On Sex in the City, Carrie and the girls were always running into celebrities. A few years ago, on my way to my bank to make a deposit, I had a “celebrity” sighting of my own.Al Sharpton.
He was coming out of a building on 43rd Street in Midtown carrying a few bags of groceries. He popped open the lid on his trunk and, as he placed the grocery bags inside, I saw a huge 25 pound bag of dog food already stashed inside.
This was not long after he ran an unsuccessful bid for the presidency. And now, here he was---no Secret Service in sight, and picking up dog food and groceries all by his lonesome.
Today was the day Al Sharpton declared that he was going to shut down the city in protest of the Sean Bell verdict. It’s been all over the news for days.
Sharpton Vows To Shut City Down and Get Himself Arrested.
Exactly what illegal thing he was planning on doing to get arrested was beyond me. Rape? Murder? Public Urination? Well, then I say lock him up, by all means. Because, I’m sorry, whipping out your junk in a public place is not going to solve anything. It’s just about you wanting to show your pee-pee.
The local news has been showing a map all week of where he planned on holding his public demonstrations. I looked at that map. It’s all on the East Side! How are you going to shut down NYC from the EAST Side? What’s he going to do? Block the deli?
In the end, he wound up blocking some bridges and tunnels by simply standing there peacefully. The police quickly gave him what he wanted, put him in handcuffs and took him down to The Big House. And a few minutes later, the city went back to normal.
There is no love between Al Sharpton and the NYPD.
I have a lot of cop friends and they LOVE dogging on Sharpton. To most of them, he’s pretty much a big, loud-mouthed boob. And they love telling stories about his idiocy.
My favorite is a story that seems to have passed all thru the NYPD. A few years ago, in an effort to bridge the gap between the local police and Sharpton’s contingency, the NYPD offered to take him out on the town and show him what being a cop is really like. One of the places they took him was to the firing range where they train the rookie cops to shoot. They hooked Sharpton up to the video game-like simulator, gave him the usual instructions on how it all worked and let him go.
Sharpton shot up the joint.
He killed pretty everyone within firing range. He shot the perps as well as fellow cops and pedestrians. It was a virtual massacre.
Now, while I agree that the officer firing 50 shots had obviously shot almost as well as Sharpton himself (albeit, with real tragedies) and that the case should most certainly have gone to trial---frankly, I just don’t care for Al Sharpton.
Beyond the fact that the man appears to be a bonafide racist (who could ever forget the whole Get Whitey remark?) I just don’t like the fact that he seems to immediately attach his name and face to ALREADY high-profile cases. You kinda expect a guy like him would find some poor soul who can’t get their story on TV and help them get some much-needed attention.
Instead, he seems to jump into the fray when the story is already being investigated by both the media AND the courts.
I have yet to see a big story that Al Sharpton actually breaks.
I guess, I just wish he would use his power to really help those who aren’t being helped at all.
But no, this is not a blog about race issues. This is about celebrity.
It’s not a myth that you can spot celebrities all over Manhattan. That is, if you know who they are. I can’t say I’m always hip to the latest starlets and boy bands. In fact, last night a band that I believe is called Boys Like Girls came into our bar for a round of drinks before they did a concert nearby. I had no idea who they were. Our bartender did and they wound up inviting him out to see their show and have a drink when he got off work.
My first Manhattan celebrity sighting happened my first week in New York City. A friend had hooked me up with a week’s worth of work doing some production work for the New Yorker Festival. My first event was a fiction reading at a downtown club. As we were setting up the chairs, one of my fellow production guys looked out the window and said, “Hey---that’s the guy from The Princess Bride on the pay phone across the street!”
A moment later, Wallace Shawn walked in the door.
Turns out, his girlfriend was one of the novelists on the slate for the night. My job that evening was to work the door, and as Wallace Shawn kept popping in and out several times throughout the night, I had a lot of fun giving him trouble every time he passed thru my gate.
“Eugh! You again?”
He would snicker a bit and apologize and, after a while, we had a bit of a running gag. A fun night my first week in NYC.
For me, guys like Wallace Shawn ARE New York. Smart, funny, sophisticated and just a little bit quirky. And I admit that the “celebrities” I tend to most admire, tend to be the ones that not everyone would recognize.
That’s why, a few days later, while working a different event in Midtown, I was a little worried about my ability to perform a certain assigned task. The event was a fashion symposium. And one of the speakers was fashion designer (and daughter of Paul) Stella McCartney. Ms. McCartney was quickly whisked off to the backstage area upstairs by a Festival Coordinator. She wasn’t my problem.
Gwyneth Paltrow was.
Apparently Gwyneth and Stella are friends and my job (as a gal who’d been in New York City for exactly one week) was to be on the lookout for Gwyneth. She had called someone who told someone who told someone who told me that she was running late. And I was supposed to make sure she got backstage without a problem.
The only problem was---I had no idea what Gwyneth Paltrow looked like. Sure, I’d seen Shakespeare in Love, but that had been a while ago. And I don’t really read movie magazines. I sat there all by myself in a hallway waiting for a movie star who I would not recognize to show up.
Hmmm. This was a dilemma.
A few moments after the symposium started, stray women kept walking in late. Is that Gwyneth Paltrow? Is that Gwyneth Paltrow? How about that?
They all looked thin and pretty. After all, this was a fashion symposium.
But they all had tickets for the event and all were happily led inside the theatre.
As I sat there waiting for the unknown-featured Ms. Paltrow to show up, I started to get a little peeved. After all, why should I be EXPECTED to recognize a starlet? And what if she was one of those bitchy actresses who got all upset when I didn’t recognize her as a celebrity? Or, even worse, what if she turned out to be super-nice and I didn’t recognize her and she felt bad.
Oh, this was gonna suck.
Lucky for me, a few moments later, a blond, thin woman walked in with what can only be appropriately described as an Entourage. This HAD to be Gwyneth Paltrow.
And, it was. Out of nowhere, one of my fellow assistants (and obvious Gwyneth Paltrow fan) popped out of some unseen Hobbit hole and jumped all over Ms. Paltrow.
“Right this way, Ms. Paltrow! I’ll take you backstage, Ms. Paltrow!”
Phew. One less embarrassing situation in a life already saturated with awkwardness.
So, sure---you can constantly spot celebrities in Manhattan. But frankly, it’s not all that interesting. I’m constantly amazed at the cult of celebrity in America. Particularly for celebrities who do literally nothing except get their picture taken and wind up in the gossip columns and weekly rags.
I will say that one of the great things about living in New York City is that you often get the opportunity to STUDY with some truly amazing people. And I’ve had the chance to take classes and workshops with some writers that I REALLY admire. No, you would probably not recognize them at the local supermarket. But these amazingly talented people are often very interested in sharing their knowledge and skills with the next generation of writers, actors, directors, dancers, singers, painters, designers, etc. Because this is New York City; and the Best of the Best live and work here.
Sometimes, when you’re working so much at a regular job just to pay the bills, you kind of forget that you’re actually living in a city where so much is possible.
And this is exactly what happened at work tonight when I was repeatedly besieged by European tables who like to run up large tabs with bottles of wine, espresso and sweet desserts---and then, don’t take the time to read in their guidebooks that gratuities for good service are expected.
I’ll just say two words: The French.
I’ve been to France. I distinctly remember getting mon addition and seeing the words at the bottom of the check, “Service compris”---Service included. Even then, I STILL tipped between 15-20%. Why? Just habit, I guess.
About two weeks ago, I waited on a family of four from France. They didn’t speak much English and I not only translated the menu and gave them tips on what to order, but I chatted with them a bit about NYC (en francais) and, when the father spilled wine on his white shirt, I brought out a glass of club soda and even loaned him my Tide To-Go Stick.
Their check was $140. My tip? Nothing.
“Merci beaucoup!” they kept saying as they left.
But still, nothing.
With our economy in a shambles, Europeans are traveling to New York City in record numbers. Not only do their Euros and Pounds get more for the buck here, but, unlike Americans, they can actually afford the costly New York City hotel rates. They will spend $800 on a flight, $600 a night on a hotel room, $140 for dinner---yet they stubbornly won’t tip.
My fellow closing waitress tonight gave great service to a European table this evening. From Spain, I believe. The party of five ran up a bill of almost $200 and wound up leaving her seven bucks. Fed up with the quality of European tips, she quietly and nicely asked them if they were happy with their service.
Yes. They were very happy.
Well, she tried to explain, you know service isn’t included here.
Yes, they explained, we know that. But we don’t do that in our country.
She quietly walked away; unable, by profession, to say much of anything else. But back at the service station, she started to rail. Because it wasn’t just that table. The place was literally packed full of Europeans. It was more diverse than the U.N.
A few months ago, I was waiting on a batch of about five tables at once---one American, one British, one Australian, one French and one from Spain. I literally bounced back and forth not only between tables, but between languages. Translating French, Spanish and even British English (“Do you mean LEMONDAE or SPRITE---because lemonade in the U.S. means Lemon Squash”). The French left me nothing, the Spanish left me nothing, the Australians left me nothing (no, they don’t tip in Australia, either), the British left me about 5% (cheap even for the British) and only the Americans left me the proper tip. On a total of about $600 in sales, I received a total of $28. It should have been more like $90.
So tonight, with the place full of foreigners, the staff was losing their minds. Everyone felt like just walking out the door.
All of us began to share our plans to get out of there.
By the end of the night, as we were closing up and wiping down, we had also all calmed down. Because, despite our anger and frustration, there was really not much we could do. Trying to re-educate all of Europe on proper U.S. tipping procedures was certainly out of our realm. And walking out of a union job with health insurance would be just plain stupid. Because in New York City---while the advantages and opportunities can be great---the stakes are much higher. Rents are enormous. Jobs are hard to come by. And anything we did that might jeopardize our existence in this amazing city would be just plain foolhardy.
So we all crawled out of there with our pittances and our wounded pride and got on our respective trains.
After all, there was always tomorrow. And who knows? Tomorrow, a director might just love your audition. A designer might be entranced by your portfolio. Or a publisher might just discover your novel in the slush pile.
So, while the European tourists take their photos of Al Sharpton being hauled away---most of us are just hoping that a guy with an average face named Agent John J. Smith from Acme Talent Company spots us in the crowd.
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