basic erotic questions.” Oh, alright, get on, then.

It appeared that the point of this short survey was to detect our sexual energy, translated by the color of a mood mask we were given to wear for the duration of the evening.

The performance took place at Joe’s Pub, the quaint underbelly of the Public Theater—a low-lit, intimate space with a bar at one end, where the more reserved voyeurs sat, and a cluster of tables at the front, where brave singles positioned themselves vulnerably. The champagne flowed, a crucial aphrodisiac for the evening.

It quickly became clear that Dr. Alex Schiller, the sex therapist played by comedian Roslyn Hart, meant business. Dressed in black latex, there was no beating around her bush.

“NSA = NSA” appeared on a screen behind her, the opening chapter of the one-woman cabaret performance coming to life before us. “Never Sleep Alone equals no strings attached,” Dr. Schiller yelled in a broad Texan twang, “this is the number one principle.”

The audience cheered. Sleeping alone was out of the question.

With one in two houses in Manhattan being occupied by a single person, and divorce rates on the rise, an increasing number of people are searching for new and exciting ways to meet others and, as the night evolved, it appeared that Never Sleep Alone was acting as a catalyst to the process. Joel Haberli, a gentleman in the audience, explained how “as a New Yorker, this is a chance to be wacky.” Every person in the room was prepared to go home with someone at some point during the night. And why shouldn’t they?

They were amongst likeminded, young, beautiful people (many of whom had been scouted by Ms. Hart herself), who had been told, or rather commanded, by Dr. Schiller to “give each other the best possible times of their lives because—fuck it!—you’re young. Live!”

When The Observer piled into a limo with a transformed Ms. Hart once the show was over (think an older Audrey Hepburn; long black gloves, draping pearls), we asked why the online dating phenomenon wasn’t sufficient. She instantly referred to it as “bullshit … people build up too many expectations before they meet and when they meet the chemistry is blocked by the expectation and that’s another reason why I created NSA. Chemistry is fate minus logic. It’s about interaction.”

While the audience interaction was high throughout the performance (be very aware if you buy a singles ticket!), this was taken to the next level at the after party where The Observer managed to intercept a few of its revellers. A friend of Ms. Hart, a male actor who would rather not be named for obvious reasons, explained how he used the show to hook up with girls who didn’t expect to be called the following day.

He admitted it was “partly selfish,” but that it was deemed acceptable here.

We were concerned that with so much focus on a no-strings-attached mentality: were people really building their confidence, or rather knocking it down the following morning?

Then we met Joshua Karchem and Liz Lee, who, clinging to each other for dear life, explained how they’d met at a show in June and were madly in love. “The first time I went, I made out with two random hotties. The second time, I met the love of my life,” gushed Mr Karchem.

“We didn’t think they’d approve but we’re in love,” Ms Lee told us, stealing her eyes from Mr Karchem for only a second.

 The Observer mulled over this at the bar, taking in the scene as the dance floor emptied and couples ran up the stairs, hand in hand. Ms. Hart had not been lying when she’d predicted 60% of the club would go home together that evening. We noticed two lonely souls next to us and suddenly found ourselves playing cupid. Within minutes, the pair was chatting, at ease in their liquidated states, before sloping off into one of the discreet booths positioned around the club, and pulling the velvet curtains behind them.

ariley-smith@observer.com

Ms. Ringwald. (Courtesy Patrick McMullan)

Expectations were high for An Evening with Molly Ringwald, which featured the actress-turned-novelist in conversation with Vanity Fair’s Elissa Schappell, as part of the East Village Lit Crawl. This was either due to some deferred Molly-mania, the kind that melted the hearts of many a Reagan-era adolescent male, (and quite a lot of women), or in sincere anticipation of Ms. Ringwald’s new novel, When It Happens to You.

The minute Ms. Ringwald walked in the room, everyone fell silent as camera phones were raised in a sort of luminous shrine. The audience was mainly female, aside from her husband, the writer Panio Gianopoulos, and a handful of middle-aged men gawking at the back of the room. Unlike Ms. Ringwald’s autobiographical book, 2010’s Getting the Pretty Back, this fictional “novel in stories,” comprising eight intertwined vignettes, is really quite serious. The collection portrays less of the Ringwald sassiness familiar to fans of the Brat Pack, and is more a dark depiction of betrayal in its many forms.

“We’re all betrayers, we’re all betrayed, we betray ourselves,” Ms. Ringwald explained to Ms. Schappell. “My characters are all flawed. To be flawed is to be human.”

After the talk, Ms. Ringwald told The Observer her years as an actor helped her create convincing fictional characters. But why, then, only begin writing fiction now?

“Writing is something that I’ve always done,” she said, “but, until now, I’ve never written something I’ve felt ready to release.”

Ms. Schappell agreed that being fully satisfied with your work is crucial. “Writing is like sending out pictures of yourself bent over cleaning the bathtub,” She said.

It’s a good point.

When asked about the future of her writing career, Ms. Ringwald said she is already in the process of researching material for her next novel.

As for the various other career paths she pursues--aside from writing and acting, she’s recorded two jazz albums (the first one even predates her career as a teen idol; it was released when she was six)—Ms. Ringwald said, “They’re all a part of me.”

Delancey Underground, a.k.a. the Low Line

The fact that it was underground was not the only aspect of the Low Line that set it apart from its railroad friend, the High Line.

“There are a lot of differences. This is a new form of solar technology… the idea that we treat light like a liquid,” explained co-founder James Ramsey, the more scientific of the two. This concept, of channeling light in order to photosynthesize subterranean plant life, came to him while traveling through India.

When the Observer walked into Essex Market Building D on the Lower East Side, an old warehouse above the proposed space that the Low Line Park will occupy, for the Imagining the Low Line exhibit, we found he made a point. Once adjusted to the darkness, and the overwhelming smell of foliage, we were met with a $5,000 Japanese Maple Tree, flourishing in spite of the darkness on a bed of rich moss. Above it, the science; a solar technology demo whereby a rotating sun beamer collects sunlight and distributes it down to the organisms below.

Ed Jacobs, the industrial designer of the demo, said that the project was a case of “understanding the material, the manufacturability and an issue of scale and of production.”

The entities benefiting from this were selected by Misty Gonzalez, of Hortus Environmental Design, who attempted to assemble the trees and plants that would usually be found on the rainforest canapé, an environment similar to this microclimate. She described her experience as “design science.”

The Observer was impressed by the illuminated scene, which resembled the pastoral setting of Watership Down amid darkness. Very ethereal! But with a target of $30 million to $50 million needed to build the Low Line—the project raised $150,000 this summer—and no permission yet to develop the 60,000 square feet under the exhibit space, we couldn't help but wonder: can they really pull it off?

“The park will definitely happen in five to eight years time,” said co-founder Dan Barasch, “I have increasing confidence every day.”

He'd better be confident with the exhibit opening to the public this weekend and two days of street fairs, bringing local vendors to the space.

Mr. Barasch assured us that the concept “signifies something beyond location.” Even if this particular space does not pull through, the exhibit will highlight the potential to develop any number of underground spaces.

But the Lower East Side community does matter. The project has attracted enormous support from LES residents, who lack green space.

Mr. Barasch, who deals more with the community side of the project, felt that “by bringing together core members of the Lower East Side community throughout this exhibit, we will show that the Low Line is not only possible, but will be sustainable as a viable community organization over the longer term.”

Mr. Ramsey agreed that the Low LinePark would provide a space in which to “stitch this community together a little bit,” a place to “combine performance and education.”

And the future of park space in New York? Enter the Columbia University students whose Experiments in Motion exhibit, running alongside the futuristic indoor park, imagines the future of urban motion in New York, such as Kelsey Lent’s Gang(Green) vision of “regaining the balance between nature and infrastructure” by connecting the above ground parks via underground green spaces.

The proposal were presented via a fifty-foot long model of Manhattan’s subway grid, projected onto the floor of the warehouse (courtesy of Audi America).

When The Observer emerged from the exhibit into the daylight, it was like leaving a perpetual twilight behind. A space where visitors could spend hours in a type of parallel universe. Whether the park actually goes forward in this space or not—or whether it lives up to Mr. Ramsey's vision of a place where “futuristic technology can be linked to the deep history of New York”—there’s no doubt about the potential growth of a concept that has been meticulously nurtured.