Sporty Spice (Cyd) and Dental Dan (Dan) had their annual autumn party tonight and I never miss it. Cyd and Dan are a dream couple, the kind of storybook relationship tailor-made for TV news profiles and conniving bitches hell bent on home-wrecking. After all, the only thing the gays love more than a hot man is someone else’s hot man. With Cyd and Dan, you get two for the price of one. Anyone wishing to break them up (pay attention Charlie) would be barking up the wrong tree, as they are as right for each other as any two people I have ever met. Plus, they are the perfect party hosts.
When I ran into Mark Levine at Therapy last month, my first instinct was to drag him to Cyd and Dan’s annual event. They know virtually every attractive thirty-something guy in Manhattan, and a new man on the scene is bound to find lifelong friendships and at least a few exes at the Autumn Party. I also endeavored to bring Ben Harvey because he had wanted to meet Mark after the tireless cheerleading I have done on his behalf, as well as Cyd and Dan, who he encountered briefly at my housewarming lounging in matching sweatshirts on Adirondack chairs in the back yard while basking in the afterglow of cheese-filled hot dogs.
Ben, Mark and I met up on a familiar corner in the heart of Chelsea before dashing through the forty degree weather. Despite my legendary reputation for shorts and t-shirts under all circumstances in Los Angeles, I don’t fuck around with the cold in New York. I arrived bundled up in my snow parka, looking like an arctic explorer. Ben looked adorable as always and deceptively dressed in light layers over thermals. Mark, still getting used to winter again, just threw on layer after layer until he seemed sufficiently protected from the elements. Once at the party Mark started stripping like Gypsy Rose Lee, which only served to endear him to everyone. By the time he left, he was down to just a clingy t-shirt and jeans.
As usual, their elegantly appointed apartment was packed wall-to-wall with sexy gay men. In the spirit of diversity, a sprinkling of women decorated the otherwise masculine turn out. Cyd and Dan had tirelessly decorated with genuinely adorable fall decorations, virtually invisible to the increasingly intoxicated homos struggling to make eye contact and work up the courage to talk to guys they had seen in the same apartment time and again, party after party. One of those men, Sebastian, cornered me in the kitchen to ask if I was the one who had left the clever response to the eVite in which I said I would be hanging out with Dan in the VIP Room (which in this case was the bedroom, for the Super Bowl party it’s the kitchen). Generally their parties are so crowded; I tend to gravitate to the least crowded location, which is often where I find Dan.
It was all going well until Cory walked in and turned out to be the most pleasant surprise of the night. I last saw Cory at the closing ceremonies for the AIDS Ride, where I was cheering on Chip Arndt. I have written before about his eyebrows and his granite forehead, but it has been so hard for me to fully describe him. I think his face most reminds me of that of the Statue of Liberty, the only national icon I share a birthday with (sorry Julia Roberts). I have always felt a certain kinship with the lady in the harbor and I guess it spills over to Cory. His Masters Degree in Public Policy from Harvard is just the icing on the intellectual cake.
We talked about life and politics (he is just about to move to DC to take a new job) and it was a total delight. By quite some measure the longest conversation we have ever had and it was as rich as I thought it might be. When talk turned to Jeopardy, he too had noticed Alex Trebek’s flirtation with one of the college contestants. I then introduced him to the concept of being “Jeopardy Hot” which is a man who is hot entirely in the context of being on Jeopardy. Outside the nerdy confines of the popular game show, he would just be of normal attractiveness. But when you watch geek after nerd doling out the questions, a Jeopardy Hot guy is a welcome sight. Mike and I use the subtle distinction of Hot and Jeopardy Hot in conversation all the time, as it comes in handy constantly.
After three parties in a row as the last one left in Cyd and Dan’s apartment, I was adamant about not making it four. The party thinned out like hair in a Propecia ad and I hastily rounded up Cory, his friend Jeff, and Ben to continue our fun around the corner at Barracuda. Mark had already gone home, as had 95% of the partygoers, so I knew I had to strike while the iron was hot. Moments later, we were again packed like sardines in a sea of gay men, trying to get a drink at the bar. In between half listening to the hot 80s hits playing in the background (Major Tom, Neverending Story, Hazy Shade Of Winter), Cory and I continued our in-depth conversation about my favorite subject I never get to subject my radio audience to: politics.
Since Cory is from Iowa, I grilled him about the current political climate there. I am always curious about first-hand accounts and Cory was ambivalent about the candidates, a state of mind he also attributed to the rest of the state. I have been riveted to the debates and the tightness of the race, especially among the democrats. Unfortunately, Cory wasn’t able to resolve it for me before he ran home for the night. As usual, it was my cue to leave as well. The damned drunk train was calling again, as it always is. I left Ben in the capable hands of his cousin, who had met us all out at Barracuda, and dashed off into a cab to Grand Central. Two nights in a row of going out has taken its toll on me, and I can’t wait to climb into bed. It’s the weekend and a chilly one at that. I look forward to a party of one, relaxing in my living room, far from the roaring seas of gay men, the political fray of Washington and most importantly, the leering glances of Alex Trebek, where the only Hot I need to worry about is the heat from the crackling fire in the fireplace.
Showing posts with label Mark Levine. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Mark Levine. Show all posts
Saturday, November 17, 2007
Friday, October 19, 2007
Mark Your Calendar
It was a perfect day in New York City.
I love this time of year. The temperature is a cool 70 degrees, day and night. The trees have started to turn but there is still a flourish of green on the branches. It is so lovely now, but it will quickly come to an end. Soon the holiday crush will overwhelm the city. My office building on Sixth Avenue will join the festivities with their usual display of outlandishly oversized Christmas ornaments, a corporate staple of the Avenue of the Americas near Rockefeller Center, spurred on by the larger than life toy soldiers that adorn Radio City Music Hall across the street. With fifteen foot candy canes strewn about casually and three foot red glass balls stacked four high in pyramids, the street has the look of a late December living room floor in mid construction. Just half a block away, the massive Rockefeller Center Christmas tree awaits its missing ornaments.
But now the streets are just littered with people. During the day, the homeless are largely invisible, driven into the subways and their entrances to panhandle. On the street, business people scurry past the numerous tourists in a frenzied pace, like the squirrels at my house who madly dash about this time of year for nuts to store for the winter. The intense walking in the city is something that those of us who live there take for granted, but it is often too much for those who are just visiting. The tourists collapse along the sidewalks, unable to keep up with the breadth and width of our great city. Standpipes are for sitting, lamp posts are for leaning. True New Yorkers roll their eyes and brush brusquely past them on their way to Starbucks or other important meeting place.
After the show tonight, I too dodged tourists on the outskirts of Times Square as I dashed over to Therapy where Chris French and company were engulfed in Avalanche, the first mixer of the year for Ski Bums, the local gay ski club. We interviewed Chris on the show four years ago and he is still talking about it. I have been dying to do some ski activities with them, but my work schedule makes weekend trips to Whistler and elsewhere virtually impossible. Even the cocktail events from 7-10pm are largely out of the question. But I figured the alcohol and the boys would still be flowing when I dashed over there tonight and with winter coming, I am making a concerted effort to join in their fun this year.
The first person I ran into is my delightfully handsome friend Mark from Los Angeles. Back in the fall of 1995, I went to work at Sony Pictures in Culver City. The studio was on the old MGM backlot and also included David O. Selznick’s old studio, fronted by the famous “Mansion” so recognizable from the opening of all of his pictures, just down the road. I worked in the non-descript Tri-Star Building, on the far side of the lot that had once been home to Lorimar, the producers of Dallas and other television programs. Mark worked on the other side of the lot, first in the prestigious Thalberg Building, and then later in the old MGM school house where Judy Garland and Elizabeth Taylor once attended classes between scenes.
Mark was the only person who was ever really genuinely nice to me at that studio. Granted we became friends because I worked in Special Events, so I was the go-to guy from tickets to movie premieres and occasionally good swag, but even after I left the studio, he remained just as nice as always. Once I was having lunch with some other publicity people just outside the commissary. They asked me, if I could work anywhere at the studio, where would I want to work.
“At the Mansion!” I exclaimed, forever in awe of the tremendous Hollywood history under our own feet.
The other motion picture publicists were horrified. “You don’t want to work there. They do television there.”
The sin of the Hollywood hierarchy. No matter what you do in Motion Picture, it is infinitely better than anything in Television. It is almost as if the more profitable an industry in Hollywood, the more it is looked down upon. Movie people look down on TV people who look down on Music who look down on Home Video and so on. I never felt that same disdain from Mark, and later when he left motion picture for television and then online, it was only confirmed for me. Whatever. When I heard that Sony paved over what was left of the yellow brick road when they bought the studio, I knew it wasn’t the place for me anymore.
But now Mark is living in New York City and it is my chance to return the favor of kindness he showed me so many years ago on the Sony lot. I can introduce him to some of my friends that I think he will like, and probably a potential boyfriend or two. So it was a fortuitous jaunt I took to Therapy, spurred on by last night’s fleeting good weather. Today it is raining, and soon the candy canes will come out of hiding and the snow will fall, delicately covering the stained sidewalks in an all-too-brief splendor. And like the squirrels, I will be burrowed away somewhere for the winter, uninspired to leave my warm nook until the first signs of spring. But for one day, it was a perfect day in New York City.
I love this time of year. The temperature is a cool 70 degrees, day and night. The trees have started to turn but there is still a flourish of green on the branches. It is so lovely now, but it will quickly come to an end. Soon the holiday crush will overwhelm the city. My office building on Sixth Avenue will join the festivities with their usual display of outlandishly oversized Christmas ornaments, a corporate staple of the Avenue of the Americas near Rockefeller Center, spurred on by the larger than life toy soldiers that adorn Radio City Music Hall across the street. With fifteen foot candy canes strewn about casually and three foot red glass balls stacked four high in pyramids, the street has the look of a late December living room floor in mid construction. Just half a block away, the massive Rockefeller Center Christmas tree awaits its missing ornaments.
But now the streets are just littered with people. During the day, the homeless are largely invisible, driven into the subways and their entrances to panhandle. On the street, business people scurry past the numerous tourists in a frenzied pace, like the squirrels at my house who madly dash about this time of year for nuts to store for the winter. The intense walking in the city is something that those of us who live there take for granted, but it is often too much for those who are just visiting. The tourists collapse along the sidewalks, unable to keep up with the breadth and width of our great city. Standpipes are for sitting, lamp posts are for leaning. True New Yorkers roll their eyes and brush brusquely past them on their way to Starbucks or other important meeting place.
After the show tonight, I too dodged tourists on the outskirts of Times Square as I dashed over to Therapy where Chris French and company were engulfed in Avalanche, the first mixer of the year for Ski Bums, the local gay ski club. We interviewed Chris on the show four years ago and he is still talking about it. I have been dying to do some ski activities with them, but my work schedule makes weekend trips to Whistler and elsewhere virtually impossible. Even the cocktail events from 7-10pm are largely out of the question. But I figured the alcohol and the boys would still be flowing when I dashed over there tonight and with winter coming, I am making a concerted effort to join in their fun this year.
The first person I ran into is my delightfully handsome friend Mark from Los Angeles. Back in the fall of 1995, I went to work at Sony Pictures in Culver City. The studio was on the old MGM backlot and also included David O. Selznick’s old studio, fronted by the famous “Mansion” so recognizable from the opening of all of his pictures, just down the road. I worked in the non-descript Tri-Star Building, on the far side of the lot that had once been home to Lorimar, the producers of Dallas and other television programs. Mark worked on the other side of the lot, first in the prestigious Thalberg Building, and then later in the old MGM school house where Judy Garland and Elizabeth Taylor once attended classes between scenes.
Mark was the only person who was ever really genuinely nice to me at that studio. Granted we became friends because I worked in Special Events, so I was the go-to guy from tickets to movie premieres and occasionally good swag, but even after I left the studio, he remained just as nice as always. Once I was having lunch with some other publicity people just outside the commissary. They asked me, if I could work anywhere at the studio, where would I want to work.
“At the Mansion!” I exclaimed, forever in awe of the tremendous Hollywood history under our own feet.
The other motion picture publicists were horrified. “You don’t want to work there. They do television there.”
The sin of the Hollywood hierarchy. No matter what you do in Motion Picture, it is infinitely better than anything in Television. It is almost as if the more profitable an industry in Hollywood, the more it is looked down upon. Movie people look down on TV people who look down on Music who look down on Home Video and so on. I never felt that same disdain from Mark, and later when he left motion picture for television and then online, it was only confirmed for me. Whatever. When I heard that Sony paved over what was left of the yellow brick road when they bought the studio, I knew it wasn’t the place for me anymore.
But now Mark is living in New York City and it is my chance to return the favor of kindness he showed me so many years ago on the Sony lot. I can introduce him to some of my friends that I think he will like, and probably a potential boyfriend or two. So it was a fortuitous jaunt I took to Therapy, spurred on by last night’s fleeting good weather. Today it is raining, and soon the candy canes will come out of hiding and the snow will fall, delicately covering the stained sidewalks in an all-too-brief splendor. And like the squirrels, I will be burrowed away somewhere for the winter, uninspired to leave my warm nook until the first signs of spring. But for one day, it was a perfect day in New York City.
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