Thursday, April 24th

‘Tis the season for soothingone’s hangover face-down in the park while important people primp and pimp for gala previews! “Once Upon a Time” (O.K., we’re all adults here, can we please stop with the fairy-tale names?) is the Gala Preview of the Spring International Art & Antiques Show to benefit Lenox Hill Neighborhood House. Expect Real Housewives of NYC star Jill Zarin—who is either a real socialite or plays one on TV, does it even matter these days?—elegant Bergdorf’s fashion director Linda Fargo, interior designer Bunny Williams (hop, hop, hop!), designer Oscar de la Renta and prominent socialite and Republican Audrey Gruss. And in news of the roaring left, former John Edwards campaign blogger Amanda Marcotte reads at Bluestockings on the Lower East Side from her book, It’s a Jungle Out There: The Feminist Survival Guide to Politically Inhospitable Environments, which, she told us, “acknowledges the fact that being a feminist is also about living in the world, and the world is still very sexist, and there are eight million teeth-grinding events that can happen to a feminist in a day.” We totally know! We were a feminist in college and it was sooo frustrating! Ms. Marcotte explained that these teeth-grinding experiences can include anything from “guys who try to pick you up by condescending to you, to how to handle all the sexist traditions at weddings, to dealing with the right-wingers in your family who think its funny to tease you, to dealing with anti-choicers and other sorts of sexist …” She trailed off. (You would not believe the right-wingers in our family, but they still pay our cell-phone bill, so …). We asked Ms. Marcotte if anyone really had the energy to be a feminist anymore. “I hear all the time that it’s not a popular thing to call yourself, but I see no evidence that the percentage of women who self-identify as feminists is going down,” she said. “There’s a lot of negative stereotypes. The No. 1 being that feminists are humorless. If we’re humorless, we can’t write humor books!” Oh, snap! And back at the Tribeca Film Festival: John Landis, director of Thriller—and, more importantly, Animal House—screens his classic Michael Jackson video in honor of its 25th anniversary. (The event also features a downright scary-sounding “Michael Jackson look-alike contest.”) We reached Mr. Landis in his car in L.A., where he was just leaving the cutting room. “I just came out and got in the car and it’s like 93 degrees,” he said. “I grew up in L.A., and it ruins you, it really does, because I’ve now made films all over the world—New York, Chicago, London, Paris, Norway, Rome. And when I encounter snow and freezing weather, I think ‘These people are crazy!’ I grew up thinking of snow as a luxury. Like, you ski, you sled, and then you go home, where it’s nice! My son goes to University of Miami, it’s like a swamp! I go there and it’s like, ‘Holy shit, we’re in the Congo!’” Mmmkay. But back to Thriller: “When Michael came to me, it was only because he saw American Werewolf and loved it. He wanted to turn into a monster. It was a ridiculous sensation. No one was prepared. And it was on TV every 3 minutes.” Also: “Up until Tim Burton’s Planet of the Apes, it was the largest makeup call in history, in terms of how many makeup artists worked on it.” And! “There have actually been courses in the Harvard Business School taught about Thriller,” which inadvertently “created the home video business. It changed everything. Although with technology it’s changing again.” (Umm, we kind of zone out when discussing life before Netflix, sir.)

[“Once Upon a Time,” Park Avenue Armory, Park Avenue at 67th Street, 6:30 p.m., 212-744-5022, ext. 1355; Amanda Marcotte at Bluestockings, 172 Allen Street, 7 p.m.; Thriller screening, Tribeca Drive-in, 200 Vesey Street, 7:30 p.m., www.tribecafilmfestival.org]