It’s here, in the movie, that Gordon Gekko schools Bud Fox: “Buy a decent suit. You can’t come in here looking like this.”
And here, in real life, that presidents, socialites, stars and deal-makers have been rubbing elbows for nearly a century.
The place is the “21” Club, New York’s iconic power restaurant and former speakeasy -- and soon, perhaps, a trophy for some 0.01 percenter.
Belmond Ltd., which owns “21,” as well as the Hotel Cipriani in Venice and the Grand Hotel Europe in St. Petersburg, Russia, among other high-end hospitality properties, is reviewing its strategic options, its chairman said Thursday. Nothing is off the white-linen-topped table, including the piecemeal sale of prized assets.
Gekko and Bud, of “Wall Street” fame, would be thrilled: Belmond’s stock promptly soared 35 percent on the news.
At “21,” the thought had yet to pierce the music of evening cocktails. By 6 o’clock Thursday, every seat in the front room was taken. Martini glasses chilled behind the bar, to the strains of a “mostly Sinatra” soundtrack.
In the dining room, where Bogart squired Bacall, patrons studied menus under a ceiling hung with toys and memorabilia. The model PT-109 torpedo boat, a gift from John F. Kennedy, was still there. Ditto the pool cue from Jackie Gleason.
‘Last of Its Kind’
Back at the bar, a regular named Jerry Leventhal looked as though he’d had the wind knocked out of him by the suggestion that “21” might change hands. “If for any reason this place would close,” he said, cutting off mid-sentence. “It’s the last of its kind.”
Leventhal first visited the restaurant in 1960, when, as an aspiring actor, he’d managed to scrounge up $12 for lunch. He donned his best clothes but it didn’t matter. He was turned away. “That was the last of an era, when you had to be known,” he recalled.
These days, anyone can step past the ornate iron gates and corps of colorful iron jockeys and pull up a seat at the bar, even a reporter wearing a one-size-too-small jacket borrowed at the last minute to meet the dining-room dress code.