While the City Sleeps

 

Mayor Z and President O Hang with Preschoolers in the Bronx

This is just so beautiful and heartwarming, and a reminder that we have and had great, compassionate leadership in this city and country.

Mr NYC in Legoland

Recently took the family to Legoland, a theme park up in Westchester that opened in 2021. We had a great time -- lots of rides, lots lego stuff to do, and it had a chill, nerdy vibe that we all enjoyed.

My favorite thing, as you might imagine, were the big outdoor Lego builds of American cities -- Philadelphia, Washington DC, Chicago, Las Vegas, and Los Angeles were featured amongst others. But the really big one, the really major one, was of New York City (no suprise there). Here I will provide you a short photographic tour of Legoland NYC -- it's really amazing to see and something that I encourage all city buffs to check out:

We start out to the north in ...

Da' Bronx

We zoom down into Lego Yankee's Stadium and then visit the Lego Bronx Zoo and the Lego New York Botanical Garden ...

Then we traverse into Manhattan and breeze by ...

The Upper East Side & Upper West Side

Here we see the Lego Guggenheim, the Lego Dakota and Lego Sam Remo as well as the Lego Central Park.

Now let's hop on ...

The Subway 

And go to ... 

Queens

And go through Lego Long Island City and Lego Flushing Meadows Park to a Lego Mets game at Lego Citi Field.

Let's go back into Manhattan and hit ...

Midtown

We pass by the Lego AT&T Building, the Lego St. Patrick's Cathedral, the Lego Times Square, the Lego United Nations, the Lego Empire State Building, the Lego Madison Square Garden and Lego Pennsylvania Hotel, and the Lego Flatiron Building.

Now we go ...

Downtown

We head south from the Lego Washington Square Arch and Lego City Hall to the Lego Castle Clinton and Lego 9/11 Memorial to the Lego One World Trade Center, Lego Lower Manhattan and, in the midst of the Lego New York Harbor pool, the Lego Statue of Liberty.

But what, dere's more! Let's dip into ...

Brooklyn

And we finish up our visit passing by the Lego Brooklyn Museum, the Lego Grand Army Plaza Arch, and Lego Coney Island.

As for ...

Staten Island 

It's not there (yet).

So that's my little tour of Legoland NYC -- but I highly, highly suggest that you go check it out, along with the whole park, yourself.

Funky Town Redux

Over the years I've blogged a lot about how 1970's and '80s NYC was Funky Town. 

And Funky Town was a big, wild place! 

Here are some more examples of that time, that seems so far away and yet is right around (literally) the corner:

Back in those days trade school commercials were all over NYC television, like these for the Albert Merrill School and Apex Tech (that lovely set of tools is yours to keep after you graduate).

Then there's movies. A lot of great movies were shot on the streets of NYC back then -- The Godfather, Taxi Driver, Annie Hall, and Saturday Night Fever, just to name a few. As you might imagine, shooting them on location could be a challenge. Recently I read about the making of the 1974 original movie The Taking of Pelham 1-2-3. You gotta love it -- it's an action movie that stars Walter Matthau and Jerry Stiller! It's a great NYC movie that mostly takes place on the subway movie but it was a tough movie to shoot in the fall of 1973 -- as this article points out. 

Talking about NYC movies of the 1970s, recently I was on the East Side and walked by The Copinette restaurant that has a plaque outside, commenterating its appearance in the 1971 Oscar Best Picture winner The French Connection.

And of course, there's The Sexy. 

Before AIDS closed them down, sex clubs were prominent around town. Here's previous Mr NYC interviewee and former adult film star Hyapatia Lee talking about her visits to Plato's Retreat and The Hellfire Club and the wild, sexy times she had in this town.

And talking about sexy clubs, one night in 1975 a young songwriter named Van McCoy went to the Apple's Apple nightclub and saw people dancing in an interesting way. He therefore decided to write a song called "The Hustle" and it became one of the most famous, beloved, and iconic disco songs of all time:

So there's just some more examples of Funky Town, a place long-gone but that will forever live in Mr NYC's heart. 

Mayor Z @ 100 Days

Mayor Z has been in office for 100 days -- a rather random benchmark but one that chief executives are always measured against.

Thus far, the mayor has had to deal with a budget shortfall and put together agencies that will deal with affordability. These first 100 days have been, it seems, all about putting the pieces in place to delivery his affordability agenda. 

He still has high approval ratings -- but also high expectations. The next 100 days need to be more policy oriented so that the reality can soon match the promise.

Classic Mr NYC

Well, well, well, Mr NYC really is ... well, maybe not exactly prophetic than certainly perspicacious. 

In the early days of this blog I wrote about the early 1950's NYC Mayor Vincent Impelliteri -- perhaps the city's most forgotten 20th century chief executive. Well, a man named George Arzt, a lifelong city government journalist and staffer, actually knew "Impy" back in the day. Arzt is retirning after 60 years working in and around city government and he's given a great exit interivew that you can read here. 

And then here's another interview you can listen two between podcaster/comedian Billy Procida and adult film star Sonia Harcourt -- where they talk about polyamory and  swinging and all sorta of sexy stuff. I interviewed both Billy and Sonia several years ago so it's great to here two previous Mr NYC interviewees talk to each other ... and apparently that's not all they did! 

Enjoy!

Review: "Hair" (1979)

Recently I came upon an article in the Hollywood Reporter listing 47 iconic movie and TV sites in NYC. Read it here. (Why it's not an even 50, I can't say.) 

One location that's obviously cited is Central Park which has been used in too many movies and TV shows to count. But one of movies that's not on this list but that makes great use of nation's most famous urban park is Hair from 1979. 

Based on the late 1960s anti-war, anti-establishment hippie Broadway smash, it's about a young man named Claude from Oklahoma who comes to NYC on his way to enlist in the army before shipping to Vietnam. (Why a guy from Oklahoma would need to travel all the way to NYC to go into the army is odd but, hey, it's a movie). Anyhoo, while roaming around Central Park one afternoon he comes upon a group of hippies who befriend him and rock his world. He also gets close to a young beautiful society lady who is bored by her preppy boyfriend and upper class life. Eventually it all goes haywire and Claude goes into the army -- before his friends head out to Nevada, trying to rescue him from going to Vietnam. There's a big, surprising, ultimately tragic twist at the end about the randomness of friendship and fate.

When the musical Hair hit Broadway in 1968, it was a stunning, crazy, and almost dangerous thing. America was mired in the hopeless Vietnam war and the anti-war, hippie movement was gaining steam (Woodstock would be a year later). This musical rocked the culture, a show that was both highly political and highly entertaining -- plus, at various points, the cast members took their clothes off. Richard Nixon, right after he became President, imagined that he'd go to a show and, as soon as cast got naked, he'd get up and walk out, showing his solidarity with the Silent Majority, the squares in the "real America" (fortunately he never did it although it would have been lit). Like A Chorus Line, Rent and Hamilton later on, this show defined its time. 

But when the movie came in 1979, times had changed. Vietnam was over, Watergate and stagflation had and were traumatized the nation, and this movie already seemed like a museum piece. It was of and about another time. Hair the movie was moderately successfull but didn't have the same resonance as it had had on Broadway 11 years earlier. 

The movie was directed by Milos Forman, who had just won Oscars for One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and would, later on, do so again for Amadeus. Hair is somewhat forgotten from his filmography. The cast is amazingly -- especially a young Treat Williams (RIP) as George, the hippie leader, and Beverly D'Angelo, the bored young deb. Claude is played by John Savage who had just had a huge success in The Deer Hunter. He's a good actor but rather miscast -- he's not really believable as a young Okie. The rest of the mostly unknown cast is quite good, including the late, wonderful Nell Carter singing in the park at night.

Still, there's something about the movie that sorta doesn't work -- it reminds me of the Rent musical, a great, brilliant show put to film that somehow, someway, sucks the life out of the story and score. But I still suggest seeing it for the music, the cast, and beautiful shot Central Park. 

Remembering Vanessa Del Rio, NYC's Greatest Adult Star

In the wild heyday of the NYC adult film scene of the 1970s and '80s, no star shone brighter than that of Vanessa Del Rio's. 

She was the Judy Garland, the Barbra Streisand, the Meryl Streep of that time and place -- quite simply, the best. She was famous and iconic in her time and remains so almost 40 years since she quit the business.

Born and raised in Harlem, Vanessa was the quintessential New Yorker -- and a striking contrast to most of the adult performers of her time and after. She was Latina, curvy, tough talking, odd-looking -- and a stunning, gorgeous ball of fire. From 1974 to 1986 she made roughly 80 movies, many of her as the star. And her various co-stars -- both male and female, and including some of the biggest names of the time -- were both the most fortunate of pepole as well as her helpless prey, so insatiable were her performances. She was amazing!

In the decades since she left the business, Vanessa has popped up here and there. She appeared on NYPD Blue and also had an entire Taschen book made about her. She's on social media and appreciates her fans. Now in her 70s, she lives quietly (I believe on Staten Island) and lives a fairly quiet life. But her legacy will never be quiet -- it will rage on forever.

Bobby D & Al Talk "No Kings" in NYC

Review: "Chess"

Well this is certainly a Mr NYC first: I'm reviewing a current Broadway show that I had previously blogged about as being a historical curiosity relegated to the  distant past.

I'm talking of course about Chess, the messy and failed 1988 musical that has been revived to massive success on Broadway. In 2021 I wrote a lot about how its various problems and controversies doomed it almost 40 years ago, and I mused about whether any producers might have the courage to rework and revive it. 

And they did!

Perhaps Mr NYC played a small part on this? (Who knows, only that I was ahead of my time.) So here's my review of the revival:

Set in 1979, the plot involves two brilliant chess masters, American Freddie and Soviet Russian Anatoly, who are set to compete in Milan. The match is heavy with Cold War politics, and the CIA and the KGB want Freddie to lose the match so that the Russians will be willing to engage in the Salt II Nuclear Talks. Freddie doesn't want to do this, obviously. Caught between them in Florence, Freddie's lover whom he mistreats and who, through various personal and political events, moves over to Anatoly -- who then defects to England with Florence, leaving his wife and children behind. Eventually, four years later, they all come together at another chess match in Bangkok -- the all of their fates intertwine and explode. 

This version of Chess has a new book that simplifies and clarifies the story. Some of the songs have been put in a more logical order that does a better job of pushing the narrative story. As for the story itself, it still doesn't really work as being quite as compelling as it aims to be, and the characters are a bit two-dimensional. That said, it never lags and you're never bored. Not at all! It's massively entertaining.

Chess is both helped and hindered by a narrator who explains all of the action and the historical context of the show. Because this version is being staged almost 40 years after the fall of the Soviet Union, it is therefore presented in a "once upon a time ..." fashion which gives the audience more perspective -- something obviously not possible in 1988. So that was good. Unfortunately the narrator tells a lot of dumb, corny, jokes that gives the show some humor (it's otherwise pretty heavy) but that is tonally dissonant with the rest of the story. 

However, the songs are amazing, and the production is brilliantly staged.

Lea Michele, as Florence, is beyond great -- she is a true Broadway star, the best of her generation, and her version of "Nobody's Side" is so hot, so on fire, it nearly burns the theater down. Aaron Tveit as Freddie and Nicholas Christopher as Anatoly are also great, incredible singers and actors who play these tortured geniuses struggling to survive. The rest of the supporting cast is strong and I must give a shout-out especially the ensemble which is on stage for the entire show and sings and dances throughout, performing many complicated numbers. They are the heart of this show and are wonderful.

So see Chess for a good time, a piece of fun Broadway theater -- a reminder that yesterday's failure can be tomorrow's triumph. 

The American Rasputin's Home -- March 21st, 2026, 4:14 PM

Russia's Grigori Rasputin lived at Gorokhovaya Street, Apt. 20 in St. Petersburg, Russia:

America's Rasputin, Jeffrey Epstein, lived at 9 East 71st Street in New York, NY:

Two buildings on opposite sides of the world -- a century apart -- sitting quietly on city streets wherein the course of history was changed and two great empires were shaken to their foundations.

The Saga of the Ansonia: NYC's Most Notorious Building

If a building could be called a Drama Queen, then NYC's most drama-filled building is the Ansonia on West 73rd-74th street and Broadway. 

I've blogged about it a few times over the years -- and, again, did so long before many others, being ahead of my time!

It was built in the 19th-century by a copper heir named W.E.D Stokes who wanted to make it an urban Utopia -- a place where its residents could retreat from city's nuttiness and enter into a world of peace and happiness. It had sound-proof walls so that families could live quietly, and Stokes even had the idea of a roof-top farm (he was well-ahead of his time).

But soon the Ansonia became a den of inequity, with its rich tenants using its sound-proof apartments for parties and affairs. The Continental Baths opened in the basement, becoming a gathering for gay men. And it's also where Plato's Retreat existed for many years, NYC's most famous swingers club.

It's where the 1992 movies Single White Female was set (I've blogged about that too).

But it's not only sex and psychos that made the Ansonia drama filled -- from Day 1 it was a money-pit, Stokes's creation driving him into poverty. And it is the most litigated building in NYC history, with lawsuits flying between tenants and owners for decades. 

The Ansonia is, of course, the inspiration for the fictional Arconia in Only Murders in the Building (although it's not filmed there). 

Yes, the Ansonia is so drama-filled that it's had podcasts and videos made about it (see below). It's quite a saga!

Gotta Love New Yorkers

I've been listening to the public radio show This American Life for over 25 years. Recently they did an episode called "In the Shadow of the City" about people who live on the fringes of big cities (something I've also blogged about). 

Anyway, one of the segments in this episode is called "Brooklyn Archipelago" about how a bunch of Ukrainian teenagers from Brooklyn managed to get themselves shipwrecked and washed up on a deserted island -- right in the sight of the Empire State Building and Midtown skyscrapers. 

A short boat trip in Jamaica Bay turned into a day-long saga more akin to Robinsoe Crusoe or Gilligan's Island (Castaway or Lost). It's a hilarious story about the immigrant experience, being young and reckless, and how the geography of NYC never fails to surpise.

It's also a classic example of how you Gotta Love New Yorkers. 

Remembering Sleazy NYC

Currently I'm really into looking at ads and newstories from 19070s NYC. I promise I won't post too many of these but I couldn't resist sharing some ads/news stories from back in the city's sleazy heyday. What a different time, what a different NYC it was! Some much more fun but also, let's face it, kinda gross. Enjoy! Or don't ...

NYC Commercials 1978/79

I can never get enough of these old NYC commercials -- and if you want to know what was popping up on TV screens around the city in 1978 and 1979, see below:

Ronnie Eldridge RIP

Ronnie Elgridge has died at the age of 95. She was a staple of Manhattan politics for decades as an activist, adviser, government staffer, broadcaster, and NYC Councilwoman for a dozen years. She was smart, tireless, and deeply beloved. Her career spanned decades and she never stopped caring about, or working for, her city.

Oh, and Ronnie was married to the brilliant columnist Jimmy Breslin for 25 years, a New York City legend in his own right. They were easily my favorite, and NYC's cutest and most admirabe, power couple. 

RIP.

Inside NYC's Secret Skyscraper

If you ever stroll around Lower Manhattan, you might find yourself on Thomas Street. And if you walk past 33 Thomas Street, you'll pass the most mysterious skyscraper in NYC.

It's a 45-story hulking brutalist pile that looks like a weird Lincoln Log and looms over its immediate vicinity. It has no windows. No ornamentation. Whereas most skyscrapers are gleaming with glass, inviting glares and glare, this one ... doesn't. It seems to be purposefully, aggressively shutting out the world.

And that's exactly what it's doing. 

In fact it's an AT&T building that was originally built to connect long-distance phone calls and oversee phone networks. Today it does something similar for the digital age. 

And it's also apparently built to withstand a nuclear attack in order to keep society functioning and communicating. It is, so to say, "apocalypse proof."

So here's a little inside look at NYC's secret skyscaper.

Anti-War Protests Rock Times Square

NYC Back in the Day

The thing about NYC is that it's a city with a fascinating past but that is always,  relentlessly, looking into the future. And Mr NYC tries to be as future-oriented as possible, following the trajectory of the greatest city on earth.

But ... the past never fully vanishes. As F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote, we are always going against the current, "borne back ceaselessly into the past."

To put it another way, people will always be fascinated by NYC back in the day.

So here are some various examples.

Nostalgia for NYC back in the day is so huge that there's literally an entire Youtube Channel called ... NYC Nostalgia. It has numerous videos chronicling life in NYC in the last couple of decades and centuries, including about things you might not necessarily realize existed. For example, did you know there were motorcycle gangs all over NYC? Yes, there were, as this video shows:

Then there's the money. Yes, NYC was built by great wealth and generated great wealth. Heck, there's an entire show about it called The Guilded Age about the late-19th century when NYC's wealth changed the entire nation.

Sometimes this wealth produced great things and sometimes ... not so much.

This was true even before the Gilded Age, before families like the Vanderbilts and Rockefellers -- families that name many of our streets like the Astors, the Jeromes, the Schermerhorns, the Delanceys, and many others. Here's a great video about some of these families that used to rule NYC back in the day, the original city elite:

And then there's the darkness. Look at this photo taken in October 2001 at Ground Zero, a month after 9/11:

Ouch. You got then-Commissioner Bernard Kerik who ended up going to jail for corruption (and is now deceased). It includes then-Mayor Rudy Giuilani who later committed treason but trying to overturn the 2020 presidential election and wound up broke, indicted and disgraced. And then there's the now former Prince Andrew, who's been arrested for corruption and settled a mult-million dollar sexual abuse lawsuit. The photo above was taken only six or seven months after this infamous photo:

The then-prince was in NYC at that time to pay his respects to the families whose loved-ones has perished, to visit and thank the first responders for their work, and extend sympathy to a traumatized city. 

It appears that, during this visit to NYC, in the aftermath of this horrific event, Prince Andrew came to town not only to provide comfort but also to do some partying with Russian broads. Watch this video about Andrew's 9/11 jaunt, it'll both fascinate and disgust you:

And to think that these dark people were the ones taking care of NYC at this dark time only makes the darkness even darker -- darkness on top of darkness. And today when we see images of the now former prince, this is what we see:

But let's end this look at NYC back in the day on a happier, funnier note.

In the early 1980s, as Saturday Night Live was transitioning out of its '70s heyday, the show went into a critical and ratings downturn -- and flirted with cancellation. But it was saved by a 19-year old kid who was still living with his parents in Brooklyn named Eddie Murphy. His comic brilliance was so blazing, so wild and fascinating, that he saved the show that has lasted for half-a-century. When SNL started back in the day it was a curiousity -- a quirky, funky 1970s late-night sketch show from NYC. But Eddie Murphy turned it into an institution that defines the city and its impact on American culture to this day. 

By the way, you can watch one of Eddie Murphy's funniest "Mister Robinson's Neighborhood" sketches below and the entire archive for your enjoyment here. 

This F@&%$#g Guy!

Yep, he's still in business after more than 20 years!

He even has his own Wikipedia page! 

My only questions is: can he still make a living doing this and does it help him score chicks?

Something Important to Remember

Blizzard '26

 'Twas a a doozy. 

Jesse Jackson RIP

The long-time civil right activist Jesse Jackson has died. He was, in many ways, the bridge between the activism of Martin Luther King and the Presidency of Barack Obama.

Jackson kept his civil rights fight going for his whole life -- and he had lots of controversies and lots of successes. He was an American original, a man who burnished his way into history, a legend.

And he was funny. 

In the early 1990s I remember when he popped up on Saturday Night Live's "Weekend Update" and he did a brilliatly hilarious telling of "Green Eggs & Ham." In fact, it was so funny that In Living Color felt the need to match it -- and did, also hilariously. This was back in the day when comedy was edgy, slightly dangerous, and so much more relevant than it is today. 

A much younger Jesse Jackson also appeared in 2021 documentary Summer of Soul about the musical festival in Harlem in 1969. Jesse Jackson's life was truly mult-varied, and epic. RIP.

Memo from NYC

So today a member of the British Royal family was arrested for public corruption.

And the former president of South Korea was sentenced to life imprisonment for leading a coup against his own government.

The former presidents of Brazil and France have gone to jail for treason and corruption too.

But not here. Not in the USA. Not in a country where we say that all men are created equal. Nope. If you're a Donald Trump or one of his associates, you float above the law -- and the media and half of the public are okay with it.

You can engage in blatent corruption and violence and get away with it.

This is a shameful, dark chapter in American history that we're living through. One day I hope it might end.

NYC 101

New York City isn't one city -- it's many, as this video explains. That's NYC 101! 

The Epstein Mansion in NYC History

As the world continues to grapple with fallout from the Epstein Files -- and the horrible system of abuse that he enabled and that society ignored for too long -- the issue of the 21st-century Rasputin's real estate (in which so much ugly stuff happened) continues. 

Epstein's Island in the Carribean as well as his house in Palm Beach are the most notable places. As was his townhouse -- the largest in Manhattan -- on the Upper East Side. (See the video below for more.)

The house has a long and varied history, like any piece of NYC real estate, and the story behind it is an interesting as it is sordid. One thing that has been noted is that the house used to be a school -- which is deeply, darkly ironic considering the man's crimes.

And here's the  thing: I remember it as a school!

The Epstein mansion used to be the home for the Birch Wathen School. It was one of those fancy townhouses on both the Upper East and West Sides that were converted into apartments or schools or various business & non-profit headquarters in the 20th century. In 1989 Birth Wathen merged with the Lenox school and it moved ... leaving the mansion vacant. The Victoria Secret founder Lex Wexner bought it and, so it seems, turned it back into a home. He eventually gifted it to Epstein who then made it into his headquarters for foul deeds.

The fact that a townhouse that was turned into a school was eventually turned back into a home is one of those regressive things like a republic becoming a monarchy that's really depressing.

Anyhoo, when I was a kid I went to another private school nearby -- also in a converted townhouse. And one year I took a private school bus service to school that my parents paid for (one of my fellow bus-mates was Cameron Douglas, son of Michael, who was a nice kid but sadly whose life went awry). But the other school that used this service was, you guesed it, Birch Wathen. And every day we would stop first at Birch Wathen -- and the mansion that would, decades later, fall into infamy.

I never went to the school nor was in the mansion so it's interesting to hear stories of those who did. But I was close to it back in the day, a creepy thing to realize now.

Postscript: about three years ago I walked by the mansion on a cold weekday morning. No one was there thankfully, no voyeurs or people taking pictures -- at least not as far as I could tell. Epstein was dead, the FBI had taken whatever they had needed back in 2019, and it was just sitting there, forelorn.

But there was one clear sign that something was amiss, that something was wrong with this place: the huge double-doors where Prince Andrew was seen poking his head out of and where lots of young women of various ages were seen going in and out -- was covered up by a big ugly wood plank. It was a decidedly weird thing (I assume that it was boarded up because the cops didn't want people breaking into the mansion but who knows). I thought about taking a picture of it and posting it on the blog but I didn't ... it just felt wrong and exploitative and voyeuristic of a tragic situation. So I let it be. 

But this story is far, far from over. 

Andrew Corsa & Corsa Avenue & CorsaAveTV

Recently I discovered that I'm a descendant of Andrew Corsa.

Who's he?

He was a farmer born in 1762, and he owned property in what is today the Bronx where Fordham University now stands. 

Most notably he was a "Westchester Guide" (the Bronx being part of Westchester back then) during the Revolutionary War. In July 1781, he helped General George Washington and Count Rochambeau navigate the Bronx, doing reconnaisance with them about British troop locations and movements. It burnished his legend. 

Corsa also had two wives and 13 children, and some untold number of great and great-great and great-great-great and beyond grandchildren.

And Mr NYC is one of them.

Also, the Corsas are on the map! In the Bronx there is an avenue named after Andrew Corsa called ... Cosa Avenue! Here it is:

And in doing some more Corsa research I found ... this ... apparently 14 years ago the was a YouTube channel (and perhaps a public access show as well) called CorsaAveTV. It's something! Enjoy.

Review: "The Ice Storm" (1994 & 1997)

As a young, overeducated man who grew up with lots of books in the house, I will confess that I had literary pretensions. I dreamed about writing a great book that would be critically acclaimed and would sell big and would be turned into a hit Oscar-winning movie and that I would be rich and famous and happy for the rest of my life.

Yeah, so that didn't happen. I became Mr NYC instead. 

But I will confess that, when I was operating under such a delusion, I wanted to write like Rick Moody whose 1994 novel The Ice Storm became a great movie in 1997.

As I write this post, ice has consumed the life of NYC ergo my thoughts are turning to the meaning of ice, of what ice can represent -- beyond the expanding molecules of H2O. 

The Ice Storm is a very funny, very dark story about two families in New Canaan, CT, a wealthy suburb of NYC. The story takes places over Thanksgiving, 1973 where the fates of two families tragically collide while an ice storm bears down on them. Interspersed with the domestic drama -- focused on adultery, alchoholism, teen sex & "swapping", drugs, and lives held together by lies -- are wry commentaries about the popular and political culture of early 1970s America. The country is enjoying movies like The Exorcist and books like Breakfast of Champions while the Watergate scandal envolopes the nation -- the idea that darkness and corruption are endemic to the very soul of the country that the characters live in (the October 1973 Saturday Night Massacre had just occurred, as shown below). 

In a sense, they and us are already doomed.

The novel is a great read although you'll want to take a breather every so often. Moody's writing is funny but also deeply sarcastic and cynical, very "in quotes", often mocking and derisive in tone. The best word to describe the novel is "acerbic." But the humanity in the darkness of these characters' lives cuts through, and that's what makes it a powerful read. And it has an interesting twist at the end. 

The movie is also powerful although a bit more overtly emotional. It was directed by Ang Lee who would later go on to make big hits like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Brokeback Mountain. The cast is amazing -- Kevin Kline, Joan Allen, Sigourney Weaver along with a young Christina Ricci and Elijah Wood. Even more interesting is that this was the film that brought Tobey Magiure, pre-Spiderman, and Katie Holmes, pre-Dawson's Creek/Tom Cruise, into prominence. And it's beautifully directed and shot, the beauty clearly at odds with the ugly lives portrayed.

It also is something of an NYC movie -- this is a story about the commuters, the people who live comfortably outside the city but whose jobs and identities exist there. And at one point the Tobey Maguire character flees to a night of booze and drugs and a failed attempt at sex at an Upper East Side apartment before he flees to Grand Central Terminal before the very real "ice storm" prevents him getting home. 

What The Ice Storm reminds us is that darkness and corruption in the personal and political lives of America is nothing new -- it seems to be our constant, perenial existential state. I'm personally interested in this story because it's set just a few short years before I was actually born -- given me a sort of window into the world that I was soon to join.

And given the current weather both real and political, it's a book and a movie more timely than ever.

Highly recommended.