New York Oddities

I just finished grading one class--finished, that is, if you don't count the 10 students (out of 38) who didn't hand in a final. At least two are really great students so I suspect they are falling victim to their own perfectionism.

Before I go to bed, however, I just wanted to record the great dinner I went to on Tuesday night. My friend, Michael, is a historian of sexploitation cinema whom I met several years ago when he discovered that I was writing about Doris Wishman and femininity in sexploitation. I admire Michael as a scholar, but as a person, he's even more impressive. He has gathered together a group of sexploitation, softcore and early hardcore directors and stars/former starlets. Along with his equally amazing wife, Alison, he has befriended forgotten talents and helped make their work available on dvd and through the occasional screenings at Pioneer, Anthology and other NYC/East Village institutions. He is also Doris's biographer and they were great friends.

Tuesday night's gathering included Michael, Alison, director Joe Sarno and his wonderful, beautiful wife/actress/collaborator, Peggy Steffans Sarno, aka Cleo Nova (amongst other pseudonyms), all of whom I have known for years. I also got to meet Jamie Gillis, an AVN Hall of Famer, and Carter, a director whose last name I can't remember, but whose work is evidently very impressive. Jamie's girlfriend, Zarela Martinez, owned the restaurant and is a celebrity chef of some renown. Everybody was so interesting and smart, making it a relatively late night for me to trek back to Brooklyn. As I walked through midtown to the F, it was nearly midnight, but it was both warm and snowy, with Christmas lights ablaze. Despite the end of the semester stress and the struggle to get everything completed before I leave for the UK (and the terrible pain I always feel about being parted from my cats), this was a wonderful stolen moment. The city showed another side to its beauty, a misty, gauzy, gothic haze, where consumerism, religion, industry and media all combined into something specifically New York. And I enjoyed the wonderful pause it offered after reuniting with old friends, and their histories of what now appears to be a largely innocent erotica--something that, again, seems quintessentially New York.

And, on another note, Steven Alan is now vastly reduced. $39 cashmere hats and $59 shirts. If time permits, I'll try to get into the Nolita branch and get one more shirt to take home with me.