Last night I was fortunate enough to attend D'Artagan's (the meat purveyor) anniversary party.The food was mostly excellent and decadent, and you could see many culinary celebs shuffling around chowing down on duck legs including Drew Nieporent and the great Anthony Bourdain...
When -- lo and behold! -- I saw Tom Colicchio!
My colleague (who had invited me) had little interest in approaching him (she's apparently not a fan) but I saw nothing wrong with it. When Colicchio was standing quietly by himself for a minute, I tapped him on the shoulder, introduced myself and mentioned a friend we had in commmon.
Tom: "Oh, yeah."
He murmured a word or two about our mutual friend, and he didn't say anything else.
There was an uncomfortable silence in the air for a moment before I said, "Well, anyway, I just wanted to tell you I'm a big fan of your restaurants and a big fan of Top Chef."
He nodded -- clearly uninterested.
I suppose I can't blame him. I can't imagine what a pain-in-the-ass it must be to be famous. To have all sorts of idiots approaching and wanting to be friends. Not that I expected anything approaching friendship. (Just politeness.) And not that it takes away his greatness in the kitchen and his greatness on TV. (Well, maybe a little.) But I was slightly surprised.
I suppose Tommy falls into the Bob Dylan category of celebrity, "Just because you like my stuff doesn't mean I owe you anything."
BTW: Tom is way shorter in person than he looks on TV.
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Update: Apparently I left just before it got good, because Tommy took the stage with Drew and rocked out!
Here's the footage:
