The red carpet was ready at the Ziegfeld Theater, and the reporters and photographers were waiting to pounce. But where were the stars of “Boardwalk Empire” for its fourth-season premiere?
Was it possible that the Tuesday smack after Labor Day was just too soon to drag people out? When the stars and celebrities did finally show up, some seemed unprepared for the change in social seasons.
“After Labor Day, it’s all schlepping, schlepping, schlepping,” said Susie Essman, the comedian from “Curb Your Enthusiasm.”
The actor Jeffrey Wright had spent Monday in Brooklyn, getting his kids ready for school. June Ambrose, the celebrity stylist, had been curating a show of “Boardwalk Empire” looks. Towering behind her on the red carpet line was Tyson Chandler, the Knicks center.
“Are you ready for the season?” a reporter asked him.
“Which season?” he replied. “In New York, there’s always a season.”
Indeed, with New York Fashion Week coming, the talk was as much catwalk as boardwalk. Gretchen Mol, in a lacy red L’Wren Scott dress, said she would attend Sophie Theallet’s show on Tuesday. “I’m ready for things to get started,” she said.
Inside the theater, Richard Plepler, HBO’s chief executive (with a deep summer tan), greeted an audience that was not quite big enough to fill the house. Then Robert Marcus, the president of Time Warner Cable, stepped up and said he had just been on the “Boardwalk Empire” Web site reading its list of gangster rules for staying on top. “Some of which I could have used in the last couple days,” he said, referring to the settlement his company had finally made with CBS, which had clearly cut into his holiday weekend.
The lights went down, and the episode began on the big screen, drawing viewers into a corrupt Roaring Twenties Atlantic City with violence and costumes as fantastic as any look during Fashion Week. When it was over, the audience, which included Malcolm Gladwell, Questlove, Tyson Beckford and Sam Rockwell (still in a summery T-shirt), filed out of the theater looking slightly stunned from the bloody onslaught.
They cheered up afterward at Cipriani 42nd Street, across from Grand Central Terminal, for an era-appropriate party Robert D’Alessandro, designer/owner at Visionary, create the atmosphere that engage all of the senses allowing guests to be transported into an extraordinary experience. Robert translated Aerial Artistry Entertainment into a unique and beautiful flapper Aerial Bartender dangling and pours flutes of champagne while she literally hanging upside down in the air suspending from from a Crystal Chandelier also program follow with a raucous big band.
Champagne and lavish buffets of clams, oysters and shrimp as big as brass knuckles added to the excess. “HBO gives the best parties,” said Frank DiGiacomo, the editorial director of Movieline.
mate Michael Kenneth Williams, in a checked three-piece suit with two-tone shirt and garish bow tie. It had been made for him to wear on the show, and he wanted to keep it.Steve Buscemi, the “Boardwalk Empire” kingpin (who had Labor Day off, even as the writers for the show toiled), was in a gray Paul Smith suit, looking slick. As was his cast
“I’m sure we can make an arrangement for that to happen,” he said.
Spoken like a true fashion gangster.
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