Browsing the merch at the Lucky/Cargo Club at the Ritz-Carlton.
It occurred to me that a conflict of interest might prevent me from doing a fair job of reporting on the Lucky/Cargo Club held at the Ritz-Carlton during television Upfront Week last week. Held in the hotel’s basement—oops, they call it a mezzanine—this style suite aimed to capitalize on the television celebrities in town to greet network affiliate types and advertisers (and their spouses, who are sometimes interested in having their pictures taken with celebrities).
I used to produce suites like this for the Oscars, the Golden Globes, the Emmys, and Fashion Week, and Lucky’s phenomenally successful publisher, Alexandra Golinkin, is a friend of mine. (I’m sure it seems like I’m always writing about my friends, by the way, but some of them do such interesting things.) But these aren’t the conflicts I’m worried about.
Instead it’s my own tangled memories of Upfront Week that I’m afraid might cloud my objectivity. I attended this annual event many moons ago (1980 or so) as the guest of my Uncle Barry, who owned an ABC affiliate in Illinois. The highlight of this trip was a backstage peek at The John Davidson Show, the taping of which we did not even stay for, because my Aunt Joan was not one of those affiliate wives who seemed interested in showbiz or celebrities. Instead we went to a restaurant.
Frustrated, apparently, by my meager exposure to the world of TV, I volunteered to be an intern at Uncle Barry’s station. One of my important duties was to turn off the tape recorder at the control board after the network satellite-beamed us the next day’s programming. Since my uncle owned the station and therefore everyone assumed I was a complete idiot, I didn’t have much to do, so I got in the habit of watching the next day’s shows with earphones on.
One day, we were taking John Davidson’s show off the bird, as they called it. (Apparently, despite our disinterest, the show had been picked up. It’s okay if you don’t remember John Davidson—it’s not crucial to the story—but he also played the straight guy to Sally Field in The Girl With Something Extra, where she had ESP, which was big back then). As I was enjoying musical guest KC and the Sunshine Band, I noticed lots of scurrying and worried looks. Reluctantly removing my headset, I gathered that someone had activated the tornado warning system. The miniature graphic of a tornado on the screen didn’t seem a big deal to me, but let me tell you, they take their tornado warnings real serious in Decatur, Illinois. The switch was found, the tornado canceled, and the scuttlebutt was that the dumb nephew was responsible, which I was not. But the suspicion stung, the memory lingers, and now I have been upfront about my upfront backstory. This should explain why the upfronts make me think bad thoughts about cheesy television celebrities and the dangers of getting involved with them.
How else to explain my lack of enthusiasm over what was obviously a roiling success? When I arrived at the Ritz-Carlton, velvet ropes kept a dozen or so fans at bay and admitted me credential-free to the hotel. I felt guilty, and wondered if I should go back to the fans and say, “Stop waving your arms, and just walk into the hotel like you belong there. Inside, buy a Coke at the bar or a newspaper at the gift shop, and linger around all you like—I treat all hotel living rooms as my own, and you could, too.”
But as much as I disdain celebrities, I disdain fans even more, so I kept moving and went to meet Lucky/Cargo publicity director Mistrella Murphy, whose interesting first name came to her father in a dream.
This “getaway” (quotations theirs) is intended as a place for “talent to indulge in complimentary shopping, lunch, and cocktails.” I have now quoted about half the text on the event’s press release, which then listed 15 or so vendors and a zillion “confirmed” celebrities.
The 1,100-square-foot conference room was buzzing with activity. Lindsay Lohan was there!!
Mistrella began my tour at the Bose station, where I tried to chat up the attendant by asking why none of their cool speakers were on display. She explained that they were too expensive to give away (which embarrassed me—had she thought I was asking for a pair?). I tried to chat her up about the company’s nifty speakers (I own a nongifted set, and I thought I could tell her about my headphone story above), but the Bose lady seemed completely disinterested, immediately sizing me up as press, not celeb, and went back to awaiting a real celeb, in front of a few cardboard boxes with brochures I thought needed tidying up.
Somewhat taken aback, I retreated to the lounge area, where snacks and water were prettily displayed, but Grey Goose vodka looked like a real afterthought. In my days, when Grey Goose was an exhibitor in one of my suites, they sent (and demanded use of) bottle “glorifiers.” They were just little black plastic bases with a light, but the name horrified me until I turned one on and decided they were nifty. Mistrella told me only a handful of Bloody Marys had been poured that day, but I resisted observing, “That’s because you don’t have the glorifiers!”
The lounge is where the other nonceleb press were hanging out. There was a young lady from The New York Times’ Boldface Names column, who looked horrified, and whose next-day column confirmed she had been thinking of jumping out a window (thank God for the basement—oops, mezzanine). Designed by Mark Musters, whose styling work I usually enjoy, the lounge was tricked out in vivid, inexpensively dyed blue pillows and a step-and-repeat wall hanging that made no effort to match the boardroom decor of the hotel suite.
Mistrella explained that last year’s event had been a huge success, serving 250 celebrities, and had garnered over 30 million press impressions. This was an “editorial” event, meaning that the exhibitors had been selected by the editors, not been given spots as advertising merchandising, which is how I used to do it with Vanity Fair. But then she acknowledged there were some advertisers mixed in, but these were not distinguished. I also got the sense that some exhibitors paid more than others, but Mistrella was too clever to go down that path. She handed me some nifty Lucky mints, instead. (Is it just me, or do other people wonder why there are always so many ingenious new ways to package mints? Is it an especially clever industry? Could they lend some of their packaging people to the CD/DVD people, who desperately need new ideas?)
Lindsay (whose near-platinum hair did not fully succeed in hiding the clips from her hair extensions) and her entourage had shifted, so it was time to get moving again. I chatted up Fiona from Ted Baker, a British men’s line, which was also showing a new women’s line. Fiona explained that Kelsey Grammer had ordered a jacket that day. Apparently, a number of sample items had been tried on, found wanting, and dropped onto what was becoming a large pile on the floor. I offered to help fold. “Oh, I know,” she said. “I’ve been meaning to get to that.”
On to the Mario Badescu skin care station, where I was immediately handed a gift bag of shaving products that I would not use, while the representative explained, “We custom-make each gift bag depending on what the celebrities want.” There were no custom orders for press, evidently—not even an explanation about the products I got.
But as I made way for the blonde lady from The Apprentice, who was escorted by last season’s winner (so that’s what they do!), I realized I was the fish out of water.
I was expecting the treatment you get at Bergdorf Goodman, where the guy talks for half an hour about where angora comes from, but this was Lucky/Cargo. Here, it’s all about the stuff—and celebrities.
Posted 05.25.05
Columnist Ted Kruckel is an experienced and opinionated former event and PR pro who ran events for 20 years for high-profile clients like Vanity Fair, Elle Decor, Christian Dior and Carolina Herrera. He shuttered his firm, Ted Inc., in 2003. You can email him at [email protected].
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I used to produce suites like this for the Oscars, the Golden Globes, the Emmys, and Fashion Week, and Lucky’s phenomenally successful publisher, Alexandra Golinkin, is a friend of mine. (I’m sure it seems like I’m always writing about my friends, by the way, but some of them do such interesting things.) But these aren’t the conflicts I’m worried about.
Instead it’s my own tangled memories of Upfront Week that I’m afraid might cloud my objectivity. I attended this annual event many moons ago (1980 or so) as the guest of my Uncle Barry, who owned an ABC affiliate in Illinois. The highlight of this trip was a backstage peek at The John Davidson Show, the taping of which we did not even stay for, because my Aunt Joan was not one of those affiliate wives who seemed interested in showbiz or celebrities. Instead we went to a restaurant.
Frustrated, apparently, by my meager exposure to the world of TV, I volunteered to be an intern at Uncle Barry’s station. One of my important duties was to turn off the tape recorder at the control board after the network satellite-beamed us the next day’s programming. Since my uncle owned the station and therefore everyone assumed I was a complete idiot, I didn’t have much to do, so I got in the habit of watching the next day’s shows with earphones on.
One day, we were taking John Davidson’s show off the bird, as they called it. (Apparently, despite our disinterest, the show had been picked up. It’s okay if you don’t remember John Davidson—it’s not crucial to the story—but he also played the straight guy to Sally Field in The Girl With Something Extra, where she had ESP, which was big back then). As I was enjoying musical guest KC and the Sunshine Band, I noticed lots of scurrying and worried looks. Reluctantly removing my headset, I gathered that someone had activated the tornado warning system. The miniature graphic of a tornado on the screen didn’t seem a big deal to me, but let me tell you, they take their tornado warnings real serious in Decatur, Illinois. The switch was found, the tornado canceled, and the scuttlebutt was that the dumb nephew was responsible, which I was not. But the suspicion stung, the memory lingers, and now I have been upfront about my upfront backstory. This should explain why the upfronts make me think bad thoughts about cheesy television celebrities and the dangers of getting involved with them.
How else to explain my lack of enthusiasm over what was obviously a roiling success? When I arrived at the Ritz-Carlton, velvet ropes kept a dozen or so fans at bay and admitted me credential-free to the hotel. I felt guilty, and wondered if I should go back to the fans and say, “Stop waving your arms, and just walk into the hotel like you belong there. Inside, buy a Coke at the bar or a newspaper at the gift shop, and linger around all you like—I treat all hotel living rooms as my own, and you could, too.”
But as much as I disdain celebrities, I disdain fans even more, so I kept moving and went to meet Lucky/Cargo publicity director Mistrella Murphy, whose interesting first name came to her father in a dream.
This “getaway” (quotations theirs) is intended as a place for “talent to indulge in complimentary shopping, lunch, and cocktails.” I have now quoted about half the text on the event’s press release, which then listed 15 or so vendors and a zillion “confirmed” celebrities.
The 1,100-square-foot conference room was buzzing with activity. Lindsay Lohan was there!!
Mistrella began my tour at the Bose station, where I tried to chat up the attendant by asking why none of their cool speakers were on display. She explained that they were too expensive to give away (which embarrassed me—had she thought I was asking for a pair?). I tried to chat her up about the company’s nifty speakers (I own a nongifted set, and I thought I could tell her about my headphone story above), but the Bose lady seemed completely disinterested, immediately sizing me up as press, not celeb, and went back to awaiting a real celeb, in front of a few cardboard boxes with brochures I thought needed tidying up.
Somewhat taken aback, I retreated to the lounge area, where snacks and water were prettily displayed, but Grey Goose vodka looked like a real afterthought. In my days, when Grey Goose was an exhibitor in one of my suites, they sent (and demanded use of) bottle “glorifiers.” They were just little black plastic bases with a light, but the name horrified me until I turned one on and decided they were nifty. Mistrella told me only a handful of Bloody Marys had been poured that day, but I resisted observing, “That’s because you don’t have the glorifiers!”
The lounge is where the other nonceleb press were hanging out. There was a young lady from The New York Times’ Boldface Names column, who looked horrified, and whose next-day column confirmed she had been thinking of jumping out a window (thank God for the basement—oops, mezzanine). Designed by Mark Musters, whose styling work I usually enjoy, the lounge was tricked out in vivid, inexpensively dyed blue pillows and a step-and-repeat wall hanging that made no effort to match the boardroom decor of the hotel suite.
Mistrella explained that last year’s event had been a huge success, serving 250 celebrities, and had garnered over 30 million press impressions. This was an “editorial” event, meaning that the exhibitors had been selected by the editors, not been given spots as advertising merchandising, which is how I used to do it with Vanity Fair. But then she acknowledged there were some advertisers mixed in, but these were not distinguished. I also got the sense that some exhibitors paid more than others, but Mistrella was too clever to go down that path. She handed me some nifty Lucky mints, instead. (Is it just me, or do other people wonder why there are always so many ingenious new ways to package mints? Is it an especially clever industry? Could they lend some of their packaging people to the CD/DVD people, who desperately need new ideas?)
Lindsay (whose near-platinum hair did not fully succeed in hiding the clips from her hair extensions) and her entourage had shifted, so it was time to get moving again. I chatted up Fiona from Ted Baker, a British men’s line, which was also showing a new women’s line. Fiona explained that Kelsey Grammer had ordered a jacket that day. Apparently, a number of sample items had been tried on, found wanting, and dropped onto what was becoming a large pile on the floor. I offered to help fold. “Oh, I know,” she said. “I’ve been meaning to get to that.”
On to the Mario Badescu skin care station, where I was immediately handed a gift bag of shaving products that I would not use, while the representative explained, “We custom-make each gift bag depending on what the celebrities want.” There were no custom orders for press, evidently—not even an explanation about the products I got.
But as I made way for the blonde lady from The Apprentice, who was escorted by last season’s winner (so that’s what they do!), I realized I was the fish out of water.
I was expecting the treatment you get at Bergdorf Goodman, where the guy talks for half an hour about where angora comes from, but this was Lucky/Cargo. Here, it’s all about the stuff—and celebrities.
Posted 05.25.05
Columnist Ted Kruckel is an experienced and opinionated former event and PR pro who ran events for 20 years for high-profile clients like Vanity Fair, Elle Decor, Christian Dior and Carolina Herrera. He shuttered his firm, Ted Inc., in 2003. You can email him at [email protected].
Related Stories
ABC's Star-Studded Upfront Sales Pitch
Fashion Week Lounges: You Sit, They Sell
Mag Launch Has Cargo-Load of Guests
Domino Launches With Bright Branding Ideas
![For the after-party, Event Eleven built three 30-foot pagodas and hung 300 lanterns from the ceiling. They also brought in a 20-foot-tall bonsai tree and a variety of 30-foot red maples, along with other greenery and foliage. '[It all] helped create the organic atmosphere and helped transport guests into a gardenlike room,' said Schubert.](https://img.bizbash.com/files/base/bizbash/bzb/image/2024/02/Shogun.41_f.65dba8f23433b.png?auto=format%2Ccompress&dpr=2&fit=crop&h=167&q=70&w=250)
