Wednesday 28th
Sake to me! We called Benihana’s founder, Rocky Aoki, and asked him if he’s ever gone sake-bombing. ” Heh, heh, heh! That’s some type of a trend for the younger generation , isn’t it? Where they mix the beer and sake together?” Tonight, Rocky and his wife Keiko host a sake-tasting with sake sommeliers and plenty o’ Japanese fare. How’s that hot daughter of his, Devon ? “Did you see her in Page Six last week? They’re calling her a fashion model who became a movie star! She was in 2 Fast, 2 Furious , too! She did well. Now she’s in Texas, where she’s going to learn karate for something. I don’t know much about it.” (Let’s hope Quentin Tarantino isn’t involved …. ) Meanwhile, remember the date you had with that perfectly nice-seeming paralegal who turned out to have an apartment full of harnesses and swings? Relive it tonight when the high-flying folks at De La Guarda try to keep their numbers up by bringing in Fatboy Slim as a guest D.J. While we’re not on the subject, the much-ballyhooed “indie” film Garden State premieres tonight starring emo boy Zach Braff and Natalie Portman , who graduated from Harvard but still seems like a really nice person ….
[RKA Sake Club tasting, Haru, 280 Park Avenue, 5:30 to 7:30 p.m., www.rha-sakeclub.com to sign up; De La Guarda, Daryl Roth Theater, 20 Union Square East, 8 p.m., 212-239-6200; Garden State premiere, Chelsea Clearview Theater, 333 West 23rd Street, 7 p.m., by invitation only; let’s see if Ms. Portman sexes it up for the premiere.]
Thursday 29th
Is it just us, or are “travel” and “leisure” mutually exclusive? Hours on the Long Island Expressway , followed by stuffing your pasty heinie in the sand as you mumble, “I’ll freaking enjoy myself if it’s the last damn thing I do!” Nevertheless, Travel + Leisure magazine (the lazy cousin of Condé Nast Traveler ) gets it together and doles out the 2004 World’s Best Awards tonight. And then, lordy , what’s this? Victoria's Secret (VSCO) (the secret is that if you wear her stuff out like regular clothes, you get to take someone home) has commandeered a motorcade of pink Hummer limos to carry a fleet of it’s models (aa- oo- gah!) to its flagship store in Herald Square to launch its newest lingerie line, Pink . It’s targeted at 18-to-22-year-olds , as if their foreplay involves anything beyond someone buying them a tequila shot and a tab of E …. Alessandra Ambrosio , a Brazilian-born Victoria’s Secret model, will be leading the way into Herald Square. “Pink is like the combined sexiness of Victoria’s Secret and lots of young energy!” she told us. “We’re going to ride around town in this Hummer-I think it has polka dots? -and give away tops, Frisbees, beach balls. My favorite is the bra. I love the bras! I wear it every day! The straps are so cute and pink, and you can show them off because-you know how you can see them when you’re wearing a tank top?-with these, it’s O.K. I think they picked me because they saw how I work and all my energy, and they know that I love to jump around during the shoots and laugh a lot and dance -but, you know, still being sexy, never forgetting to be sexy …. I’m looking for a new apartment right now. I have to live near the midtown tunnel, because it’s close to the airport, and I am always going to the airport.” She’s 23: “I’m one year older than who the Pink line is supposed to be for, but I still feel young-and that’s what matters!” Also rolling into town are actors Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman , who have been riding their “hogs” (BMW motorcycles) 20,000 miles across seven continents and four months for a documentary, Long Way Round . (Someone should screen Easy Rider for these boys …. ) “For the first two-thirds of the trip, they were really good about keeping this diary,” said publicist Amber Feld. “They put it on their Web site with some pictures-I guess for the fans-with all this stuff about really cool weather conditions and this or that militant who came up to them. Then I guess Ewan got really stressed out and started smoking again …. ” Tonight, their sore butts end the journey with a pawty in their honor at the portholed Maritime Hotel in the potholed meatpacking district.
[ Travel + Leisure 2004 World’s Best Awards, North Plaza, Lincoln Center, 7:30 to 10:30 p.m., 800-798-6204; Pink collection launch, Victoria’s Secret flagship store, Herald Square, 36th Street and Sixth Avenue, 11 a.m., www.victoriassecret.com; Long Way Round party, ballroom, Maritime Hotel, 371 West 16th Street, 8 p.m. to midnight, by invitation only; ask Ewan why he’s never seen a good dermatologist about that eruption on his forehead; www.longwayround.com.]
Friday 30th
Line up, ladies! Adidas, the athletic-wear company whose logo looks like a marijuana leaf , borrows the entire sweaty, pulsing AC Milan soccer team from Italy (where they call it futbol ); the fellas will be in town for a match against Manchester United tomorrow at Giants’ Stadium. They’ll leave their cleats off and play foosball -a sport normally reserved for chubby, beer-drenched men-against the team from America Scores (a youth soccer club, not the nudie club spreading through town like crabs). “They’ll unveil the new jersey they’ll be wearing during the game and play foosball on the world’s largest foosball table!” said peppy publicist Colleen McCarthy. “It’s going to be a fun, quirky event!” Uh oh. Expected players include singularly named stars Kaka, Cafu and Crespo . What, no Becks?
[Jersey Unveiling/Foosball, 1211 Avenue of the Americas, outside plaza, 10 a.m.]
Saturday 31st
We’ll always have Paris! The beloved George Plimpton may have gone to that big literary quarterly in the sky, but The Paris Revie w chugs on. Catch the last day of their prints exhibit at Guild Hall in East Hampton, featuring 50 years of cover art-hey, is that Alec Baldwin in shorts over there? Later , just down the road a piece, investor Richard Weisman signs copies of his new book, Picasso to Pop , about the paintings he commissioned Andy Warhol to paint of Pelé and other famous athletes. (Afterwards, prepare yourself for fall, when all art reverts to urinals and bodily-fluid paintings.) Then take the back roads, darling , to
[ The Paris Review at Guild Hall, 158 Main Street, noon to 5 p.m., 631-324-0806; Athletic Portraits, Vered Gallery, 68 Park Place, East Hampton, 5 to 7 p.m., 631-324-3303; Super Saturday, a field in Water Mill, noon to 6 p.m., 212-268-1002; Hell’s Kitchen Flea Market, West 39th Street, under the E1, 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.]
Sunday 1st
Yup, still have Paris! If you’re like us and the word “poor” is in your job description (re-poor-ter) , you’ll be happy about today’s reasonably priced benefit for the Society of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. Kathy Hilton trots out porn princess Paris and the entire fam to prance about at the Hilton Pink Ribbon Estate Sale (let’s see if Kathy brings her babe sister, Kyle , now available on ER ); today’s event in Southampton will (of course) be televised on NBC this fall-yet more proof that Jeff Zucker and his colleagues have become slavishly enthralled to what passes for the upper classes in this country. In fashion news, only one more month of enduring the office flip-flops , skirts and tops with more tiers than that sappy Notebook movie, as well as that depraved terry Juicy dress that’s still kicking around-for which Jessica Simpson should take full blame and offer everyone a refund ….
[The Hilton Pink Ribbon Estate Sale, 9 Fordune Drive, Southampton, 1 to 5 p.m., 212-672-0509; crash strategy: show up.]
Monday 2nd
A Tony Kushner tsunami hits town-and, frankly, we’re a bit concerned . We applaud the 21 Emmy nominations for his well-done show, Angels in America , though we were under the impression that “didactic” and ” tendentious” are things one tried to avoid, on the whole. Mr. Kushner re-enters the arena with We Who Guard the Mystery Shall Be Unhappy , a play that begins with First Housewife Laura Bush addressing a group of dead children in pajamas. Yikes! John Cameron Mitchell , of Hedwig fame, will play the First Lady alongside co-stars Patricia Clarkson and Kristen Johnson . The triad reads from the first act today at a fund-raiser titled ” Another Anti-War Fundraiser .” Meanwhile, the playwright himself herds the cast of his medium-well production, Caroline, or Change , into the Barnes & Noble in Union Square in an attempt to ignite ticket sales. Tell him to send Angels actress Mary-Louise Parker some flowers; she turns 40 today.
[Another Anti-War Fundraiser, American Airlines Theatre, 227 West 42nd Street, 8 p.m.; Caroline, or Change , Barnes & Noble, 33 East 17th Street, 7 p.m.; 800-494-TIXS.]
Tuesday 3rd
Hello, sailor! Bill Pullman made our hetero male friends want to enlist when he delivered that patriotic monologue in Independence Day -of course, then the real war came and they all submitted 11th-hour applications to Harvard Law . Anyhoo. Now the boyish charmer stars in Tiger Cruise , as a naval man aboard a ship that goes on high alert with civilians on board two days after Sept. 11. Tonight’s premiere is brought to you by Disney . It’s also relegating the media to “outside, red-carpet coverage only ,” and if we ain’t invited to the after-party, we ain’t with it. So instead, we turn our attention to Jane columnist Pam (Stripperella) Anderson . Why? Because between her implants and openness about hepatitis C, has there ever been a fake celebrity who keeps it more real? Way to be, Pam! Today, she’s a little too far downtown, reading from her new book, Star . Expect one ill-fitting tank top and drool supplied by frat-boy analysts pledging Goldman Sachs. Bonus dirty excerpt! ” … as she wound her legs around his waist and drew herself up to him in excitement, he withdrew, sliding down to bury his face between her legs. And as his tongue made contact, she joined the soprano line of the ‘Flower Duet’ echoing up from the floor below.” Ummm… boi- oing ? Meanwhile, the Mostly Mozart festival (fans include: cultivated actress/retail model Sarah Jessica Parker and her fluffy chia skirts) has experienced some upheaval over the past several years, what with all the striking musicians and all, but Alsatian conductor Louis Langrée sets things right tonight when he whips out his wand at the opening-night gala. We would’ve preferred Chiefly Chopin, but who are we?
[ Tiger Cruise premiere, Intrepid Sea-Air-Space Museum, Pier 86, 12th Avenue and 46th Street, 8 p.m., by invitation only; Pamela Anderson, Borders Wall Street, 100 Broadway, 1 p.m., 212-964-1988; Mostly Mozart gala, Avery Fisher Hall, Lincoln Center, 8 p.m., 212-875-5766.]
Wednesday 4th
Feelin’ Lucky ? Hearst is! After feeling the hot breath of Condé Nast’s wildly successful Lucky magazine, Hearst is cranking out its own sartorial mag-alog, Shop, Etc. It’s helmed by saucy Brit editor Mandi Norwood -you loved her book Sex and the Married Girl -who called us from the Hearst mothership, where she’s been “hatching” Shop, Etc . for the last 18 months. “Gawd, all the shopping!” she said. “That was the hardest part-on the bank balance, anyway. The party is going to be about a great shopping experience instead of a bunch of people standing around eating dead things on toast . It’ll be less of a clubby atmosphere …. A Shop, Etc . girl will likely be shopping across all sorts of labels: I imagine that, in the same day, she could be in Bergdorf Goodman in the morning and Target in the afternoon. She’d be wearing a Marc Jacobs skirt with an Isaac Mizrahi for Target top, and also a Banana Republic coat and a pair of Prada shoes.” Nuts! How is the mag different from Lucky ? “First of all, it does have fashion, home and beauty, and it’s very much about those three interests …. Also, we’re not focusing on celebrities. Our shoppers-we call them ‘shoppers,’ not ‘readers’-are between ages 25 and 49. They’re not just thinking about what they’re going to wear on a Saturday night.” Win a $10,000 shopping spree at tonight’s swishy launch party. For literary shoppers , the P.E.N. American Center presents an earnest salon, “State of Emergency,” at Cooper Union, promising “unconventional readings” from music maker Laurie Anderson , sexy Brooklynites Paul Auster and Jonathan Safran Foer, newly blond Michael Cunningham, and heavy hitters Salman Rushdie and Kurt Vonnegut . Elizabeth Wurtzel alert at DEFCON 3.
[ Shop Etc. launch party, Milk Studios Gallery, 450 West 15th Street, first floor, 6 to 9 p.m., 212-649-2141, by invitation only; “State of Emergency: Unconventional Readings,” the Great Hall, Cooper Union, 7 East Seventh Street, 7 p.m., 212-334-1660, ext. 107.]
