They just didn't get it

A quick note on the end of "Siskel & Ebert"/"Ebert & Roeper." As Roger Ebert noted yesterday on his Web site, "After 33 years on the air, 23 of them with Disney, the studio has decided to take the program named 'Siskel & Ebert' and then 'Ebert & Roeper' in a new direction. I will no longer be associated with it."

I still haven't forgiven them (from 1989!) for trashing one of the greatest bad films ever (partially) shot in NYC.

Looking at Socialite Olivia Palermo's "Sweet Spot"

Page Six Magazine yesterday took a close-up look at 22-year-old socialite Olivia Palermo's new one-bedroom Tribeca apartment in a piece titled "Living: Socialite Olivia Palermo's Sweet Spot."

The lead:

“I’m so excited to be living in my own home,” says socialite Olivia Palermo, surrounded by clothes racks, shoes and handbags in her colorful, 63-square-foot walk-in closet accented with a zebra-print rug. Olivia is photographing outfits she has selected for a short trip to Los Angeles so she’ll know exactly what she wants to wear while she’s there. “This is the space I love the most. You can see it the second you walk in,” she says. “It represents me.”

Inspired by pictures of Mariah Carey’s spacious NYC home . . ..

This is the point that I stopped reading the article. If you'd like to continue....

[Photo: Karin Kohlberg, Page Six Magazine New York Post]

“The hotel guests also used to be culturally hip people. Now we get Mom and Dad from Cedar Rapids. It’s like living at Motel 6.”

Page Six Magazine on the Hotel Chelsea:

“It’s chaos here,” says one resident....many tenants haven’t paid rent (because there’s no one around to pay it to), and there’s been no super on duty for repairs. Tenants also say they are worried that, at some point, their rents will double. While the building is rent stabilized, the apartments aren’t registered with the city, and a lot of the leases aren’t on the books.

For further reading:

Hotel Chelsea Blog

[Photo: Katie Orlinsky, Page Six Magazine, New York Post]

Ninth Street Espresso coming to 10th Street

This summer, at the site of the former Tompkins Square Bakery next to Life. [Update: There seems to be some confusion... thanks to the commenter for the note. The bakery's address was 341 E. 10th St., now home to the real-estate office... The Ninth Street Espresso's Web site said they are moving into 341 E. 1oth St. I'll get this right eventually. And none of this will be on the midterm. Regardless, there will be a new Ninth Street Espresso location on 10th Street...]

A storefront and sign that I like

At the Stapleton Shoe Company, on Trinity Place at Rector, just south of the American Stock Exchange.

Stopped by Houston and Avenue D to pay my final respects

Meanwhile, on Avenue D between Third Street and Fourth Street:

Directed toward the Mamma Mia! crowd, obviously

At thew Loews Village 7, 11th Street and Third Avenue.

Save the date: August 2

Morningwood this afternoon

Morningwood is playing a free show today at 1:30 at Stanton and Orchard. (Bring a fan.)
And I still like their video for "Nth Degree," which you can see here.

Is this the leakiest (drippiest?) AC in the EV?

Oh, probably not. But don't be surprised if a car wash opens for business here outside the Christodora.

Why EV Grieve could never be in advertising

Because my tagline for these ads would be, "Hey, it's your colon."

A short history of subtle butt-in-the-air billboards downtown

The owl and the pig

Near 12th Street and Second Avenue.

Dumpster of the day

On 10th Street and Second Avenue, near the soon-to-be-departed Mill Quality Cleaners.

Random piece of movie dialogue about New York City of the day

"I'm tellin' ya, the crime rate in New York will kill ya. There's so many problems, you never feel like you're accomplishing anything. Violence, rip-offs, muggings. The kids can't leave the house. You gotta walk 'em to school. But in Amity, one man can make a difference. In 25 years, there's never been a shooting or a murder in this town." -- Amity Police Chief Martin Brody, Jaws (1975)

Another day, another direction

Is it me, or is that crane hovering over Cooper Union move around by the minute? Particularly on weekends, when no one is working...



See some of my previous photos of the crane here.

New York TV party today

Inspired by a post by Rolando at Urbanite, I started revisiting some TV shows of yesteryear that were set in New York. Posted a few yesterday. EV Grieve commenter Eric suggested Bosom Buddies. As he wrote, "Pretending to be a woman to have an apt. in NYC, now that's gritty." Indeed! (Sidenote: It's too bad that both leads from Bosom Buddies faded into obscurity!)

Anyway, here are the intros to a handful of TV shows from the 1970s and 1980s that show some NYC scenery. I missed a lot. Feel free to offer any suggestions. (Oh, and I couldn't find McCLoud...)









Sorry, commercial break.






This includes the opening scene of Bridget Loves Bernie, one of my favorites -- a wealthy Catholic woman marries a Jewish cab driver. Ran for one year, 1973-74. Lead actor David Birney went on the play the lead in the understandably short-lived Serpico TV series.









Time for more commercials




Our sponsors insist we close with more commercials. Sorry.

Distrubing trend of the day: Golf clubs on the bus

My bus passes through the heart of the newish condo country on the LES. And, with greater frequency this summer, I see more young sporty sports getting on the bus Friday mornings toting golf clubs. Didn't see this many even, say, two years ago. Either these fellows are a year or two away from car-service privileges at the firm or gratuitous use of such car services have been chopped from the company budget. Whatever. Just don't take up three seats guys, OK?

"First of all, their hair rules"

That's the MC introducing Nirvana at the Pyramid Club on July 18, 1989. Nirvana made their New York City debut that night as part of the New Music Senimar. They played a 14-song set. Other bands on the bill that night were Cows, God Bullies, Lonely Moans and Surgery. (This information came from the Nirvana Live Guide.)

Here's some grainy footage of their NYC debut:



During "Floyd the Barber," a drunk gets on stage. He's eventually shoved off by Kurt Cobain and second guitarist Jason Everman, who was later kicked out of the band. (This was his last show with Nirvava, who were so disappointed in how they played, they cancelled their remaining four gigs on this East Coast tour. )



Meanwhile, here's a video for "In Bloom," some of which was shot in and around East River Park, the Financial District and the South Street Seaport the day before their Pyramid Club gig. The peformance footage for the video was shot in April 1990.



This article by Joe D'Angelo and Jem Aswad published on MTV.com provides more background about the performance at the Pyramid Club and the "In Bloom" video:

According to Michael Azerrad's "Come As You Are," the definitive Nirvana tome, the show was far from the band's best: One of the few who refrained from heckling was Iggy Pop, who cheered encouragingly. After the show, bassist Krist Novoselic was so disappointed with the performance that he shaved his head bald in the Jersey City, New Jersey, motel where the band was staying. This explains why, in the video, he's seen with hair in some scenes and resembles Kojak in others.

Sonic Youth's Thurston Moore and Kim Gordon stitched in the story's silver lining by bringing A&R man Gary Gersh to the show. Not long after, Gersh signed the band to Geffen Records, the company that released Nirvana's breakthrough, Nevermind, in 1991, after Moore convinced Kurt Cobain that signing to a major label wasn't selling out. The video, however, offers no indication that the band was on the verge of a bad night.

EV Grieve Etc. -- Time Out New York edition

New York City native David "deadpan" Duchovny is out pushing the new X-Files movie and is the subject of the Time Out New York Hot Seat this week:

Time Out New York: I hear you’re moving back to New York with your family this fall. How long has it been since you last lived here?
David Duchovny: Over 20 years. Has it changed?

TONY: Not at all. Especially not the East Village, where you grew up.
David Duchovny: [Laughs] Yeah, it’s very different. But the East Village was always struggling to have an identity. I think it always will.

Well, this short-n-snappy Q-and-A format doesn't lend itself to any thought-provoking, in-depth answers... he's a bright guy, and I'd like to hear more on why he thinks the East Village has always struggled to have an identity. (And I wonder if House of D questions were off limits?)

Meanwhile, this issue of Time Out features an "Activism for every attention span" cover package. "Inspired by a readers' poll of top concerns, we show you how to improve our city, no matter how much — or how little — time you're willing to give." Among the concerns tackled:

• Overdevelopment is killing your neighborhood
• Affordable housing doesn’t exist