The 21 Club, a well-known New York City restaurant, is closing, the New York Post reported, citing a spokesman.
The restaurant was a location for the literary James Bond. In the novel Diamonds Are Forever, James Bond and Tiffany Case dine there after Bond has smuggled diamonds into the U.S. They meet “one of the famous Kriendler brothers, who have owned ’21’ ever since it was the best speak-easy in New York.”
The Kriendler and Berns families owned 21 from 1922 to 1985, according to the restaurant’s entry in Wikipedia.
The 21 Club also is referenced, but not shown, in the film Live And Let Die. Bond (Roger Moore) and Felix Leiter (David Hedison) are to meet there for dinner, the audience is told as Bond and Solitaire (Jane Seymour) get ready to board a train to travel to New York.
The restaurant is known for his exterior (statues of jockeys) and its clientele (the likes of Frank Sinatra and Ernest Hemingway) over the decades.
The restaurant has been hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic. New York state has banned indoor dining for a second time to slow the spread of the virus. 21 has been shut since March of this year. According to the Post, 21’s employees have been told they’ll lose their jobs by March 2021.
The Post said 21’s owners are exploring options for the restaurant to reopen in some form in the future.
Filed under: James Bond Books, James Bond Films | Tagged: 21 Club, Diamonds Are Forever, Live and Let Die |
The Spy Command 
That’s a tragedy! I once met a James Bond icon at the 21 Club! 🙂
F*** You, Andrew Cuomo.
Another tradition gone.
The only thing NY is stopping is the livelihood of desperate business owners and workers. If the State had really wanted to take charge in the beginning, they would’ve “banned” mass transit (for one thing). And safeguarded the elderly and their casual day-care workers. Thank heavens I don’t live there, but our State was the first indication of the “hand-writing” on the wall. And every State needed to be taking lessons from the collective.
@Pacificsun
Banning mass transit would have been a terrible idea. That would have mean depriving millions of people of a livelihood.
So people with a livelihood (particularly asymptomatic) unknowingly infecting people in close quarters on public transportation worked out better?
In order to ultimately avoid the closure of entertainment venues (also a source of livelihood) like (theaters) pertinent to the discussion of postponing the release of Bond 25, perhaps some thought should’ve been given to testing people who needed to use public transportation. With priority given to the most essential of workers. Because there were an awful lot of people mandated to working from home. And avoiding service industries (like restaurants, etc.).
How well did that work out, in terms of saving service workers and business owners from losing their jobs and livelihood anyway.
Who dictates what an essential worker is ? The state ? The hell with everybody else who is an essential worker is and if you loose your job when mass transit was shut down, sucks to be you I guess. Secondly, back in March, over 95 who died of the virus in NYC had underlying health conditions. Third, did you know that deaths counted include those who never died of virus ? There are people who contracted the virus and committed suicide who are considered victims of Covid19. There have been a lot of mendacities spread about this virus .
Such things as the impact on restricted entertainment outlets, (deferred premiers like Bond 25) are perhaps (?) a seemingly small concession to make in the interest of public welfare, but are symptomatic of a larger defect in our ideas about commerce and dominating attention. The entertainment business sector seems such an easy example of “simple” sacrifices the population is expected to make in the name of general “welfare.” In our State, who’s industry is 1/3 based on entertainment, it’s also private businesses where the State controls liquor and operating licenses and so can dictate restrictions. And yet they do not enforce consequences upon national corporate wide chain stores.
For this reply, I don’t want to focus on Cuomo’s rulebook of excuses (manipulation of numbers to alarm the public into submission) of which I’m well aware. But (supposedly) essential workers were those unable to work from home because of delivering field services provided for the safety of the population. Not just first responders, health care professionals, but sanitation, utility workers, social services (and on down the line). Seems like a frivolous question, but then should anybody’s job, seemingly as frivolous as selling popcorn inside a theater (premiering Bond 25) be less consequential than the next person’s? Who gives permission to judge the financial solvency of average Americans in the absence of (or rather the excuse for) not prepared in the first place. Or after 8 months for that matter!
Staying at home was never a solution. A distraction, yes. While creating time needed to establish an emergency response to an overwhelming bioterrorism attack (without ever using the words because they were politically charged!). Also in the absence of the State’s preparedness for an attack (or in response to) a situation that had been predicted for decades. Meaning to be prepared for anything that would handicap the population on a mass casual basis! Had the affront been a coordinated effort to attack the nationwide electrical grids, how different the emotional response would’ve been! It would’ve become a voluntary nationalized coordinated effort to make solutions. And fast. Stripped of politics, biased media reporting and ulterior motives, it would’ve been seen as warfare and therefore a threat to national security that we (ironically) suffered anyway.
Instead we have experienced daily bundled “numbers” dominating the headlines! Those that repeatedly emphasize the level of everyone’s individualized peril, well beyond any Flu contagion of any decade! [ Simply for the lack of a hands-on vaccine ]. Yes, proactive health screenings, mental health have been discarded in the process, leading to their own level of fatalities. However during Flu epidemics were people ever compensated to stay out of the workplace? Were they required to wear masks? Did anyone care about diagnosis in order to control the spread? Were people denied a final goodbye with their loved ones? Hell no! Because a vaccine (of questionable effectiveness and acceptance) muddled people’s instinctive fear! It made them willing to risk (potentially) fatal complications. Again, complications existing among the infirmed, elderly, compromised, infants, etc.. Because “most” “average” people believed they could (would) survive. All because Flu deaths were NOT a data point! Much less being reported daily! Health care workers, assisted living facilitators, school systems (and down the line) “could be” required to be vaccinated in the interest of the population’s safety. The difference being Covid has the potential for long term effects. Yet those statistics (studies ?)are hard to come by. Delving into details, “can” invoke privacy issues whenever the self-serving manipulation of reality is required. Meaning the use of another alarming headline is much more useful!
Instead of reporting Covid in blanket numbers, why not by sectors, explanations, breakdowns, ratios and rationale? Contact tracing soon became useless because the result of it, didn’t match true mitigation processes. The reason every Covid illness is/was captured in every way possible (even if dying from cancer) is that the medical organizations collected money for every data point reported! Pharmaceutical Investors & Distributors (incl. Patent owners) knew they were going to make a financial killing! So the absolute distraction spiraled into “let’s scare the population to death. We can not only control them. Through desperate dependence on entitlements. And a medical breakthrough. But they will (ultimately) pay for all solutions applied anyway!” Which they will through taxation. Do you also think people should’ve been paid more NOT to go to work, as did our State?
The mismanagement of the NYC transportation model (during a contagion) has been the least of peoples’ disadvantages. Wait for the coming recession (which nobody has the guts to name as a depression). I don’t mean for Billionaire & Millionaire classes. Even those living a comfortable life, necessarily. But for those formerly known as middle class workers, who will not only lose jobs because of outsourcing, but the manufacturing that will be deferred overseas, as the Global Economy takes precedence over national self-sufficiency and profitability that provided our international security and independence! Once becoming dependent on foreign Oil again, the game is over. Meaning this should never have become a protest about a “personality” but the process of educating people on the reality of a balanced reciprocal and sound business model, accomplished for the right intentions. Where capitalism seeks it’s own level of success, as people learn to operate using sound initiatives and sensible judgement! [ If you’re Covid-sick, stay home stupid, it’s that simple. And get tested!] But make doing POSSIBLE through rapid and responsive testing turnarounds ]. Ask yourself why these brain-children STILL can’t manage that!!! Yet they’re still planning on a trip to Mars! So somebody’s got the money!! Ask yourself, what are THEIR priorities!
Great memories of the Licence to Kill premiere party there. A very “old New York” magical place. Damn. Hope they reopen.
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