After a year-plus of social distancing, the New York social scene came back in full force as spring turned to summer and COVID-era restrictions began to relax in the city. Landon Nordeman followed three prominent New Yorkers as they reemerged to their respective social strata.
As Gagosian opened its Chelsea doors on Thursday, June 24, Antwaun Sargent, a new director and curator at the gallery, stepped into a quiet room to look ahead at the next few hours. His group exhibition “Social Works” features 12 Black artists who engage their communities through both art and social practice. “These artists belong to communities,” Sargent said as he surveyed the crowd beginning to gather, “and those communities are showing up.”
Masked guests streamed between the rooms of the gallery, pausing for conversation near Theaster Gates’s installation of the legendary house DJ Frankie Knuckles’s archives or Lauren Halsey’s painted explorations of signage in South Central Los Angeles. “It’s so experiential,” Sargent said, adding, “I’m excited about folks immersing themselves in the exhibition.” Later in the evening, one attendee asked him to autograph the recent issue of Art in America, which Sargent had guest-edited.
Outside Gagosian, a sunny runway formed as guests lined up to get into the gallery. The exhibition was a demonstration of community, Sargent said, among both the attendees and the artists, whose social practices have informed one another. “There are all these different connections, not only conceptually,” he said, “not only socially and politically, but also the way that they’re working in and between communities.” By sunset, the line had stretched around the block. —D.A.
After more than a year of darkness, theater owner Jordan Roth knew just who to call: Bruce Springsteen. “Bruce is the person that we need to bring us back to life,” Roth told Vanity Fair en route to the reopening night of Springsteen on Broadway. Roth, the president and majority owner of Jujamcyn Theaters, which oversees five Broadway houses, dressed in white Alexander McQueen couture and Givenchy jewels, plus a purse from his grandmother, arrived at the St. James Theatre looking like an angel sent to save the Great White Way.
As the saying goes, all the world’s a stage, and when Roth and his husband, producer Richie Jackson, arrived at the Kerr, they were met by an unexpected performance from a vocal group of anti-vax protesters picketing the theater, spurred to action by Springsteen on Broadway’s strict “no vaccination, no entry” policy. Ignoring chants of “this is segregation” and “welcome to Nazi Germany,” Roth floated through the anti-vax protest, serenely answering interview questions from press outlets like New York 1. “It feels pretty normal,” Roth told V.F. of his return, lauding his team for figuring out “how to make it possible” and “how to make it safe” to put on a show again. When asked if his feathers were ruffled by the unexpected show outside of the theater, Roth had a one word answer: “No.”
The vibes inside were friendlier, as theater fans and Boss heads alike mingled and marveled at being members of a packed house for the first time in over a year. Among those in the audience were New Jersey governor Phil Murphy, Tony Award–winner Brian Stokes Mitchell, president of the Broadway League Charlotte St. Martin, and secretary of transportation Pete Buttigieg and his husband, Chasten Buttigieg, who were seated next to Roth and Jackson. “It’s been 15 months,” Chasten said in disbelief to Roth after exchanging hugs and kisses. While heads turned to get a look at the Buttigiegs, the audience erupted in a standing ovation when E Street Band member and The Sopranos star Steven Van Zandt entered the theater rocking a brown bandana, leather blazer, and a scarf.
“We’ve been preparing for this for 15 months, and also four days,” Roth said. “I know that everyone is cheering for this moment because it’s a moment for all of Broadway and all of theater.” Soon after, the lights dimmed and Bruce Springsteen took the stage with his guitar to Van Zandt–level applause. “Shut the fuck up and sit in your seats,” he said after the upteenth applause outbreak, before breaking into his classic “Growing Up.” The Boss and Broadway were officially back. —C.M.
“I’m happy that the one year I did spend drinking, I was drinking with the fucking Real Housewives of New York,” said Leah McSweeney, The Real Housewives of New York City’s feisty, street-smart, and (newly) sober cast member. She was at her downtown apartment getting ready for another night on the town to celebrate Pride month. It was Saturday, but she was still recovering from Madonna’s Pride party at the Boom Boom Room two days prior. “It was, like, crazy elite gay,” she said. “I was like, ‘Oh, there’s Lance Bass!” Bass’s husband, Michael Turchin, is a fan of RHONY and McSweeney’s; she’s still adjusting to that level of notoriety. “Someone from ’NSync knows who I am,” she said. “That’s kind of cool.” She left the event before Madonna even showed up (“too crowded, too soon”), but she’s ready to go out again to see her friend, drag queen Bootsie Lefaris, perform at Pieces. To a soundtrack of classic tracks by Cassie, Mario Winans, and Azealia Banks, McSweeney put the finishing touches on her outfit, a midriff-bearing psychedelic bralette and bell-bottoms combo from Mirror Palais. “I can’t sit down in this,” she said, only half-joking.
“There is this counter culture that is going on in New York that is fucking cool,” McSweeney said in the cab en route to the West Village. “It’s like a rebellion against the mainstream. It’s very leftist, anti-political correctness. Very pro-art, pro-creativity,” she said, name-checking the Red Scare podcast, her friend and NYT best-selling author Cat Marnell, and The Drunken Canal. But her streetwear-designer exterior belies a theater kid at heart who, growing up, took acting classes alongside Donald Faison and dreamed of becoming a Broadway actor. “I know every single line to Les Misérables,” she said. “Funny Girl is my favorite musical. Fanny Brice, oh, my God.” McSweeney grabbed the aux and we belted out “Don’t Rain on My Parade,” hitting approximately 80% of the notes.
“This is where I had my first communion,” she said as we drove by St. Joseph’s Church on Sixth Avenue. Her daughter, Kier, just made her confirmation. “It makes me kind of sad,” she said, “because I’m converting to Judaism—which I love—but watching her make communion and get confirmed makes me sort of nostalgic for my childhood.” At a stop in at Village Cigars, she picked up a Juul before heading to the bar.
The Village was teeming with bodies. “She’s really real, she’s a breath of fresh air, she’s authentic,” said an amiable, inebriated woman after asking me to snap a pic of her and McSweeney. In the cigar shop, she posed for a photo with a bald, middle-aged man named Italo who didn’t recognize her, but liked her general vibe. After the cigar shop she swapped her Juul (“it hurts my throat”) for a popsicle from an ice cream truck as she strolled down the street with her friend, John McCollum, no relation to the failed congressional hopeful of the same name.
At the bar, owner Eric Einstein took us through a backdoor into Pieces, approximately 117 degrees and packed like sardines with a legion of drunk Gen Z twinks and twunks. McSweeney found refuge backstage in the dressing room, gabbing with queens Lefaris, DD Fuego, and Jolina Jasmine who had somehow kept their makeup from running despite the heat. Right before the show began, McSweeney snagged a front-row seat for clutching an ice water in one hand and dollar bills to tip the performers in the other. After an inspired montage of songs by Miss Fuego, a looser and livelier McSweeney turned and said, “My friend Greg Yüna is having a party for his jewelry line in the LES. Want to come?”—C.M.
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