Wednesday, March 3, 2010

Important by Associaton

One perk of working for a bigwig New York City boss is my standing as his eager social alternate. Occasionally, when one of the owners of the restaurant where I work as an event planner (which I'll now refer to as "The Restaurant") happens to be previously engaged or otherwise uninterested in one of the many invitations that hits his inbox, he generously asks if my co-worker Sabria and/or I might like to attend. Often times, they're his B-list invites. But, every exciting once in a while, Sabria and I get to pull the important-by association card to get into pretty sweet New York soirees...my favorites being front row seats in the Bryant Park tents during New York Fashion week and tickets to attend a taping of "The View" as Barbara Walters' personal guest

So, when the boss man tossed us an invite to an exclusive movie screening at the Tribeca Cinemas we snatched up the opportunity. After work Monday night, Sabria and I took the E- train downtown to Varick Street to get a sneak preview of "Brooklyn's Finest", a movie staring Ethan Hawke, Richard Gere and Don Cheadle. The invite promised an after-show Q & A with Ethan Hawke and the director Antoine Fuqua (who also did Training Day).

They had me at Ethan Hawke. Well, really they had me at free movie, but Ethan didn't hurt. I think it was "Reality Bites" when I first started crushing on him and "Great Expectations" that sealed the deal.

Anyway, there we were, on the door list, snug in our "reserved" seats, chomping on free popcorn, pumped for our fancy advanced screening...fabulous night guaranteed, right?

Wrong. The movie sucked, and I'm not even one to come down hard on films, let alone free Ethan Hawke films. But, after almost three Debbie Downer hours of gritty shoot-outs and nonsensical drama, Sabria and I wished we could follow behind the handful of other viewers who walked out early. The dissatisfaction in the room was palpable as people whispered and fidgeted, even laughed out loud as (spoiler alert) just about every lead characters' brains were blown out.

At the end, it got a weak, nervous clap as they introduced Ethan Hawke and the director (who, come to find out, was sitting in the row in front of me next to one of the guests who actually walked out mid-movie).

It was bad, real bad. But, the novelty of seeing a a lead actor in person seconds after seeing him on the big screen won back some major points. Per usual with actors in interviews, they spent the Q&A gushing over how wonderful and talented they are and how shocking it was that the movie got bad reviews at Sundance....blah blah blah. And, I gotta admit Ethan's looking a little skinny and strung out these days...not so much the dreamboat I remembered.

Still, I can't say all the exclusive hoopla wasn't fun. And really, there's pretty much nothing that could keep me from cashing in on future invites. It's a tough job. But somebody's gotta do it.

3 comments:

  1. 1. awesome that you got to go!
    2. crappy that the movie sucked. i wanted to see it. grrr.
    3. thanks for saving me 12 bucks
    4. Great Expectations... omg how i love that movie.

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  2. Oranges to apple aka how Nana's life is so much cooler than mine.

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