Good morning and welcome to a hot hot Monday! There’s an emergency heat advisory in place across the city for the next few days. Keep cool…
Forty years ago this week, at the age of 18, I started my first job as a trainee press photographer in Liverpool. One of my first jobs was to photograph the Toxteth Riots (picture below). My sister, Sandra, recalls: “I remember you coming home with a huge bruise on your ribs where you’d been hit by a brick – and you begged me not to tell mum and dad.” I went on to photograph many famous people — from Princess Diana to Mother Teresa, from Freddie Mercury to Nelson Mandela.
On March 13 last year, I started my career as a writer with this daily newsletter. When the PPP money ran out last September, I began my apprenticeship as an editor. Thanks for indulging me as I learn — I’m enjoying this journalism adventure as much as my teenage self all those years ago!
Two weeks into the pandemic — and his 17 years run at Birdland with the iconic weekly Cast Party broken — Jim Caruso was in bed “watching every single episode of West Wing, eating Oreos and ice cream and basically pulling my covers over my head.”
Even though he was “sad and depressed and stuff” his next action created a brand new show — Pajama Cast Party — that created a weekly audience which peaked at 15,000 (the maximum Birdland crowd is 150) and connected him with a young producer (who had first attended Cast Party at age 6). Read more…
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What we’ve been reading
Springsteen reopens Broadway after 471 days of darkness. (Vulture)
300 construction sites have been shut down in a safety swoop. (New York Daily News)
Healthcare union to fight mandatory vaccines for workers. (Gothamist)
New Yorkers moved to the Hamptons — and it all went to crap… (The Guardian)
Here’s the United States through the eyes of 1936 New Yorkers — and it’s a little confused! (Reddit)
Freeze Frame
For what was supposed to be PRIDE’s second “virtual” year — up close and personal celebrations took over this city this weekend. Thanks to Jeffrey LeFrancois for this amazing photo simply captioned: “And we march.”