Child Services storms Chateau Jackson when Jermaine's kid puts Blanket's life in peril. Megan Fox announces she's only slept with two men. Jolie and Franco are shoo-ins for based-on-a-true-story suicidal artist roles. Wednesday gossip is full of surprises.
• Christian Delouvrier, the French chef who earned four stars at Lespinasse and later put in time at Alain Ducasse and David Bouley's Secession, is now behind the stove at the more modest La Mangeoire on 53rd and Second Ave. [NYT]
• Ravi DeRossi of Death & Co. and, more recently, Mayahuel, will open a Cuban sandwich…
• An autopsy was performed on Brittany Murphy yesterday and while no obvious cause of death was determined, more should be known when toxicology tests are completed in several weeks. Meanwhile, police sources say a huge stash of prescription pills (painkillers, antidepressants, anti-anxiety drugs, antibiotics, etc.)…
Simon Hammerstein and Randy Weiner's Purgatorio, a two-week haunted house nightlife experience is the most beautiful venue in New York right now. It's scary all right: witness the horror of New York's nightlife elite rubbing elbows with the public.
• Todd English's troubles with Erica Wang, his former fiancée (and the woman he was supposed to marry last weekend) continue: The chef filed a criminal complaint against her earlier this week, claiming she clocked him in the eye, a wound that he says required seven stitches to close. [NYP]
• A bit of better news for…
• Openings: Gansevoort 69 opened today in the meatpacking space formerly occupied by Florent. And Motorino's first Manhattan outpost is now open in was once Una Pizza Napoletana. A few more openings today are here.
• Also open, but just for private parties for the time being: The Boom Boom Room, the new bar on the…
• After 37 years in business—and following several lease extensions—La Goulue on Madison Avenue will close its doors on Aug. 26. The owners say they're still hoping to reopen it somewhere else in the neighborhood. [NYT]
• Further evidence that this is a really tough time for media companies: The New York Times has…
Through the recession-blackened debris of our once great nation, there blows a consolatory treasure, a reminder, if you will, of what being American is all about: suing people! Thanks to the mass layoffs of lawyers—on February 12th alone, 800 law firm employees were let go—the cost of a lawsuit should drop "for the…
Following months of rumors and allegations about his bad behavior, pervy Box boss Simon Hammerstein has finally been slapped with a sexual harassment lawsuit by the Porcelain Twinz, two of the venue's best-known performers until they quit last summer. The burlesque dancers have been putting on a kinky act for years,…
• The Cipriani family is planning to close the Rainbow Grill on January 12th, although the bar and banquet space will remain open. [AP]
• The troubled Palm Court inside the Plaza closed last week. [Eater]
• A pizza-making school is coming to Bleecker Street. [NYT]
• Upright Citizens Brigade is contemplating an East…
♦ New York takes a long look in this week's issue at The Box, Simon Hammerstein's infamously sleazy club. Don't read it if you're eating or you're easily offended by tales of snot and/or raw sewage. [NYM]
♦ Fresh trouble for the Cipriani family: The head of the State Liquor Authority, Daniel Boyle, says an aide to…
You'll recall that The Box owner Simon Hammerstein was accused of pressuring burlesque performers into three-ways, stashing them in dog-feces-strewn dressing rooms, pushing drugs on them and leaving welts on their assess. He denied most of the charges, and denies them again in this week's New York, backed up this time…
♦ Yesterday evening the New York Women's Foundation Fall Gala took place at Gotham Hall: Michael Bloomberg and Diana Taylor, Iman, Joel Klein and Nicole Seligman, Robert De Niro and Grace Hightower, Felicia Taylor, Jamie Niven, Herbert Wachtell, and Jonathan Farkas ate, drank, and watched a performance from the…
Simon Hammerstein, co-owner of downtown burlesque theater The Box—which pretty much everyone in the neighborhood wants shuttered—is sort of defending himself—mainly via proxy—against charges that he's a grunting hog who sexually harasses his female employees. And he's doing it in the pages of the Times' Sunday Styles,…
Poor Simon Hammerstein. First, the burlesque club owner's employee abusing-and-sexing ways were exposed when one of his star burlesque acts quit the Box, along with the tech staff. Then, CityFile rightly and hilariously accused him of setting the entire financial crisis into motion by reminding us that "It all goes…
We've done it! We've figured out just what set into motion the financial crisis that has led to billions in losses, demolished two investment banks (so far), and led to tens of thousands of lost jobs. It all goes back to Friday, March 7th when sleazy club owner Simon Hammerstein, headband-wearing scenester Arden Wohl,…
The Box is one of the most interesting and decadent spectacles in downtown nightlife. Owned by Simon Hammerstein, descendant of the theater scion, the jewel-box theater hosts a variety of unique and sexually-charged acts nightly. Open since 2006, it's still a pretty hot ticket—"If you're good enough to make it in,…
Simon Hammerstein, the hipster founder of the LES hotspot The Box, paid $1.27 million for a Financial District loft, according to property documents posted this morning. The fourth floor pad—located at 265 Water Street—features two bedrooms and 1,650 square feet of open living space. Check it our for yourself after…
Down By The Hipster passes on a rumor that The Box can't even recruit a lawyer to extricate the downtown cabaret club from its legal woes. It would be amusing, except owner Simon Hammerstein deserves some reward for his ambition, and the smell of schadenfreude is nauseating.
