The 'Scandal' Employment Guide: 'We Do Not Touch First Ladies'
Cronut Creator Bringing Chocolate Chip Cookie Shot Glasses to New York
Planes Trains & Automobiles Bill de Blasio Names Meera Joshi to Lead TLC
The Last Frontier? Artists Are Running Out of Neighborhoods to Be Priced Out Of
A So-So Week for Opera: A Less-Than-‘Enchanted Island’ at One Met
Talk to the Hand: ‘Hand to God’ Stars One Scary Sock Puppet
Work-Life Balance: California Producer Contracts for Flatiron Loft Listed at $3.5 M.
hangin' in the blogosphere De Blasio Welcomes Parent Bloggers to City Hall
Planes Trains & Automobiles Bill de Blasio Names Meera Joshi to Lead TLC
Mayor Bill de Blasio today named Meera Joshi, the former general counsel at the city’s Taxi and Limousine Commission (TLC), as his pick to lead the agency. Read More
The Last Frontier? Artists Are Running Out of Neighborhoods to Be Priced Out Of
It’s an old dance, and a rather tired one—artists move into new neighborhoods, get priced out, move, get priced out—a seemingly endless repetition of advance and retreat. But there are only so many steps that artists can take in a finite amount of space, only so many neighborhoods that they can flee to when their studios are converted into luxury condos. And now, The New York Times reports, the dance may be nearing its end. In a city as expensive as New York is, there just aren’t that many places left to go. Read More
A So-So Week for Opera: A Less-Than-‘Enchanted Island’ at One Met
Broadly speaking, there are two types of New Yorkers: the ones who say “I’m going to the Met” meaning “I’m going to see an opera” and the ones to whom the phrase means “I’m finally going to see those Piero della Francescas everyone has been talking about.” Recently, though, opera showed up at both Mets, the Metropolitan Opera and the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
At Lincoln Center Feb. 26, the Met brought back its production of The Enchanted Island, which premiered in 2011. Two seasons ago, it was not just a new production but the first-ever performance of a new work cobbled together from bits and pieces of 18th-century operas and oratorios, fitted to a libretto concocted by British writer and director Jeremy Sams. Read More
Talk to the Hand: ‘Hand to God’ Stars One Scary Sock Puppet
Hand to God, a regional euphemism for “I swear,” turns out to be the perfect handle for this tall and demented Texas tale of a boy and his sock puppet. What seems to be arriving March 10 at the Lucille Lortel is the age-old contest between good and evil. Jason is a diffident lad of 15 who is coping with the recent death of his father. Jason’s alter ego is a malevolent sock puppet named Tyrone that has gone into takeover mode.
From this kinky Jekyll-and-Hyde Jr. premise, it’s reasonable to suspect playwright Robert Askins was at an impressionable age when he saw either A) Dead of Night, the creepy British classic where ventriloquist Michael Redgrave is dominated by his wooden dummy or B) Magic, William Goldman’s latter-day rip-off in which another ventriloquist, played by Anthony Hopkins, goes mad for the same reason—on a bigger budget. Read More
Work-Life Balance: California Producer Contracts for Flatiron Loft Listed at $3.5 M.
On one of many recent frigid days, Prime Manhattan broker Robert Danker had more than wet feet and windburn to complain about. Having scheduled a viewing for a full-floor unit listed for $12.5 million at the tony One Madison, Mr. Danker became victim to last-minute cancellation when a client begged off—citing inclement conditions and confirming the broker’s hunch that his “buyer” was less than serious. Fortunately, Mike Pardee, executive producer at The Mission—a California-based visual effects studio—waited in the wings. Though Mr. Pardee planned to see a more humble unit at 7 East 17th Street, asking $3.5 million and in need of serious work, he arrived that day equipped, Mr. Danker told us, with both enthusiasm and imagination, entering contract the very next day on the live-work space. Read More
hangin' in the blogosphere De Blasio Welcomes Parent Bloggers to City Hall
Mayor de Blasio took his pre-K campaign to the blogosphere this afternoon, inviting a group of parent bloggers to City Hall for a discussion on preschool and after-school programs, which he is fighting to expand.
“We need Albany to hear concerns of parents in our city and provide the resources,” said Mr. de Blasio, who has launched a massive push to try to convince lawmakers in Albany to approve a tax on the city’s richest residents to fund the programs. Read More
Cronut Creator Bringing Chocolate Chip Cookie Shot Glasses to New York
Bow before Dominique Ansel’s latest dessert creation. Read More
He Said, She Said: ‘The Open House’ Has a Bullying Dad, ‘Stage Kiss’ Follows a Quirky Couple, ‘Arlington’ Is a Musical Monologue
In early 2012, Quiara Alegría Hudes won the Pulitzer Prize for drama. A year later, her prize-winning work, Water By the Spoonful, a play about addiction and redemption among a sprawling Puerto Rican family in North Philadelphia, arrived at the Second Stage Theatre for its New York debut. It was an admirable work if not an ideal one. Now Ms. Hudes has returned to the same theater with The Happiest Song Plays Last, the final play in a trilogy about this clan, which opened Monday night. And once again, the play isn’t perfect, but there’s an awful lot to like.
The central relationship here is between two strong-willed cousins, Elliot (Armando Riesco, reprising the role), an Iraq war vet, and Yaz (Lauren Vélez), the one who got out—a classical musician with a prep school scholarship, an Ivy League education and a Center City penthouse—but then came back, to settle into her late Aunt Ginny’s role as neighborhood protector. Read More
The ‘Scandal’ Employment Guide: ‘We Do Not Touch First Ladies’
Do you want to be a go-getter like those ambitiously inspired types on Scandal? They all have hopes! And dreams! And will achieve them, no matter what kind of torture-laden machinations or relationship-killing secrets they have to endure. This week’s episode, “We Do Not Touch the First Ladies,” was chock-full of advice for the budding Scandal-ite:
Saturday Night Fever? Measles Outbreak Hits New York City
First came the mumps, now the measles? Read More
