My Halloween MoJo: Missing

I, Model Behavior, a usually fearless partygoer, admit to be so intimidated by the Halloween madness that I fled Tavern on the Green’s Saturday Halloween soirée before even entering the party premises.

Tavern on the Green’s PR people deserve a hearty handshake. I failed to meet anyone in a twenty-mile radius of Manhattan who didn’t know about Tavern’s Halloween shindig in these past two weeks. Invitations went out early and in abundance. Every promoter I’ve ever stumbled across in years united together and to make the place a living madhouse. And here’s the thing about Holidays – it’s an excuse for club owners to financially ass rape the New York population with an extra thrust by charging $40 entrance fees, justified by the concept of a ‘Halloween Party.’

Question: What makes reasonable people accept this kind of brutal monetary abuse? Do people really think some spider webs and a string of glowing pumpkin decorations cost even a fifteenth of the dough clubs reel in by monopolizing on a child’s holiday?

And clubs aren’t the only ones cleverly commercializing on Halloween’s easily exploitive nature. Costume shops somehow convince normally savvy Manhatteners to shell out sixty bucks for a disintegrating cliché costume in a plastic bag that cost $2.50 to produce in Taiwan. How do they do that? How do they get us to accept it?

I’m being the textbook definition of a party pooper, I know. And I apologize. Anyone who follows this blog knows hating on an excuse to party isn’t my nature. But I spent a wretched twenty minutes competing with fallen angels, Mario and Luigi, and a lot of slutty devils for a cab home Saturday evening on Seventh Avenue after I prematurely aborted my evening plans. The city was that overcrowded. I wasn’t drunk, and an especially disorganized trip to Atlantic City on Friday night (is there such thing as an organized trip to a casino?) had cut into my quality weekend costume planning time, which I wasn’t looking forward to anyway. Sober in a sweater and jeans isn’t really the best way to crash a Halloween party, especially when you’re hung over from a frighteningly intense game of blackjack from the night before.

I enjoyed an especially leisurely dinner with Safari Saturday night, so we didn’t even get to Tavern on the Green until around midnight. It was clear from twenty yards away that entering the establishment was a lost cause. Lines branched off in two directions outside the entrance, both so long and winding that they were difficult to follow even while squinting. Mobs larger than anything I’ve seen on 27th street launched themselves through the middle.

Who were all these people?

Another disturbing thing about Holidays…those who consistently stay home on a Saturday night come out for the ‘special occasion’ of Halloween. The city becomes disproportionately packed! The entire party-going system is clogged with outsiders. Which is fine. I have nothing against non-religious-party-goers, although I wish they’d try harder to not get so ripped off.

In order to even out the New York going-out equilibrium, I feel the regulars like me need to stay in. That’s why I was home by one thrity a.m. Safari and I took one look at the throngs outside Tavern, calculated that everyone lucky enough to negotiate a successful entrance would be coughing up $40 for the privilege of buying drinks inside, silently applauded Tavern’s money-making savvy, and high-tailed it out of there as soon as I took these pictures:



A girlfriend of ours who’d wisely arrived at ten p.m. and had a table in the VIP section (Tavern on the Green has a VIP section? Apparently on Halloween they do…) confirmed that the party was fabulously fun. So I’m not bad-mouthing their bash. I like Tavern if only for the sparkly Christmas lights wrapped around all the trees. Cheers to them for monopolizing on Halloween in the most lucrative scheme I’ve seen yet.

I proceeded to observe the Halloween chaos by essentially walking home to Tribeca (since finding a cab was impossible) all the way from Central Park. We swung by some house parties and observed the similarly absurd lines outside Spirit and Cabana (even Cabana had a cover charge! Unimaginable!)

The good news is that if I have the willpower, I can redeem myself Wednesday night – the official day of Old Hallows Eve. Word on the street is that Cipriani’s 42nd street is throwing some sort of Wednesday night Halloween ‘ball’ in collaboration with Roberto Cavalli vodka, Pink’s hosting a ‘disco inferno,’ and the Italians will be rocking their own mini party at I Tre Merli in SoHo. I’m posting Pink’s invite below because I appreciate the way they’ve phrased “costumes highly encouraged,” instead of “required” or even worse, that there will be a “costume competition.”

Please join us Next 
Wednesday, October 31st


for the 

DISCO INFERNO


Halloween Party

 at 

Pink Elephant


with music by Miami's
 Mr. Maurizio


Costumes Highly Encouraged 


527 West 27th Street, New York
212.463.0000

www.pinkelephtantclub.com

For once I say “thank you” Pink for the thoughtful “highly encouraged” phrasing. Isn’t life challenging and competitive enough without costume requirements infiltrating our Holidays?

Sorry, sorry.

I’ll try to locate my Halloween mojo by Wednesday.