Feinstein.

What are you doing New Year’s Eve? The cultured and the wise will be punishing the parquet at Feinstein’s at Loews Regency for the last time, saying goodbye forever to one of New York’s most venerable cabaret kingdoms. Yes, it’s one more nail in the coffin of the kind of sophisticated nightlife that used to be a staple of a musical stay-up-late crowd that now goes home to tweet and watch bad television. But Michael Feinstein, the swank supper club’s namesake, is not going down with ears plugged and eyes closed. While scouting locations for a newer, better venue that he’ll announce soon, he’s been filling Feinstein’s final days with an extraordinary lineup of superior talent—from the magnificent voice of Sue Raney to the tapping toes of Tommy Tune. Now the beat goes on through the month of December with the headliner’s annual holiday show, dedicated to keeping the spirit and sound of the Great American Songbook alive.

Michael calls this one “A Gershwin Holiday,” and he’s not kidding. It’s a holiday show in festive theory only—there isn’t one Christmas song in it—but Gershwin revelers will still find plenty of peace on earth and goodwill toward men. It opens with five tunes sung by Nick Ziobro, a lanky, clean-cut winner of the Michael Feinstein Great American Songbook Initiative’s 2012 High School Competition. Sixteen years old and crooning “Here’s That Rainy Day” in tune, with dreamy phrasing and perfect pitch? Don’t tell me the Great American Songbook is six feet under.

Then comes the indefatigable former saloon singer-turned-stand-up superstar himself. He loves the Gershwins and he’s been singing their praises for years. This is the first time I’ve known him to devote an entire show to their genius. Besides, he didn’t have to learn any new songs. He already knew them all. So we get a crowd-pleasing song cycle that runs the gamut of the Gershwin style, including swingers (“Strike Up the Band,” “Swanee”), familiar ballads (“Embraceable You,” “Isn’t it a Pity”), and even a surprise or two—Mr. Feinstein as Porgy, essaying “Bess, Oh Where’s My Bess?” is not something I was prepared for, but darned if he doesn’t do it justice, while demonstrating how much he’s expanded in range and vocal technique since he started singing for his supper in the old days of smoky piano bars on Hollywood Boulevard. From a raucous ragtime throwaway written when George Gershwin was 17 to a mellow “Who Cares?” there is something here to please everybody, marvelously served by a five-piece band conducted by ace arranger-pianist Alan Broadbent. Mr. Feinstein even finds the time and space to work in a medley of eight Fred Astaire songs expressly written for him and his sister Adele by his friends George and Ira in their halcyon days on Broadway. Except for the sad fact that the Gershwins, being nice Jewish boys, never wrote a single Christmas song in their lives (odd when you think about it, since almost every famous Christmas carol was written by Jews, including Irving Berlin’s “White Christmas”), I can think of no better way to toast the most popular holiday than a concert by the most important composer of American music of all time. It’s a great way to bid a fond adieu to an old cabaret institution and usher in a new Yuletide season.

Bring your own mistletoe.

rreed@observer.com

Mr. Goldberg interviews Rev. Al Sharpton after his power breakfast.

A breakfast meeting at the see-and-be-seen Loews Regency Hotel has always had its hazards. Diners risk Page Six sightings and uncomfortable run-ins with political foes. Losing a coveted window seat spells professional disaster.

Now, two more dangers lurk outside.

Huffington Post front page editor Adam Goldberg and associate video editor Hunter Stuart have taken to loitering outside the Park Avenue hotel one morning each week in hopes of snagging an impromptu interview with the newsmakers inside. They’re taping their efforts for a new Huffington Post video series, “Power Breakfast.”

The series quietly launched in March but gained traction last week, when the pair landed a serendipitous chat with Newsweek editor Tina Brown, whose stirring gay Obama cover was on newsstands and in the news.

“It wasn’t obvious that it would work,” Mr. Goldberg told Off the Record in an e-mail Q&A. “I didn’t realistically think that just standing outside of this place on a random morning would net any actual newsworthy interviews.”

Huffington Post Washington bureau chief Ryan Grim knew better. He came up with the idea for “Power Breakfast” in February, brainstorming ways to get Mr. Stuart, then mostly making video mash-ups, out of the office.

Mr. Stuart recalled: “He said, well, there’s this place right in New York where everyone eats—it’s called the ‘Power Breakfast’—and I bet if you just hung out outside you’d catch some pretty big people walking out of their breakfasts.”

“That was news to me,” admitted Mr. Goldberg.

Mr. Grim had told them to expect Loews regulars Harold Ford, Jr., and Al Sharpton, but on day one they spotted David Patterson.

“Suddenly we’re talking talking to someone who had reached the pinnacle of politics,” Mr. Goldberg said, “being parodied on Saturday Night Live.”

The series is “very likely” to be featured on the new Huffington Post Streaming Network, now called HuffPost Live, and the pair’s high-brow paparazzi act has revealed challenges foreign to the news site’s nap machine-enabled newsroom.

In the seconds it takes a newsmaker to get from the hotel to their Town Car, they have to identify them, run them down, hopefully with a timely question by the time they secure their attention. (Although occasionally, the mere mortals among the restaurant’s clientele, seeing their camera and microphone, serve as casual tipsters, alerting them to the bold face names inside.)

“We call our tactic ‘the polite ambush,’” said Mr. Stuart, who leaves his camera on during the entirety of the three-hour stakeout.

They’ve only run into trouble with hotel management once—filming on the sidewalk is within their rights—which they got out of with some sweet-talking.

“We tried to interview him, and I think he was flattered that we wanted to,” Mr. Stuart said. (He eventually declined.)

And then there are the tourists and passers-by, for whom a video camera and a guy with a microphone are like a beacon for a celebrity sighting to write home about.

“They ask ‘Who are you waiting for?’ and we say, ‘Anyone, really.’”

In addition to Ms Brown, Haley Barbour, Lewis Eisenberg and Cornel West have given interviews. Many more have passed, including actor Willem Dafoe.

“We’re interested in talking to regular bankers, even if they’re not CEOs,” said Mr. Stuart, “but they usually just ignore us or crack a joke as they walk past us.”

Still, they say few outings yielded no interviews.

As for Mssrs. Goldberg and Stuart, they indulged the power breakfast only once, on their first outing, March 7. They were seated in the upstairs dining room, The Library.

“They brought us fresh squeezed grapefruit juice and a pitcher full of coffee as soon as we sat down,” recalled Mr. Stuart, who ate a $14 bowl of oatmeal and a side of thick-cut bacon. Mr. Goldberg had the salmon benedict, which comes with caviar garnish. They expensed the $70 meal.

Now, they just meet on the sidewalk outside at 7 a.m.; Mr. Goldberg toting McDonald’s coffee.

“Powerful people seem to like early meals, so we get there early too,” he said.

“Sometimes I bring something for Adam to eat because he never eats breakfast,” Mr. Stuart added.