Metropolitan Diary
Seeing Stars
Dear Diary:
It was 1985, and my husband and I were living on the Upper East Side. We planned a rare date night out and found a friend to babysit our 1-year-old daughter.
We set out for a nearby theater where “Cocoon,” with Jessica Tandy and Hume Cronyn among the stars, was playing. I was a fan of the couple, having seen them onstage at the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis when I was growing up in Iowa.
Unfortunately, when we got to the theater, we found that the next showing was sold out.
Determined not to waste the evening, we walked a few blocks to another theater, where “Prizzi’s Honor,” with Kathleen Turner, Jack Nicholson and Anjelica Huston, was about to start.
As we waited to buy tickets, I noticed an older couple standing a few feet ahead of us in line. I nudged my husband
“Look,” I whispered. “That couple: That’s Jessica Tandy and Hume Cronyn!”
— Jean Young
For the Birds
Dear Diary:
It was a bright clear morning in Manhattan. I was visiting from Arkansas, helping my college daughter settle into a summer program. While she was in class, I explored the city.
Wandering through Bryant Park, I spied a crowd of people with their phones out and all pointed in one direction. Some of them were cradling large cameras with long lenses.
I hurried over, eager for a celebrity sighting. The phones and lenses were angled downward at a cluster of bushes near the carousel.
The crowd spoke in hushed tones. I was confused.
“What’s going on?” I whispered to a particularly intense young man with a huge camera. His face was aglow.
“It’s amazing!” he said. “The mourning warbler. We don’t usually see him here!”
He lowered his camera, eager to show me shots of the small, brightly colored songbird. He explained its migratory pattern, its unique features and our stellar luck at being able to witness him.
I nodded gratefully, tickled at his joyous rapture over this avian miracle. He returned to his focus, kneeling for more shots.
A woman joined us.
“What is all this business?” she asked, her Australian accent evident.
“It’s the mourning warbler!” I said, having caught the enthusiasm. “It’s amazing!”
— Shelley Russell
At the Theater
Dear Diary:
I went with good friends to a performance of the Nancy Harris play “The Beacon” at the Irish Repertory Theater on 22nd Street. It is a powerful play about a dysfunctional family hiding secrets, and it hit home hard for me.
“Did you like the play?” one of my friends asked me innocently after the performance.
Still reeling, I said I would rather not discuss it and that I had found the play difficult to take.
A friendly woman standing nearby spoke up.
“I’m a psychologist,” she said with a smile, “in case you’d like to schedule a session.”
— Howard Husock
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/16/nyregion/metropolitan-diary.html
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