Twilight Zone Time. It was odd to look out the window this past Saturday morning, the 6th of January,  and see a couple strolling along East End Avenue (power-walk style) in shorts and short sleeved tees. And it was a nice day, in the low 70s (!)); sunny and fair. The Promenade in Carl Schurz Park overlooking the East River was jammed with people; strollers, joggers, rollerbladers, cyclists, children, dogs; the play areas for the dogs and for the little ones were jammed and so were the playing courts – basketball on one side, roller-hockey on the other. The kind of crowd-wise you see only on the nicest summer days.

Friday night I went with old friends to “21” for dinner. I don’t dine at “21” often so when I do it is an occasion. I have a feeling it is an occasion for even those who dine there often (my friend John Jakobson lunches there every weekday). Because there something about the place that just feels like a tradition. And in this day and age, that’s an occasion all by itself. It’s the décor, the ambience, the staff and the fabulous club room. One of my guests Friday night first went there with her parents when she was fifteen (which was quite some time ago on the clock). It was an occasion then and she still recalls it. Her experience, however, is not unique.

“21” is an institution, the closest thing to a private men’s club (with women admitted) that exists as a public restaurant in New York. In terms of its history and provenance, so to speak, it is without peer. Interestingly, it is a very welcoming establishment with its clamoring crowds holding receptions, private dinners, gala dinners and a big lunch and dinner clientele. It is the spot to spend Christmas Eve to a whole group of New Yorkers and their families, so popular that you have to make your reservation months in advance.

It was first opened at 21 West 52nd Street 76 years ago this year as a speak easy called Jack and Charlie’s. The Kriendler and Berns boys. The subterranean caves where they hid the booze from the cops is now a wine cellar private dining room for patrons entertaining 20 or 30. In those early days every doorway on the block was a speakeasy – literally. 52nd Street was “jazz” street, where the partiers went to party, and where many of the greats of the 20th century popular music also plied their trade. Just down the end of the block on Fifth, the Vanderbilt mansions were also still occupied and fully staffed. That was New York.

But that’s so far gone, it’s not even a memory anymore. After Prohibition, “21” transformed into the smart club and restaurant that it remains today. Outlasting all of its original neighbors, it is now surrounded by a block of retail and commercial business space, museums, banks, hotels, etc. The Kriendlers and the Bernses are gone now too, but their tradition and style remains quite intact.

Tradition. In all those years right up to today, it has been the watering hole and restaurant of choice of Hollywood stars, tycoons and captains of industry, Social Registerites and sports figures. Peter Rogers likes to tell the story of the night he went there to dinner with Joan Crawford who told him she was going to show him how she could make an entrance into such hallowed halls of capitalism: removing her mink, she took it by the collar and dragged it behind her as she entered.

There are grandfathers now who first went to “21” with their grandfathers, and except for the faces, and the expected changes in the menu, and all cases the prices, the place is the same. You get it as soon as you enter the restaurant where you are formally greeted by one or more of the restaurant’s management.

I got there before my guests. New York was still holiday-quiet but “21” was buzzing as soon as you walked into the club room with its curving bar that runs along the south wall and its ceiling covered with patron’s corporate and athletic replicas and symbols suspended from the ceiling.

New Line Cinema co-founder Michael Lynne and his wife Ninah, along with Ninah’s mother (who I learned reads NYSD) were on one side of our table, and on the other side was Liza Minnelli with a man and a woman I didn’t recognize.

I brought my digital along, as it my wont these days which was good because I had the opportunity to meet the chef John Greeley and to photograph him in his kitchen. I very discreetly took a couple of shots of the ceiling which brings out the kid in you.

By the time everyone was assembled at our table, the conversation was deep “21” reverie as none of us had been there in some time and everyone was excited to be there.

The menu still has some of the famous dishes that were popular a half century ago like the Senegalese soup, and the “21” Burger (which for years was a then-considered pricey $21; not anymore -- $30.) and the chicken hash. My eyes were drawn to the “Tasting of American Caviar” so I ordered that for the table. Three types and all delicious as we attacked the serving as if we hadn’t eaten in days, washed down with a glass of champagne for some, vodka for others.

For starters we ordered the red and white endive salad, the oysters, and for the main course two of us had the Dover Sole sautéed (served with asparagus and potato), one chose the steak tartar and one of us chose the squab. It must have been the heapings of caviar because I was beginning to feel like I had too much to eat. Although I agreed to sharing the Profiteroles with everyone else (and ate more than anyone else).

Dinner was at eight. It was a combination of the atmosphere, the service, the menu, and the company, but our animated non-stop conversation ran until after eleven.

No coffee. Time to take a nice long walk (or a nice short walk), which I did, thinking I was walking off some of the calories. A quintessential New York evening.

And while on the subject of restaurant traditions, New York lost one of its legendary restaurateurs last week when Vincent Sardi Jr. passed away at age 91. In his day, and before that, in his father’s day, Sardi’s restaurant on West 44th Street between Broadway and Eighth was the culinary social mecca for the giants of the American theatre – producers, directors, chorographers, composers, lyricists, playwrights, actors, actresses, stars – all went to Sardi’s. To see, to be seen, to make their way, to make their day.  It was a theatre restaurant with its lunch and dinner hours arranged tightly around the theatre’s schedules.

In the mid-1960s I was living in New York, pursuing a career as an actor (not very prosperously, to be sure). Looking for some part time work and a friend of mine Peter Gina, (pronounced Gin-ay) who was the nephew of Vincent Sardi, recommended me to his uncle to work as an assistant to the maitre d’ at the dinner hour and the Wednesday and Saturday matinee lunch hours.

I reported for work at 5 and it was over at 8 when the restaurant would virtually empty out with everyone going to the theatre. I was given Ruritanian officer’s red and gold jacket for the occasion. The maitre d’ was Jimmy Molinski, known by all the rich and famous and regulars as Jimmy, who had started as a busboy at Sardis when he was a kid. By the time I met him he was a very polished complement to his boss, Vincent (“Mr. Sardi”) who was also his contemporary.

My job was to stand at the door as the customers entered and if I didn’t recognize them (stars, VIPs, etc.), I was to ask them if they had a reservation. If they did, I directed them to Jimmy. If they didn’t: upstairs (unless there were open tables downstairs).

The little square entrance area where I stood was the hub of the restaurant. It was where the hatcheck was, where the entrance to the bar was, the staircase and the maitre d’s desk which opened to the main dining room.

Soon I got used to the cast of characters who frequented almost daily: agents, press agents, producers (David Merrick would walk in and out a couple of times, often followed by his two deputies, Jack Schlissel and Allen Delyn. A ruddy faced blond man named Lawrence Shubert Lawrence came and went with his two lieutenants, Bernie Jacobs and Gerry Schoenfeld. There were people in the casts of the local shows who came in for early dinner so as to be in their dressing rooms by 7. And many of the staff of the New York Times which used Sardi’s as its local tavern. This included everyone from the Sulzbergers right down to the boys in the newsroom.

Then there were the theatre legends. Jack Kirkland, who had one hit, but a bonanza in “Tobacco Road.” By the time I got to Sardi’s Mr. Kirkland was a lonely but loved figure at the bar. Dorothy Fields the lyricist (“I Won’t Dance,” “I Can’t Give You Anything But Love…”) came every Saturday and was the only person, man or woman who ever gave me a tip. A buck, passed discreetly to me as she exited. Often lunching with Mrs. Martin Beck. Two older ladies (to these eyes) in their minks, with their drinks, their cigarettes, then some cannelloni. Hal Prince, sunny and prolific at all times, arriving in his grey chauffeur-driven Jaguar. Also the white-on-white and all pailletted Miss Hope Hampton (of yesteryear even then) arriving for the after theatre opening I her black Rolls, ready for her closeup.

Everyone came through the doors in those days (late 1960s). “Hello Dolly” was down the street. “Cabaret” was across the way and “Fiddler On the Roof” a few doors down. Richard Burton was appearing in “Hamlet.” The night he came in with Elizabeth Taylor after the show, the cops had to close off the entire block because of the thousands of people wanting to get a glimpse of the stars. Mrs. Onassis came; the Ford Sisters, Anne and Charlotte, with their mother, the three of them all aglitter and 60s haute, setting off the front room center like Diamonds as Big As the Ritz. Movie stars, new stars, old stars; June Allyson looking like she’d just walked out of a movie I’d seen when I was six.

One night right after the diningroom had emptied, Warren Beatty came through the door looking for Barbara Harris. (His girlfriend at the time.) A funny question because she was appearing in “The Apple Tree” across the street at that very moment. He turned around and left. Unbeknownst to me only minutes before, the middle of the first act, as she was about to perform a musical number, Miss Harris said to the audience, “I can’t do this,” and walked off the stage, out of the theatre, down 44th Street to Times Square and got on a bus going downtown. (She later resumed her role in the show).

And in the middle of all this was Vincent Sardi always moving around the room and amidst the crowds gathering at the entrance doors, greeting, hallo-ing, clasping a hand, patting a shoulder, sharing a quick joke, opening up his hearth and home to YOU.

He was not a tall man, maybe 5’10” if that. Bald with a good Roman head; turned out usually in a grey bespoke suit (to his maitre d’s dark suit); that fit him impeccably. He was solidly built, broad shouldered, thick arms and neck looking like you’d think an ex-Marine officer (he was) might look. With this came a world class personality, an ambassador’s finesse with a royal flourish yet warm and effusive. He had a very audible almost booming yet soft voice with a bit of a rasp to it. It’s a vocal quality that always appeals. He lowered it as he leaned in and spoke to his guests, almost deferential, but not, as if with a slight bow, and when he moved away there might be a burst of laughter between everyone. And on to the next….

I’d stand by the door and watch him with his clientele. They were always glad to see him, always charmed. His attention was light and brief, but intensely focused, as if to leave its mark. While talking to them, even if for twenty seconds, he was with them. Then might come the laugh, and then he turned away and moved on to the next hello-hello. Again the same intense focus, brief convivial, in that voice. It was a marvel to behold. There was a precse technique, and conscious of it or not, he knew what he was doing; this was his stage, and all the stars came to it.

Everyone, everything came and went but Vincent Sardi remained. And when he sat down to dine, which was rare, the conversation would often slowly raise in decibels to accommodate his convivial charm. He was a pleasure to be around, and he extended that charm to everyone who came into his realm.

As a manager, the owner, he was decisive and definitely the boss. But he had an executive in charge just as he had Jimmy (and Mr. Valentine at supper) at the door. They were the team and he was the leader, the king. He socialized with his clientele, went to their parties, skied and summered among them. The theatre in his lifetime was a powerful social institution even within the confines of Manhattan society. It was very much part of the elite, and Vincent Sardi was as much a part of it as he wished to be.

As it is in his business, marriages can be difficult. Vincent had three, and four children with his second wife Adele.

I worked there for a little more than a year and decided to leave when Vincent asked me if I’d be interested in going into the restaurant business. I could see its allure but I could also see how it owns you; it is your wife, your partner.

The business changed as the theatre changed. The 70s and early 80s saw a big drop-off in the Broadway theater-going. Changing tastes and economics. Vincent sold Sardi’s in 1985 to a group of investors to who lost it back to him several years later.

By the 1990s, the theatre had come back to prosperity but the audience had changed. An obvious measure of that is the average theater-goer’s mode of dress. When Vincent Sardi started out in business working for his father, men wore top hats to opening night. When I was working the door with Jimmy in the late 1960s, all opening night after parties were held at Sardi’s, and men wore black tie. Today they wear anything but. The fashion is whatever you want and nothing much matters. So by the time that he had abdicated his role as the ambassador of Broadway, Broadway had changed too. Vincent Sardi’s passing marks the closure.