As a mecca of theater and television, New York City plays host to all sorts of broadcasts. Take a look at some of them here:
For me, the highlights include 30 Rock, Saturday Night Live, The Colbert Report and The Late Show with David Letterman.
Searching late one night for dwindling opportunities in the city – take note, fellow fans of film and television, plan early for popular occasions like seeing show tapings, as they usually fill up months in advance – I discovered that tickets to The Late Show with David Letterman may still be available. But those people over at CBS sure don’t make getting them easy. First, you fill in an online form with your name and phone number. If your phone number is selected, one of a handful of trusty veteran Late Show organizers calls you, in my case Lisa, to ask you a trivia question. If you get the trivia question right, you receive two tickets for you and guest to attend the following day’s taping. My mother usually turns Dave Letterman on at night in the summers when I’m home, so I thought I had a relatively good shot at getting my hands on those tickets. My conversation with Lisa went something like this:
Lisa: Do you watch the show often?
Mason: When I’m home in the summers.
Lisa: OK, well give this one your best shot. (She doesn’t believe I can do it. I’m just a caj, a casual watcher, a nobody.) We have been interviewing Rupert Jee for years at his small establishment near the Ed Sullivan Theater. What is his establishment called?
Mason: (Instantly, his instincts guiding him – a former star Quiz Bowler, Mason was trained to fire lightning fast at questions pertaining to his vast knowledge base) It’s a sandwich shop.
Lisa: (Just like she thought, a caj) It’s actually called the Hello Deli, but I’ll give you “sandwhich shop.”
Mason: (Sincerely) Thanks.
(The pictures in this blog post were taken by Phillip on his phone.)
So on Monday I lined up with Phillip outside the Ed Sullivan Theater on Broadway, where the Late Show is filmed. After we received our tickets, we are told to come back in an hour to be seated. With so much time to kill, we decided to visit the location that gave us this tremendous opportunity: Hello Deli. I couldn’t believe his eyes when I walked into the sandwich shop:
Mason: (In his head) Oh my gosh! That’s Rupert Jee! He looks so normal, so normally bored! That’s his wife behind the counter! This place actually exists.
You must keep in mind that this is the first “famous” (but not “Famous”) person I can claim to have met in my whole life, except the White Ranger from Power Rangers when I was little (and come to find out that wasn’t even the real one, so I guess I shouldn’t count it). My “Famous People I’ve Seen” list would grow much longer in the coming hours.
Halfway through Phillip eating his “New Yorker” – a delicious pastrami sandwich – a clatter outside attracted our attention. Upon further inspection, we discovered the origin of the commotion: Jennifer Lopez was exiting the back door of the Ed Sullivan theater.
A four foot tall black woman behind me proclaims: “Jenny! Jenny from the Block!” and runs headlong into the mass that begins swarming around the singer/actress. I was amazed at the sight: people shoving their elbows into the crowd, trying to make room, people holding cameras as high as their extended arms and tippy toes would allow in order to gain just the possibility of snapping a photo of the shoulders of The J.Lo. In all likelihood, they probably just got blurry photos of other spectators. Such are the hazards of chasing fame.
The security guards diligently hold back the throng as J.Lo, in four inch heels and slinky black dress, climbs into a champagne SUV and drives off to her next engagement with rabid fans and no privacy. Poor girl. Poor people of this city. If you’ve ever seen a sight like this, maybe you know what I’m talking about. Or maybe I’m the only one who thinks that mobbing a mound of flesh just because she’s had her mug plastered on big moving screens across the country is strange and sad in a way. I prefer to watch from the perimeter, to confirm that J.Lo is actually 3D, not just the everyday 2D version I normally see. That’s all I want to know, that J.Lo isn’t a cartoon, a cardboard cutout. She isn’t, by the way. And she looks great in heels.
Inside the Ed Sullivan Theater, Phillip and I get terrible seats, in the mezzanine level next to the sound guy. But we get to see most of the action: Dave Letterman interviewing Kelsey Grammar and Jeff Altman and then the musical act Hanson, a group who every decade has a different vibe. First they were the bubble-gum tweens, then the pop-rock teens, and now the bluesy-rock twenty-somethings with j-crew looks. I can’t wait for 2020.
The Old.
The New.
…
The lesson of this story is: if you want to see famous people or attend a taping of your favorite late night television show, you can probably do it best here. Remembering these blissful moments staring at celebrities will help you overlook the garbage dump of a subway system – which still everyone manages to praise (it’s the largest and most sophisticated subway system in the world!) despite the rats and grime and smell. So go to The Late Show with David Letterman and think about it on the downtown six train in the mornings when a six foot tall woman is poking your face with the book that she insists on reading despite there being no room books, just faces and bodies and briefcases.
I think lots of people, myself included, tend to put up with all kinds of things so long as they can laugh every once in a while. Living stacked in buildings may not be everyone’s idea of the “good life,” but who wouldn’t want access to all the entertainment opportunities here? For that, it’s simply the best.
Which is why, despite the to me excruciatingly enormous investment of 19 dollars, I bought a ticket to the IMAX 3D “experience” (not just a showing, but an experience – it’s written on the ticket) of How the Train Your Dragon. My hometown back in Kentucky just got the regular kind of 3d a couple months ago, so this is the kind of treat I can’t miss. As with all IMAX experiences, the screen is huge, the sound is enveloping, and as with all 3D experiences, you get the added pleasure of seeing things flying at you, which in a movie about how people ride dragons is pretty awesome.
A couple notes: when I saw Alice in Wonderland in IMAX 3D at the AMC Lowes 34th St. Cinema, the screen wasn’t nearly as big, the theater not nearly as impressive, and the glasses not nearly as comfortable as at AMC Lowes Lincoln Square near Lincoln Center on the west side, where I saw How to Train Your Dragon. If you want a better experience for the same price, go to the second one.