Today’s big events brought me through the range of New York culture: the newly-reopened Frick Collection in the morning and the Tony-nominated Oh, Mary! written by and starring Cole Escola.
1) People have asked how I like staying at a hotel with a shared bathroom. To be honest, it’s OK for two nights, but I wouldn’t want to stay longer. My room is quite close to the bathroom, privacy is possible, but I was a little startled to pass a bathrobe-clad young lady in the hall this morning.
2) Dressing to go out, I put on my brand-new navy blazer from J. Press — and the center button just fell off to the floor! Brand-new jacket! Would they have sold this to a Hahvahd man?
3) Instead of writing my pages this morning, I showered, dressed, and went off to a little breakfasty place called Maman a couple short blocks away. If you are going to put up a sign for customers that says “Please Wait to Be Seated,” it’s best not to respond “Oh, sit anywhere” when you see them waiting. That said, I had the most savory breakfast sandwich served me on an antique white plate thinly ornamented in blue. The chef must have known that the egg yolk and spicy ketchup would look wonderful on that plate.
4) I reached the Frick about half an hour before my timed entry via the L and 6 trains to Hunter College. Standing looking at the garden (also restored), I fell into conversation with a woman not too much younger than I, wearing a white-and-blue denim toile jacket and jeans and a lot of turquoise jewelry. Even her nails were lacquered turquoise (when they weren’t gold). She and her husband (and at least one other person) were up for a few days from the middle of the country, and we ended up having a very intelligent conversation about the Frick family, London (they are also going), Aida, opera in general, and New York. Unexpected, and refreshing!
4a) If you go to the Frick (which you should), 11 AM is when it opens, and long lines form to get in. One for ticket holders, one for members, and a third for stand-bys. First the members are admitted, about 20 at a time; then the ticket holders. I crossed the threshold about 11:08, and I got there about 10:30.
4b) When the member line was almost completely inside, I saw a woman approach the staff member with a question. It transpired she had an 11:30 entry ticket and didn’t want to walk all the way to the end of the line to get in. Unhappy with the answer she got from the staff, she asked several of us near the front “Are you 11 AM? Are you 11 AM?” We all were, of course.
4c) So also, wear shoes that are good for standing, and bring a shade umbrella. The tree pits have been planted with white and purple pansies, which are very beautiful, but provide no shade.
5) The first thing I wanted to do was dash up the grand staircase to see the second-floor residence, open for the first time to the public. The rooms have been arranged sensitively and harmoniously overall, especially one room hung in a silvery dark green damask. All the paintings were French landscapes by Corot, Daubigny, and artists I didn’t recognize, with one Millet of a girl. The landscapes all brought out the colors of the walls, which in turn accepted the bright white clouds or spots of sunshine in the paintings. Masterful.
5a) A window in this room overlooked the roof, which was planted with low ground cover. And I thought — how forward thinking, a green roof!
5b) My “Aha!” moment on this floor came when I walked into a wood-paneled room and saw at the far end George Romney’s portrait of Emma Hamilton with her auburn hair, flashing eyes, and her little dog. About 25 years ago I heard Frick’s great-granddaughter Martha Frick Symington Sanger talk about her family and its collection. Lady Hamilton is shown in this painting at age 22, and Frick bought it in the year that his oldest daughter Martha would have been 22, had she not died at age six after a long illness. The author thought that perhaps Frick bought it because his Martha would have looked like that.
5c) Downstairs in the main galleries, I was reassured to see my favorite Bronzino boy again, and looked as if for the first time at Whistler’s Harmony in Gray and Pink (Lady Meux). The way he painted the light reflecting off the pink satin in her gown — masterful. But to see Veronese’s Allegory of Wisdom and Strength again — that is a painting and a message for our times. We must have both!
5d) Placed throughout all the galleries were exuberant displays of porcelain flowers, part of a special exhibition. I cast a wether eye at this type of exhibition as a rule (e.g. de Kooning at Versailles), but this I found enhanced the collection and was charming in itself. There were some especially realistic branches of white roses cascading down a pair of French tables in one room, and a wide-branching bouquet of lilacs that nearly filled a gallery upstairs.
5e) If you go to the Frick (which you should), please note that the grand staircase is Up Only, and you should see the first floor first before going upstairs, the exact opposite of what I did.
5f) The gift shop is on the second floor, and when I was finally ready to leave, there was a line to get into the gift shop. They will probably have to expand it! Also, the new café was not yet open.
6) Departing the Frick in a light rain, I was glad I hadn’t worn my panama hat. No use it warping in the rain so early in my trip! My imagination dried up, and I took the 6 train to Union Square for a burger at Max Brenner’s.
6a) The answer to the rarely asked question “Would you like bacon and cheese on your fries?” is probably why I’ve regained all the weight I lost since 2023.
7) Unusually, I did not have a NAP, but caught up on a few travel things in my room before heading through Times Square to the Lyceum Theatre. Arriving early is a good idea, and I was interested to see all the audience excitement on West 45th. Nobody just walks up to and through a theatre lobby any more. You get in long lines quite early before the doors open, and then pass through barriers, etc. I noticed a woman crossing the street in a white baby-doll dress, which made me recall that I’d seen another woman wearing the same dress the day before, while walking to dinner. There was no question what kind of underwear they had on; mother would have wanted them to wear a slip.
7.1a) Probably because it was my first Broadway show in a long time, I stopped immediately at the lobby bar and ordered a double champagne. My eyes widened twice: first when he began pouring it into a go cup with a lid (which is actually a great idea, so practical), and second when I heard the price.
7a) Why is it that the people with the most difficult to reach seats arrive as or after the curtain rises? One advantage to the Lyceum is that the aisles are deep enough for you to stand up to let people pass. Colonial Theatre, Boston, please take note.
7b) Oh, Mary! makes you laugh, makes you gasp, makes you pause at the sheer audacity of its historic revisions. As Noel Coward famously said, “I couldn’t have liked it more!” Cole Escola rewrote history in an exercise of self-indulgence — Cole Escola IS Mary Told Lincoln AS Cole Escola! — and what his next act after this will be interests me greatly.
7c) All that said, the ending was a COMPLETE surprise to me, and I really have to hand it to previous audiences for not giving it away. (Or maybe they did and I wasn’t paying attention.)
8) Again, my imagination deserted me, and I found a Mexican joint near Times Square for a tortilla salad and a glass of rosé. Only while walking back to my hotel from the 14th Street subway stop did I realize, “You doofus, you could have gone to one of this quiet bistros down here!”
9) Daddy’s gettin’ old, and it was pleasant just to lie in bed and write at the end of the day.