Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in the Age of COVID-19

 

Review: "Times Square" (1980)

The 1980s remains the Golden Age of "teen flicks" -- movies like Fast Times at Ridgemont High, 16 Candles, The Breakfast Club, Back to the Future, Weird Science, Pretty in Pink, Heathers, Say Anything ... and many others defined what it meant to be a teenager in the Age of Reagan. These movies remain classics for those of us kids raised in that decade, time capsules of youth in a time before the Internet, smartphones, and social media.

My personal favorite is Pump Up the Volume which came out in 1990. The story of an angry, depressed teen who broadcasts a pirate radio show from his bedroom was, in many ways, a perfect ending, a coda, for the '80s teen flicks era. Ironically Pump Up the Volume was directed by Allan Moyle who, in many ways, kicked off the decade of teen flicks ten years earlier with Times Square, his 1980 debut about two teenage runaways in NYC.  

Starring Trini Alvarado and an actress named Robin Johnson (who had a brief career in the '80s before vanishing completely), Times Square is about a rebellious teenager named Nicky (Johnson) who winds up in a mental hospital with another teenager girl named Pamela (Alvarado). Nicky appears to be an orphan but Pamela is the daughter of a wealthy commissioner who is trying to gentrify Times Square. Together they escape the hospital and begin raising hell around the city, calling themselves the Sleaze Sisters. They throw TVs out of windows onto the the street, they steal, they work and perform music in a strip club, and they just act crazy. A nighttime DJ named Johnny LaGuardia, played by the brilliant Tim Curry, follows their exploits on air and discovers that one of them is the same person, Zombie Girl, who used to send him letters about how miserable she was. Johnny tracks them down, as Pamela's father desperately tries to find his daughter as well. Eventually, after several twists and turns, the Sleaze Sisters wind up performing a concert above a marquee in Times Square for their fellow teenage misfits, their rebellion embraced by the whole city. 

Times Square is not, by any stretch of the imagination, a great movie. It's not even really a good one. But it has a great spirit, a lot of life to it. The performances are raw, intense, the characters believable. Johnson is really good, and Alvarado is good as a good girl gone bad. The biggest problem is Tim Curry as the DJ -- he's not in a lot of the movie which is a shame since Curry is such a great actor, and LaGuardia is a compelling character. 

Also, as you might imagine, it's a lot of fun to see a movie set largely on the street of NYC forty years ago. It really was a different city back then -- it looked different, it felt different, it's totally uncognizable from today.

But the angst, the emotion, the rebelliousness of Times Square -- and what it means to be a teenager -- remains quite relevant today. 

Grand Central Station in the Age of COVID-19

Courtesy of a friend ...

David Dinkins RIP

David Dinkins, the 106th and first black mayor of New York City, has died at the age of 93. He led an amazing life of service to this city, rising from the black power politics of Harlem to the steps of City Hall. 

He presided over the city from 1990 to 1993, during a time of both great strife and great change in the city. Crime was high (thanks to the crack epidemic) and Dinkins expanded the police force. Racial tensions were much higher than they are today -- Dinkins did his best to alleviate them but the task was perhaps too big for one mayor during one term. And he also started the revitlization of Times Square, helping to transform the city into the glistening jewel box it is today. He was a transitional figure in many ways, a bridge between the rough and tumble days of the old city and its sleeker, more polished future.

Dinkins was a trailblazer, a gentleman, and a true servant of the city he loved and governed. RIP

Princess Diana in NYC

Season four of The Crown has dropped on Netflix and much of the focus is on the doomed and beloved Princess Diana. She married Prince Charles in 1981, divorced him in the early 1990s, and then died tragically in 1997.

Dead for almost a quarter century, so famous that she's known simply by her first name, Diana still fascinates. 

Diana was more than just the Princess of Wales and future Queen of the United Kingdom. She was an icon for compassion, for humanity, for the fragility of the human condition -- she was the princess of the world, the "princess of people's hearts" as she called herself, the "people's princess" as Prime Minister Tony Blair called her right after her death. The warmth and compassion Diana emanated made the world love her and she loved the world back -- her only problem was that the one person who didn't love her was her husband.

During her time as Princess of Wales and afterwards, Diana travelled the world constantly, meeting everyone and shaking lots of hands -- including those of AIDS patients which was something that a lot of people, let alone royals, didn't dare do back in the 1980s. And when she visited the USA, she often visited the most destitute and most vulnerable of our citizens, including those in NYC -- something that a lot of our own "royals" never did.

Diana came to NYC quite a lot during her life and it was always a big deal when she did. The city embraced her, she was always its most honored guest. One of the many tragedies of her early death and is that she was denied years and years of getting to come back her, to enjoy and watch the city change. Who knows, she might have even moved here at once point.

Of all her relationships, Diana and NYC made for a most glamorous pair.

Update from Momma NYC: "Dear [Mr NYC] - enjoyed your Diana piece but I must be pedantic. A lot of articles and news stories referred to "Princess Diana" but the real title is "Diana, Princess of Wales"--she took her title from her husband. Only the children or royals can be princesses, etc. It is rather complicated and I don't pretend to know the details but it is definitely not "Princess Diana"--thought I don't suppose it takes any difference now. Love your pedantic [mommy]"

The Boulevards of Dreams

Broadway is easily the most famous thoroughfare in NYC. Overflowing from Westchester and running from the most northern spot of the Bronx to the most southern tip of Manhattan, Broadway ties Manhattan and the whole city together, giving all New Yorkers and visitors a sense of direction, a constant North Star.

But as important as Broadway is to the identity and movement of the city, it is not the most impressive artery in NYC. 

In the Bronx, Queens, and Brooklyn, you can find major avenues that are more than roads but less than highways. They are marvels of city planning and building, amazing examples of NYC at its best -- places that belong not only to vehicles but also to people. 

In the Bronx, the Grand Concourse traverses 5.2 miles of the borough running from 138th street in Mott Haven up to the Mosholu Parkway in Bedford. Sometimes called the "Park Avenue of the Bronx," it has also been compared to the Champs-Elysees in Paris -- a wide, long, beautiful street. It is populated with Art Deco buildings and other impressive structures, and was originally envisioned as a home for middle class NYC. It fell on hard times in the 1960s and '70s but has since had a rennaissance of new housing. The Grand Concourse is the glory of the city's most northern borough. 

In Queens, Northern Boulevard is not quite as gorgeous or symbolic but is impressive nonetheless. It is, in fact, a highway, but doesn't always look or feel like it. Northern Boulevard starts at the westernmost part of Queens, at the mouths of the Queens-Midtown tunnel and Queensboro Bridges, and cuts straight through the entire borough. While stretches of its resemble a highway, it also goes through many neighborhoods of the city -- like Long Island City, Woodside, Jackson Heights, Corona, Bayside, and others -- where apartment buildings, stores, subways stops, and all the signs of city life exist. Queens is a vast, unwieldy borough but Northern Boulevard gives it a sense of order. It runs for over 73 miles, out of Queens and through Nassau and into Suffolk counties. But it is in NYC that Northern Boulevard gets its character. 

You haven't really experienced Brooklyn, you can't really "know Brooklyn", until you've gone down Eastern Parkway. And the "park" part of "parkway" really is just that -- designed by Frederick Law Olmstead and Calvert Vaux, they envisioned it as being an extension of Prospect Park, the park hitting the road (it was the first "parkway" in America, hence the name). It starts at Grand Army Plaza and runs through Crown Heights, ending in East New York near the Evergreens Cemetary. There are lots and lots of trees on the avenue, and many impressive buildings and structures along Eastern Parkway, including the Brooklyn Museum, the central branch of the Brooklyn Public Library, and the Brooklyn Botanic Garden. What's most amazing about it is whole massive and intimate it feels, how it is both at the heart of city life but also has a real park-like feel. It is Brooklyn's most amazing street. 

New York City was built by people who envisioned the city as a gift to itself, a place that its people would not only live in but also enjoy. These great thoroughfares live up to the promise of NYC, the city of dreams, and show how dreams can often be realized here -- literally, on the streets. 

"Dash & Lily" on Netflix

A new addition to the category of NYC fantasia is the Netflix show Dash & Lily. I'm only blogging about it (briefly) because some people close to me really love it and it certainly is one of the odder entries into a long beloved genre of NYC as a magical playground.

The premise behind this show defies belief: two NYC teenagers meet -- but not really -- by entering "dares" into a red notebook that they leave on a stack of books at The Strand. This back-and-forth goes on a while, until, inevitably, they meet cute but with several twists along the way. It's whip cream for the soul, a vision of the city and its residents where everything and everyone is beautiful, beautifully lit, clean, caring, and just down right ... perfect.

According to some, it's the perfect NYC story!

The show takes place at Christmas time so it's even more idealic. Along the way, many NYC landmarks and vistas are lovingly exploited. What saves it from being totally silly is the quality of the acting and its wittiness. You should watch it if you want an NYC that will take you out of the COVID-19/Trump/economic depression horror show we're currently living in.

P.S. In case you didn't know, Dash and Lily are clear references to the late great writers Dashiell Hammet and Lillian Hellman who were lovers and partners for decades, both of whom were blacklisted back in the good bad old days. This Dash and Lily have it a littler easier. 

Archie Spigner RIP

Fascinating story about a former city councilman named Archie Spigner who had just died at age 92. Besides spending almost 30 years in the council, he was the great powerbroker in southeast Queens for decades -- making other council members, state legislators, and members of Congress along the way. He was also responsible for big projects getting done in the borough and for reshaping huge swaths of it. fa

Archie Spigner was the kind of power broker, the kind of power behind-the-throne, who fascinates me -- not famous or serving in high office but someone who those who do rely on, who knows where the power lies, and who make the city we all live in.

"Heaven's Gate" @ 40

Forty years ago today one of the most infamous movie reviews in American history appeared in The New York Times. It was written by Vincent Canby, the most respected movie critic in America, and he was reviewing the new movie Heaven's Gate by director Michael Cimino. Cimino's previous film, The Deer Hunter, had won the Oscars for Best Picture and Best Director the year before. Heaven's Gate had just had its premiere in NYC the night before, and this movie and review were much anticipated.

And movie history changed.

Canby wrote: "'Heaven's Gate' ... fails so completely that you might suspect Mr. Cimino sold his soul to the Devil to obtain the success of 'The Deer Hunter', and the Devil has just come around to collect ... an unqualified disaster."

Ouch. 

United Artists, the studio that had financed and produced this movie, cancelled its scheduled wide-release in December. Cimino went back to the editing room, cutting down his nearly four-hour disaster into a two-and-a-half less-of-a-disaster. It was released in April, 1981 and earned about $1.5 million against a roughly $40 million-plus budget. It was the biggest failure in American history at the time -- and United Artists was sold to MGM and effectively ceased to exist. 

One movie had brought down an entire studio. Like 9/11 or the Trump Presidency or COVID-19, something unthinkable had become quite real.  

Cimino's career nose-dived after this -- he only made four small movies afterwards and then nothing at all before his death in 2016. His career was one of the quickest rises and falls of anyone in the history of movies. Over the years many people related to this movie -- either directly or indirectly -- have shared their memories of this unprecedented flop. It premiered in NYC on November 18th, 1980, and has become perhaps the most infamous movie premiere ever -- a party no one wanted to go to, a party everyone hated, a party that quickly turned into a kind of funeral. It was like being at the election night event for a losing candidate -- a candidate losing big. 

Of course, in the forty years since, many other films have come and gone that failed bigger than Heaven's Gate. But this movie remains the most expensive failure in history -- it took down a studio, one started by, amongst others, Charlie Chaplin. 

What's also sad is that Heaven's Gate had the potential to be a truly great movie -- another Godfather, another Chinatown, another Gone with the Wind. It was a revisionist anti-Western, a re-examination of America's founding myths of the West being this vast welcoming space where immigrants to roam free and realize their dreams. The film, based very loosely on Wyoming history, was about how, in the late 19th century, immigrants were murdered by wealthy cattle barons who resented and feared immigrants' enchroachments on their land (sound familiar?). These murders were, apparently, sanctioned by the Federal Government and President Benjamin Harrison. It was an American genocide, and all perfectly legal. Sadly the movie's notorious production and failure overwhelmed any interest in its plot or the history behind it -- and, instead, it was derided as American history's most expensive "minor footnote."

The movie also became a footnote in Hollywood history, a not-so-gentle reminder that no one controls  or has the final say over history -- any kind of history. 

If you want to more of Mr NYC's Michael Cimino/Heaven's Gate coverage, go here.

Remembering the Guerrilla Girls

In many ways protesting is a form of performance art. Protesters create posters, billboards, flags, and all sorts of other colorful paraphernalia -- along with memorable catchphrases and slogans -- to gain attention, to make people notice, to make the general public understand the issue they are either supporting or opposing.

To protest is to create -- and all creation is inherently artistic. 

This brings us to some very creative protesters who have been raging against the art world for over 35 years. Known as the Guerilla Girls, they are an assortment of woman who wear gorilla masks and pop at exhibitions and other events, protesting what they see as racial and gender bias in the business of art. They point out, for example, that various exhibitions feature work by mostly white male artists or that most of the art depicting women overwhelming depicts them nude.

They ask uncomfortable questions, state uncomfortable truths, make us see the cold reality inside the warm art on display -- and they do it in gorilla masks, so as to get attention but to direct it away from the protesters and onto the issues they are bringing to light.

Recently the BBC World Service broadcast a segment on the Guerilla Girls and you can also visit their website to learn about this movement that has been rocking NYC for almost four decades.