Foxy Fox
14 May
The Mindy Project
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It’s that crazy TV time again when the networks announce their new shows in NYC. Fox is picking up shows created by two of my favorite female writers: Mindy Kaling (“The Mindy Project”) and Dana Fox (“Ben and Kate”). They’re going to sandwich them around “New Girl,” created by another favorite writer friend of mine, Liz Meriwether. This is very exciting and means everyone should tune into Fox on Thursday nights this fall.
Last night I went to Playa restaurant to check out the cooking of guest chef Flynn McGarry, age 13. I found out about Flynn from friends who were fans of his pop up restaurant, Eureka, in his Studio City home where Flynn turned his bedroom into a professional kitchen and sleeps on a cot. I was slated to write about Eureka for the New York Times Dining In section but I got scooped by my friend Chris Noxon’s Talk of the Town for the New Yorker. So, I just went to Playa for fun and it was very fun. Flynn’s food was delicate and seasonal—like a young Jean Georges. There were some hints of a young palette, like how one dessert kind of evoked a push-up pop and there was an English pea lollipop starter. Flynn was being trailed by a NBC camera crew for news segment and I bet he gets his own reality show by the end of the summer. He’s a very cute, sweet kid who really loves food. The profits from Playa were going to help Flynn’s culinary education and he was selling a self published cookbook to raise money for his sister’s college fund. I think he’s going to be a big star and am rooting for him big time.
*This was the exception for my no posting of food rule.
Check out the Wall Street Journal article today about my husband Josh Groban meeting the singer Josh Groban at the NYC premiere of Girls earlier this week:
Check out the new, longer trailer for GIRLS. There’s also a behind the scenes video. I’m excited to go to Austin next week for the SXSW festival where there’s a screening of the first three episodes and a panel featuring the creator, Lena Dunham; the showrunner Jenni Konner; and the executive producer Judd Apatow. Then the GIRLS gang is off to NYC for the April 4 premiere. The pilot airs April 15 on HBO after GAME OF THRONES. Tune in! Now we’re deep in writing Season 2 from LA and we’ll start shooting in NYC in May.
I’m featured in the March issue of Glamour magazine as a panelist on a new advice column. My friend Meredith who writes for The Colbert Report brought me on board after she was asked her to bring along three friends to do the panel. We had a great time. Best of all, they did all of our hair and makeup. Meredith and I took our new looks out to lunch at Esca after, but sadly didn’t run into anyone we knew.
I’ve been waiting to get invited to a wedding in San Miguel de Allende, a pretty Spanish colonial town near Mexico City, for years. The invitation never materialized, so my husband and I decided to check it out between Christmas in New York and New Years in Palm Springs. We loved the windy cobblestone streets, the art galleries and shops and the general vibe of the ex-pat heavy town. Best of all, a crew of friends from L.A. rented the very best house in town, Casa Hyder. I have never seen a more spectacular, cool private residence. It’s a good thing we got there a few days before the crew did because once we saw their house we never wanted to leave. We stayed at the Hotel Matilda, which was very nice as long as we didn’t compare it to Casa Hyder. I’ll be writing up the trip shortly for Fathom, my friend Pavia Rosati’s new travel site, where I also wrote up our trips to Cartagena and the Aeolian Islands.
It was surprisingly warm in New York and I had a great time visiting friends and family and hitting some holiday parties. A highlight of this trip was seeing Momix perform at the Joyce. It was the second time I saw the modern dance troupe and I loved it just as much as I did the first time, almost a decade ago. The performance, called “Botanica” waa beautiful, wacky, creative and unpredictable. I went with my dad who kept wondering how they did what they were doing. It was the first time in a long time that I can remember the audience oohing and aaahing and giving a big standing ovation. I like that Momix does not try to send any intellectual message. It’s about creating beauty with strong bodies and surprising you with optical illusions. It’s like a more sophisticated, stranger, less touristy Cirque du Soleil. It’s only 90 minutes and tickets are relative cheap and easy to get. I hadn’t seen a modern dance show in a long time and was reminded how much I love a good one. My first job was as the intern to the dance editor of The Village Voice. It was a great gig. I also studied modern dance and choreography at Mamaroneck High School through a program called PACE (Performing Art Curricular Experience). I went to a public high school, but it had some grant (maybe from the Rockefellers?) that endowed this great program. We went to a lot of dance shows and had our own student choreographed ones. Not to brag, but I did win the high school choreography award senior year. It took me until college to realize I was not much of a dancer. However, I use a lot of what I learned about choreography in my writing.
Chef Boy Wonder Flynn McGarry
10 May
Flynn at work.
*This was the exception for my no posting of food rule.
Shout Out in Slate
13 Apr
Troy Patterson’s big story about GIRLS in Slate today references my 2001 New York Observer article about Googling guys before I went on dates with them. It feels nice to be part of the canon of women writers in his story.
WSJ: Four Girls; Two Grobans
6 Apr
The singer, the star and the husband
There were many things to be excited about at the premiere of HBO’s new series, “Girls,” on Wednesday. One was just how darn good the show, created by and starring Lena Dunham (“Tiny Furniture”), turned out. (It begins on April 15.)
But perhaps the most exciting was an only-in-New-York moment involving the singer Josh Groban and another Josh Groban, who happens to be a senior adviser to California Governor Jerry Brown and is married to Deborah Schoeneman, a writer on “Girls.”
Most of Ms. Schoeneman’s friends know she has been trying to arrange an impromptu meeting between the two Mr. Grobans for some time now, to no avail. Separately, on Wednesday, the actress Michelle Trachtenberg, a guest at the party who is this season’s “Gossip Girl,” was trying to get her friend, Mr. Groban (the singer) to come to the event.
Ms. Trachtenberg overheard Ms. Dunham mention the other Mr. Groban and did a double-take. She immediately texted her pal to come to the party, where the two Mr. Grobans engaged like long-lost friends. (They are actually, it turns out, distant relatives.)
The not-famous Mr. Groban regaled the famous Mr. Groban with various anecdotes involving their shared name—renting Katie Holmes’s apartment in Los Angeles, mistaken dry cleaning, overly zealous hotel concierges, trying to get seats to a Tony Bennett concert, “the utter disappointment I am greeted with upon arrival at restaurants” after making a reservation.
“I didn’t realize how famous I was until I just met you,” joked the singer. He added: “I’m proud to say you are no small fish either. It’s like something out of ‘This American Life.’ Ira Glass would love it.”
“This is one of the proudest accomplishments of my life,” said Ms. Trachtenberg of arranging the meeting. “This is blowing my mind.”
—Marshall Heyman
GIRLS Gets Cover of NY Mag
26 Mar
Check out the great cover story about GIRLS in this week’s New York magazine (my old stomping ground). It really captures what the show and Lena are all about.
Hollywood Reporter Loves GIRLS
16 Mar
While I was at SXSW for the world premiere of the first three episodes of GIRLS, this glowing review was published in the Hollywood Reporter. It calls the show a “brilliant gem for HBO.” The review is so great, it makes me anxious about a potential backlash. However, there was tons of laughter at the premiere. Way more than we expected. So much that a lot of the jokes got lost in the laughter, which is a great problem to have. Next up: the NYC premiere April 4.
GIRLS Getting Wild
1 Mar
Lena Dunham, Allison Williams and Zosia Mamet in GIRLS Episode 2
Getting Glamourous
10 Feb
Holiday Travels
2 Jan
Hanging at Casa Hyder with Husband
Mixing it up in Manhattan
23 Dec
Momix
