Heading for its 150th anniversary is NYC’s 92nd Street Y. Says its lawyer CEO Seth Pinsky: “We’re open 24 hours a day. Offer arts, dance classes, music classes. Kids to seniors’ programs. We handle 2,000 youngsters for city camps. Hundreds of seniors in-person and online for fine arts, ceramics, jewelry making. A roundtable with professors, world chefs, Pulitzer winners, jazz stars, star chefs and Hollywood personalities.
“Actor Zero Mostel taught painting here. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg lectured here. Emma Lazarus wrote the Statue of Liberty poem and taught English here. Dylan Thomas premiered one of his shows and Truman Capote debuted his ‘In Cold Blood’ here.
“Martha Graham, Paul Taylor, Alvin Ailey began on our stage. We feature chefs like James Beard, Gen. David Petraeus teaching a class, Stephen Colbert holding a conversation.
“Emphasis is education. Ours is not membership. It’s the ability at certain levels to make donations. It’s strong belief in the importance of welcoming another and that we’re better off and more secure if bonds of community are strengthened.
“New York’s special. It brings people from all over and forces learning to live with uplifting one another. A beehive of energy, open 24 hours a day, seven days a week, the 92nd Street Y is a distinctly New York institution.”
Deep food thoughts
Norman Lear just turned 100. Once, as he and Al Roker inhaled pastrami at a deli, I remember him saying: “You must live in the moment. Not yearn for the future nor exist in the past. We’re on one planet in a universe of billions. The message is, ‘There’s something greater than ourselves.’ ”
Canoodles of yore
Continuing great moments: Bob Colacello, Warhol’s No. 1 pal, on his worst Studio 54 memory: “Getting caught making out with the boss Steve Rubell’s boyfriend — and him then banning me for a week.”
Best memory? “Seeing Yves Saint Laurent kiss Halston in the basement and Truman Capote commenting: ‘You just witnessed a great moment in fashion history.’ ”
Making screen grabs
Forging upward, steaming onward, pressing outward from my two previously great items, comes now Gina Gershon and Aubrey Plaza’s “Emily the Criminal,” where a gal commits crimes to pay her student loans. Not exactly a barrel of laughs.
Director John Patton Ford says the story’s personal. “I graduated with $90,000 of debt. Housing was a crisis. I ended up delivering food and struggling each month to pay — not the principal, just the interest. So I made a millennial ‘Dirty Harry.’ In 20 days we made stunts, car chase, COVID, 130 scenes.”
The lightweight parts include poverty, larceny, misery.
Park moves
“Dirty Dancing.” Born ’87 in Cannes, got Oscar ’88, starred Jennifer Grey and the late Patrick Swayze, gets celebrated tonight — its 35th anniversary — in Washington Square Park. Lisa, Swayze’s wife of 34 years, will be there. Proceeds from sales of the film’s music go to the fight against cancer.
New educational toy is going around in DC. Seems a little too complicated for our electees. The puzzle’s designed to help the person adjust to a world of tomorrow. It’s great. But no matter what way Pelosi might try to put its various parts all together — the thing continually comes out wrong.
Only in Washington, kids, only in Washington.
