Starring the Plaza

Buy the Book:
Amazon
Barnes & Noble
Published by: Beaufort Books, 2nd Edition
Release Date: August 21, 2017
Pages: 128
ISBN13: 978-0825308468

 
Overview

From the day it opened, on October 1, 1907, the lavish nineteen-story French Renaissance building on the southeast corner of Fifth Avenue and Central Park South was simple the grandest hotel in the world. Throughout its storied history, the Plaza’s glamorous interiors and exteriors have remained sought-after settlings for films, TV shows, commercials—even music videos—as well as home to the most significant social events of their day.

It’s no surprise that a lot of the films shot there have become beloved classics, from Alfred Hitchcock’s North by Northwest to everybody’d favorite tear-jerker, The Way We Were to Neil Simon’s uproarious Plaza Suite and Barefoot in the Park. In these and dozens of others, the Plaza’s own special magic was stirred into Hollywood’s heady mix and the results are timeless.

In Starring the Plaza, the hotel shines in a new light: a Klieg light, as it were. Page after page of moments captured from movies, plays, TV shows, parties, premiers, and press events form a new kind of chronicle of New York’s favorite landmark.

Praise

"Patty Farmer captures the essence of this golden period through her colorful profiles and interviews…and makes me want to step into a time capsule more than ever."
—LEONARD MALTIN, Film Historian

“Patty Farmer’s evocative volume movingly captures the essence of a beloved and grand institution. What a fun book.”
—Michael Feinstein, Renown American Songbook singer and pianist

Excerpt

“As much as the Statue of Liberty, the Met, and Yankee Stadium, The Plaza is a New York icon. Its appearance on screen is shorthand for New York itself… The Plaza is New York’s Grande Dame—and she’s a hell of a good actress, too.”
—Patty Farmer

From North by Northwest, with Cary Grant playing Roger Thornhill. Roger Thornhill: ‘Now you listen to me, I’m an advertising man, not a red herring. I’ve got a job, a secretary, a mother, two ex-wives, and several bartenders that depend on me, and I don’t intend to disappoint them all by getting myself ‘slightly’ killed.’