Monday, June 4, the Dorothy Parker Society is marking the 40th anniversary of Mrs. Parker’s death with a unique and engaging event that is free and open to the public. The event is at Revolution Books, 9 West 19th Street (between 5th and 6th avenues) from 6:30 to 8:00 p.m. Readers will include: Tony Award winning actress Tonya Pinkins, currently starring in August Wilson’s Radio Golf at the Cort Theatre. Also reading is Xanthe Elbrick, who just wrapped up in Coram Boy at the Imperial Theatre, and is nominated for a 2007 Tony Award for best performance by a featured actress in a play. We are also very happy that Hilda Rodgers, an executive with the NAACP, is going to be with us; Mrs. Parker’s estate is managed by the organization. The same week we remember the 40th anniversary of her death, Penguin Books has a 20th anniversary edition of “Dorothy Parker: What Fresh Hell Is This?” coming out. Author Marion Meade will give a talk and be signing copies of the new edition. And if you need one more reason to attend, how about free cocktails? Plymouth Gin is providing free cocktails to all; this is the same company that was voted “best gin” by the Times in its martini study last month. The first 50 attendees get a gift. So be on time… (Photo: Kevin Fitzpatrick's A Journey into Dorothy Parker's New York)
Monday, June 4, 7 p.m
Trevor White author of Kitchen Con will read at The Half King, 505 West 23rd St.
Are all food critics corrupt? What’s the trick for getting a table tonight in America’s and Europe’s most fashionable restaurants? How can we feast while half the world starves? Find out in Kitchen Con. ”Waiter and customer have a lot in common. Each lingers under the delusion that lunch is on the way, neither has more than a passing interest in the other, and both are at the mercy of an ill-tempered thug with a white toque,” writes Trevor White in this hilarious account of life as a restaurant critic. Kitchen Con is his passionate, intelligent exposé of the restaurant business, from the world’s first restaurant after the French Revolution to today’s most fashionable tables in London, Paris, and New York. With style and humor, White lifts the lid off the culinary cartel—owners, chefs, and critics—that cons diners around the globe. A scathing attack on gourmet dogma, his defiantly populist critique of restaurant culture redefines the dining room as a place in which people should be satisfied rather than frozen and awe-struck. No one—not even the author himself—is spared in this riveting account of life at the heart of the restaurant racket.
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