Tavern on the Green’s Halloween Nightmare + James Gandolfini Gets Slappy

I may be a day late on this story, but at least I'm not $60 short. It’s the Halloween that will never end. It lingers in the mysteriously disappearing stale candy in the mushy pumpkin by the door and a few sprinkles of glitter on my cluttered desk. It screams at me on Facebook as 1,733 (as of this morning) unhappy Facebook folk have organized a “We got scammed by Tavern on the Green 2009 Halloween!” group. Thousands of comments recall the true Halloween nightmare these people and many others endured. Many have asked me to weigh in on this, including my editor, so I made some calls.

First off I have known Alex and Leo Baskin for over 10 years; I can’t say we are friends, we have always enjoyed a friendly relationship. That is because I have never known them to be anything less than honest brokers. I rarely hang out with lowlifes unless I can tax them a lot of loot. I enjoy a very friendly relationship with Tavern operator Jenny Oz Leroy, and although we have never done business together, I do hope to work with her at one point. In the 10 years I have known her, I have found her to be the stuff that dreams are made of. Her honesty and desire to always do the right thing have endeared her to me. I make these statements because some of you out there insist that I disclose my relationships with the people I write about. I think that is fair. With that in mind the 1,734 (I just rechecked) angry Facebook friends can’t all be wrong, and many of them have asked me to address their grievances.

Tavern on the Green is as used to big events as a venue can be; for example, they hosted a monster event for the New York City Marathon just hours before the Halloween bash got underway. It seems inconceivable to me that they were not prepared to properly host 2,350 patrons at this sold-out gala. 2,350 is their legal capacity. The question arises whether the promoters, led by brothers Alex and Leo Baskin, oversold the event. An early press release from Tavern pointed fingers and toes at the promoters. It stated that Alex, Leo, and friends “irresponsibly sold anywhere from 4,000-6,000 tickets or more, putting people’s safety in jeopardy for their own profit.” It got bad for a minute between the two parties, with Alex and Leo’s phone number being forwarded to Tavern’s lines, and the promo group blaming the venue. Then the two parties started talking smart and this release soon gave way to a new joint release, where regret and refund policies were laid out. It seems that someone might have printed counterfeit tickets with the wrong time on them, etc., etc., etc.

Tappy Phillips, Channel 7’s fabulous reporter, is no sappy. A ticket with a number in the high 4,000s was shown by her, and unless it was a fake or they started the tickets numbers at 2,500 instead of 0, something is fishier here than the coconut crusted shrimp with mango salsa that guests were to eat that night, washed down by torrents of free Grey Goose. Guests paid $60 a head, or $130 if they wanted to sit in a chair at a crowded table. 6 rooms, 12 DJs, plus a chance to win a trip to Paris or $10,000 cash, an extensive banquet menu, and free Goose all night long in the romantic Central Park venue made this an easy ticket to sell. Outlets for ticket sales were abundant, and the promoters Alex and Leo had sub-promoters who had sub-promoters; somewhere down this food chain, greed might have chimed in. I can’t believe it was the brothers Baskin.

With online sales as well as hard ticket sales and a package that sold itself, somehow way too many tickets got sold. It should be noted that Tavern did pack out fast, and many people had a great time even though it was shut down by the NYPD at 1:30am. Everyone agrees the police did the right thing. An estimated 3,000 people were near riot in the cold rain. Revelers didn’t just lose their cash from the ticket purchase—they lost their Halloween, plus the money they spent on transportation and costumes. They also lost their confidence in the promotional system associated with big nights.