Chris Noth Celebrity Spotting on Eighth Avenue

On my way to the gym today about 5:30pm I saw the actor Chris Noth at the corner of Eighth Ave. and 54th St. looking exasperated while on his cellphone and out in the street waving his hands in an excited fashion. He didn’t look like the calm, collected rich guy he plays on Sex and the City…”Mr. Big.” He also didn’t seem like the cool-headed cop he played on Law & Order or the arrogant lawyer/politician he plays on The Good Wife. I recognized that look….it appeared he was trying to locate his car service driver and was on his cellphone frantically trying to talk to either the driver or the dispatcher. I know that look…I’ve been there myself! What did we ever do before cellphones? I suppose he was trying to meet someone for drinks or dinner before he was due at the theatre on West 45th St where he’s one of the stars of the Broadway hit THAT CHAMPIONSHIP SEASON. I thought to myself “why don’t you just walk, take the subway or just go to the theatre and chill out”…he only had 90 minutes or so before he was due there anyway.
He finally closed the cellphone and tried to flag a yellow cab, of which none were available. Cabs flew past him for several minutes and he finally appeared to give up and marched down W. 54th Street and disappeared into the Café Iguana Lizard Lounge. Accordingly, I disappeared into my gym next door…finished with my little “celebrity snooping” incident. Just wondering: Who tries to get a cab at Rush Hour in midtown Manhattan? I wondered why he didn’t just take the subway? Does he think he’s too famous? At Rush Hour, nobody cares who you are…they are all just looking down at their papers and counting the stops till they get off the train. Besides, I’ve seen lots of famous folk on the subway--people more famous than Noth: Julia Roberts, John Lithgow, Caroline Kennedy and others. In fact, just that morning I’d seen his Sex and the City co-star Mario Cantone on the Eighth Avenue subway platform (I’d seen him there before).
Incidentally, Noth also needs to hit the gym again (I should talk)…that nice slim body he had for the last Sex and the City film is gone and he’s got the middle-aged man’s gut again, pooching out under his beige polo shirt. I heard the filmmakers told him to get a trainer and get in shape a few months before principal photography began. Perhaps walking would have done him good.

Rich and Famous Tour in New York spots numerous celebs

WOW…this weekend the Rich & Famous Tour was hot and Jim Dykes guide to the stars! We kept running into celebrities all over New York…East Side, West Side…all around the town! Friday on the Upper Westside my group from San Francisco when we ran into Barbara Walters in front of the ABC Studio complex. We turned around and suddenly there was Ben Affleck and Jennifer Garner with baby Violet, and awhile later we bumped into old film star Connie Stevens, completely overdressed in fur (it was 54 degrees!) while gabbing on her cellphone. Connie has an apt. over there by ABC Studios even though her main home is in L.A. She lives in the same luxury building as Howard Stern, Regis Philbin, Celine Dion, Julie Andrews and others. We saw Sex and the City's Cynthia Nixon hopping a taxi with her grocery bags in front of the Columbus Circle Whole Foods store.
On Saturday morning we were touring thru the Upper Eastside (E. 71st Street to be exact) and bumped into world-famous syndicated gossip columnist Liz Smith, walking her dog, obviously having just rolled out of bed. She was NOT amused when I acknowledged her (politely) to my group of assorted tourists. As we reached Park Avenue and East 69th Street, we ran into ABC News reporter/anchor Cynthia McFadden, anxiously flagging a taxi down.
A few blocks later we passed David Koch, multi-billionaire, the richest man in New York, originally from Wichita, Kansas, who now lives at the formidable fortress 740 Park Avenue (“The Best Address”) where Jackie Kennedy grew up. On Columbus Circle we ran into someone I could actually introduce them to, my friend Dick Scanlan, co-author of the Broadway hit Thoroughly Modern Millie.
My group was thoroughly convinced that New York City is truly Never Never Land!