“The last of the great saloons.” (1)
Elaine’s
April 1963–May 26, 2011*
Italian
Ownership:
Diane Becker (2010–2011)
Elaine Kaufman (1963–2010)
Donald Ward (1963–c. 1971)
Location:
1703 2nd Avenue near East 88th Street
Literature:
Brian McDonald, Last Call at Elaine’s: A Journey from One Side of the Bar to the Other (2019)
Gael Greene, Insatiable: Tales from a Life of Delicious Excess (2006)
Stuart Woods, New York Dead (1991):
“Elaine’s, late. The place had exhausted its second wind, and half the customers had gone; otherwise she would not have given Stone Barrington quite so good a table – number 4, along the wall to your right as you enter. Stone knew Elaine, had known her for years, but he was not what you would call a regular – not what Elaine would call a regular, anyway” (Fontana, 1992: 11).
Bret Easton Ellis, The Rules of Attraction (1987):
“So there were meals left wasted at Le Cirque, and Elaine’s and the Russian Tea Room; drinks ordered and left untouched at 21 and the Oak Room Bar; neither of us talking, mutually relieved if the bar or restaurant we were at was particularly noisy.” (Picador, 2006: 267).
Neal Travis, Manhattan (1979)
Ron Rosenbaum, Murder at Elaine’s (1978)
Renata Adler, Speedboat (1976):
“‘Shall we go to your place or Elaine’s?’ the young man asked. It was 3 a.m. He was recently divorced. The same question must have been being put just then in cabs throughout New York. ‘To Elaine’s,’ I said. That was where we went. To Elaine’s, to the Dow-Jones averages, to the future, then, to preserve the domestic tranquility” (Grace Goers, 2022).
Film:
Morning Glory (2010)
Celebrity (1998)
Big Business (1988)
Author! Author! (1982)
Manhattan (1979) [opening scene]
Network (1976): Main characters Diana (Faye Dunaway) and Max (William Holden) meet at Elaine’s for dinner.
Diary of a Mad Housewife (1970)
Television:
The Looming Tower (2018)
Nick & Hillary (1988) [Elaine Kaufman appears in the episode “Nouvelle York”; it is uncertain if the scene takes place at Elaine’s.]
Publications:
Bonanos, Christopher. “…And Where She [Elaine Kaufman] Made Her Name.” In “Who Ate Where: A Social History of the City, Told Entirely Through Its Restaurants.” New York, April 8-21, 2024: 53 (illustrated, with photo of Gay Talese, Richard Behar, and Candace Bushnell at Elaine’s).
Szanton, Andrew. “Elaine Kaufman, and the New York Restaurant She Made.” Medium. Blog, April 23, 2023.
Kilgannon, Corey. “Elaine’s the Musical, From the People Who Drank There.” New York Times, April 14, 2022.
Phillips Penn, Amy. Elaine’s: The Rise of One of New York’s Most Legendary Restaurants From Those Who Were There. New York: Skyhorse Publishing, 2020.
“Reviving Elaine’s Without Elaine.” New York Times, December 6, 2013.
Blum, David. Flash in the Pan: Life and Death of an American Restaurant. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2013.
Khoury, Peter. “After Elaine’s, You Can’t Go Home Again.” New York Times, May 17, 2012.
Ferrer, Annie. “Elaine’s Library: A Breakdown of the Titles Gracing Elaine’s Walls When News of Its Impending Closure Went Out.” New York, May 30, 2011.
Barron, James. “Curtains for Elaine’s, a Legendary New York Hangout.” New York Times, May 18, 2011: A14 (illustrated).
Khoury, Peter. “Au Revoir, Elaine’s.” New York Times, May 17, 2011 (illustrated).
Levy, Paul. “Elaine Kaufman: Restaurateur Whose Eponymous Restaurant Was the Favoured Meeting Place for New York’s High Society.” The Independent, December 13, 2010.
Arango, Tim. “A Writer Remembers Elaine’s.” New York Times, December 10, 2010 (illustrated).
Barron, James. “Elaine’s without Elaine? Regulars Wonder.” New York Times, December 5, 2010.
Horan, Kathleen. “Elaine’s Employees Remember Their Colorful Boss.” WNYC, December 4, 2010. [Features an audio clip of various employees sharing their memories of Kaufman.]
Nemy, Enid. “Elaine Kaufman, Who Fed and Fussed Over the Famous, Dies at 81.” New York Times, December 3, 2010.
Rutkoff, Aaron, and Jay McInerney. “Jay McInerney Remembers a ‘Boy’s Club’ at Elaine’s.” Wall Street Journal, December 3, 2010.
Chan, Sewell. “45 Years Later, Everyone Still Comes to Elaine’s.” New York Times, April 14, 2008. [Features a photograph of Woody Allen with Kaufman at the restaurant’s 45th anniversary celebration.]
Hotchner, A. E. Everyone Comes to Elaine’s: Forty Years of Movie Stars, All-Stars, Literary Lions, Financial Scions, Top Cops, Politicians, and Power Brokers at the Legendary Hot Spot. New York: Harper Collins, 2004. [The initial pages feature a labelled seat map, depicting the preferred tables of Elaine’s regulars.]
Hotchner, A. E. “Queen of the Night.” Vanity Fair, July 2002 (illustrated). [Includes Kaufman’s list of regulars at the ten tables she reserved for her favorites.]
McElwaine, Sandra. “Star Grazing: Why Not Dine Where the Celebrities Dine?” Cosmopolitan, January 1989: 181.
Alexander, Ron. “Toasts of the Town: Star Gazing.” New York Times, April 28, 1985: A8.
Nemy, Enid. “Elaine’s: A Literary Den Marks Its 20th Birthday.” New York Times, April 8, 1983: B4 (illustrated, Kaufman in front of restaurant).
Sheraton, Mimi. “Restaurants: Lively Steakhouse, Celebrity Hangout.” New York Times, February 20, 1981: C18.
Schwartz, Tony. “The Conflicting Life and Art of Woody Allen.” New York Times, October 19, 1980: D1, D28.
Zion, Sidney. “Barfly’s Guide to the Best Watering Holes.” New York Times, August 8, 1980: C23. [Also lists Maxwell’s Plum.]
Cunningham, Barry. “Elaine of Elaine’s.” Cosmopolitan 187, 6 (December 1979): 86, 110, 192, 196.
Collins, Thomas. “Writer Returns to the Scene of the Crime.” Newsday, March 1, 1979: B2. [Regarding a release party at Elaine’s for Ron Rosenbaum’s novel Murder at Elaine’s, as well as the impending publication of Neal Travis’s Manhattan, also featuring scenes at Elaine’s.]
Chamberlin, Anne. “Four-Star Women of the Restaurant Business.” Cosmopolitan 180, 1 (January 1976): 120-121.
Greene, Gael. “It’s Not Nice to Mess with Mother Kaufman.” New York 8, 33 (August 18, 1975): 53-56 (illustrated, with a caricature of Kaufman by Tim Lewis).
Stewart, Leslie. “The Inevitable Invasion of Our Privacy: The Private Life of the Public Personality.” Town & Country 126, 4593 (April 1972): 53.
Greene, Gael. “It Must Be Calf’s Foot Jelly ‘Cause Cannelloni Don’t Shake Like That.” New York 4, 13 (March 29, 1971): 63-64. [Republished on Greene’s Insatiable Critic blog.]
Notable Guests:
Charles Addams (Cartoonist)
Denny Aiello (Actor): Pictured with Kaufman at Elaine’s in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 218.
Edward Albee (Playwright)
Alan Alda (Actor)
Nelson W. Aldrich, Jr. (Editor & Writer): “Nelson Aldrich lived around the corner…he walked by one night, came in for a drink. One after the other Nelson’s writer friends came, and once the writers started coming they attracted the publishers and actors and now I’m getting more reservations than I can handle in my little place.” (2)
Joe Allen (Restaurateur): “I came up to Elaine’s on opening night and I brought a case of Heineken beer for the bar. I knew she didn’t have a full inventory, so I told her to sell it back to me. It wasn’t much of an opening… Elaine’s place was charming but primitive, and being way up there, where no one ever came, I knew she was going to have a hard time making a go of it.” (3)
Woody Allen (Filmmaker & Actor): “I ate at Elaine’s every night for ten years. With very few exceptions. It was always packed, high energy, and full of people I knew. Even on nights when it was zero degrees out it was jammed… There was no celebrity that didn’t show up there. It was fun to people-watch. I rarely spoke to anyone not at my table and never table-hopped.” (4)
Robert Altman (Film Director & Screenwriter): “The first time I went to Elaine’s was in 1967. I walked in and there was a very rowdy table up in the front and Elaine was at her station by the bar. One of the guys at the table was making a ruckus with the waiter; the guy was wearing a scarf and Elaine came up behind him, grabbed him by the scarf and twisted it around his neck, yanked him up out of his chair, and threw him out the front door into the street. I knew then and there that this was my kind of place, and that I ought to make friends with that lady.” (5) Pictured at Elaine’s with his wife in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 40
Michael Arlen (Writer): “Elaine’s is a sort of verbal disco for grownups whose thing is to plug into the hum of urban conversation…gossip about money and power…” (6)
Antony Armstrong-Jones, Lord Snowdon (Photographer)
Lucie Arnaz (Actress & Singer)
Arthur Ashe (Tennis Player)
Richard Avedon (Photographer)
Lauren Bacall (Actress)
George Balanchine (Choreographer)
Alec Baldwin (Actor): “I remember sitting in Elaine’s one night, and there was Valerie Perrine. All the famous people that go in and out of there, and I was sitting next to Honey Bruce. I leaned over and said, ‘I hope you don’t take this the wrong way, but I never wanted to make love to a woman more than I wanted to make love to Honey Bruce.’ She just smiled and said, ‘Thank you.'” (7)
Lucille Ball (Actress & Comedian)
Ellen Barkin (Actress)
Mikhail Baryshnikov (Choreographer & Actor)
Warren Beatty (Actor & Filmmaker)
Richard Behar (Journalist) & Candace Bushnell (Journalist & Television Producer): Pictured together in New York Magazine‘s “Who Ate Where” special (2024).
Noel Behn (Novelist & Screenwriter)
Tony Bennett (Singer): Sketched a “little pencil portrait” of Kaufman which she hung over the bar (pictured in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 148). This drawing was sold for $1,600 in the 2011 Doyle auction of Kaufman’s estate (lot 1218).
Ingrid Bergman (Actress)
Carl Bernstein (Journalist): Pictured at Willie Morris’s book party at Elaine’s in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 64.
Leonard Bernstein (Conductor & Composer)
Per Bjurman (Journalist)
Curt Block (Singer)
Roy Blount, Jr. (Writer): See Notes below for his “Ode to Elaine’s.”
Helena Bonham Carter (Actress)
Bjorn Borg (Tennis Player)
Peter Boyle (Actor): Pictured with Kaufman in the kitchen of Elaine’s in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 154.
Marlon Brando (Actor)
Brassaï (Photographer & Sculptor): Pictured with Kaufman at Elaine’s in the 1970s in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 174.
William J. Bratton (Former New York City Police Commissioner)
Martin Bregman (Film Producer)
Charles Bronson (Actor)
Helen Gurley Brown (Writer): “I think you go to Elaine’s because it is a happening. I don’t mean a party is always in progress, though many are, but the restaurant itself is a personality—because of its owner and because of its clients you just feel ‘action’ is indigenous to its being.” (8)
Art Buchwald (Humorist & Columnist)
Jessica Burstein (Photographer): Famously documented Elaine’s in photographs, saying of Kaufman, “It’s not like she paid me or anything. She’d want prints, and it was all on my own dime. It was the most expensive job I ever had.” (9) Burstein’s photos hung on the walls at Elaine’s, where she met Dick Wolf, the creator of ‘Law and Order,’ and became the show’s crime scene photographer from 1994 to 2010. (10)
Richard Burton (Actor)
Michael Caine (Actor): “I always spend the first and last nights in New York at Elaine’s… I guess you’d call it the fear factor because her network of information is such that I’m sure if I dared to go to another restaurant, she’d find out about it.” (11) Pictured at Elaine’s in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 71.
Truman Capote (Writer)
Len Cariou (Stage Actor, Singer, & Director)
Diahann Carroll (Actress & Singer)
Jimmy Carter (39th President of the United States)
Christopher Cerf (Writer & Composer)
Carol Channing (Actress & Comedian)
Dominic Chianese (Actor & Singer): Pictured performing at Elaine’s in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 214.
Christo & Jeanne-Claude (Artists)
Mary Higgins Clark (Writer): “Elaine’s is special. You step inside and you will inevitably see someone you haven’t seen in ten years or had lunch with yesterday. No matter how busy you’ve been, how tired you are, you perk up.” (12)
Hillary Clinton (Former United States Secretary of State)
Father Pete Colapietro (Priest): Known as the “Patron Saint of Elaine’s.” (13) Pictured at Elaine’s in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 88.
Cy Coleman (Composer & Songwriter)
Betty Comden (Lyricist & Playwright): See Notes below for her “Sonnet to Elaine.”
Sean Connery (Actor)
Frank Conroy (Writer) & William Styron (Writer): Pictured together with fellow writer Irwin Shaw at Elaine’s in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 25.
Alice Cooper (Singer)
Noël Coward (Playwright)
Walter Cronkite (Broadcast Journalist)
Simone de Beauvoir (Philosopher & Writer)
Oscar de la Renta (Fashion Designer)
Robert De Niro (Actor & Film Producer)
Nigel Dempster (Journalist)
Brian Dennehy (Actor)
Paul Desmond (Saxophonist & Composer)
Joan Didion (Writer)
John Diebold (Businessman)
Joe DiMaggio (Baseball Player)
David Dinkins (Former Mayor of New York City)
Kirk Douglas (Actor & Filmmaker)
Richard Dreyfuss (Actor)
Faye Dunaway (Actress)
Steve Dunleavy (Journalist): Pictured at Elaine’s in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 213.
Dominick Dunne (Writer)
Clint Eastwood (Actor & Film Director): Pictured at Elaine’s in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 169.
Morgan Entrekin (Publisher): “As a young editor, hanging out at Elaine’s with writers was a much more productive way for me to find books to publish than going to lunch with agents. And a hell of a lot more fun… We did eventually come up with a rule that any deal done after midnight had to be confirmed by both sides the next day.” (14)
Nora Ephron (Writer): “Sometimes I say: It’s like going to a dinner party where you don’t quite know who’s going to be there and you don’t really have to talk to anyone except the person you came in with but at least you feel you’ve been somewhere, which is not a bad feeling when you’ve spent the day pretty much alone at the typewriter and suspect you haven’t been anywhere at all… Sometimes I say: Listen, the veal chop is terrific. What I always mean to say: You bet your sweet ass I go to Elaine’s. I love it there. You wanna make something of it?” (15) Pictured at Elaine’s with former husband and fellow writer Nick Pileggi in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 102.
Patrick Ewing (Basketball Coach)
Jared Faber (Composer & Songwriter)
Edie Falco (Actress)
Peter Falk (Actor & Singer)
Mia Farrow (Actress): Asked Michael Caine to introduce her to Woody Allen at Elaine’s. (16)
Jules Feiffer (Cartoonist & Writer): Following a play closing due to bad reviews, Feiffer arrived at Elaine’s with his wife at 2:30 in the morning: “The door was locked, but the window was lit, just barely. In the weak glow I saw Elaine closing up. I rattled the knob, I knocked. She came to the door. She let us in. She sat us down. She bought us a bottle of champagne. For the next hour and a half we were in complete agreement on what sons of bitches the critics were.” (17)
Clay Felker (Editor & Journalist)
Federico Fellini (Film Director & Screenwriter)
Albert Finney (Actor): While rehearsing for the movie version of Annie (1982), Finney required the waiters at Elaine’s to practice the dance routine with him. (18)
Carrie Fisher (Actress & Writer)
Jane Fonda (Actress)
Tom Fontana (Screenwriter)
Helen Frankenthaler (Artist)
Walt “Clyde” Frazier, Jr. (Basketball Player): According to long-time Elaine’s water Carlo Torchio, “The only time I ever saw the celebrity-jaded atmosphere of Elaine’s stilled was when Walt Frazier, then at the height of his fame with the Knicks, walked in. The place became silent. I mean absolutely silent.” (19)
William Friedkin (Film Director)
Bruce J. Friedman (Writer): “In a way, Elaine writes that restaurant the way a good writer writes a book…every detail accounted for.” (20) Pictured with Kaufman at Elaine’s in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine‘s (2004), p. 159.
David Frost (Television Host & Journalist)
Penny Fuller (Actress)
Rita Gam (Actress)
James Gandolfini (Actor): Pictured at Elaine’s in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 207.
Judy Garland (Actress & Singer)
Vittorio Gassman (Actor & Director): “[Gassman] had veal and pasta, espresso, and then wanted to know if we had flan, which was a favorite of his… The flan was brought to the table, and then rising so all could see, he raised the plate and in one gesture sucked up the whole thing. Got a great round of applause.” (21)
Ben Gazzara (Actor & Director)
Arthur Gelb (Editor & Writer)
Jack Gelber (Playwright)
Vitas Gerulaitis (Tennis Player)
Jackie Gleason (Actor & Comedian): Pictured with Kaufman in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 136.
Barry Goldwater (Former United States Senator)
Adolph Green (Lyricist & Playwright)
Wayne Gretzky (Ice Hockey Player)
Merv Griffin (Television Host)
Tammy Grimes (Actress & Singer)
Winston Groom (Writer): “At one point my tab was over seven thousand dollars, accumulated over several years, and Elaine had never said a word. She understood the situation with writers vis-à-vis paydays, and without her I might have starved. Eventually I wrote her a check for the seven thousand; no interest was ever asked. ‘Thank you,’ was all she said.” (22)
David Halberstam (Writer & Journalist)
Pete Hamill (Writer & Journalist)
Richard Harris (Actor & Singer)
Jim Harrison (Poet & Writer)
Goldie Hawn (Actress)
Joseph Heller (Writer) & Dick Wolf (Film Producer): Pictured together at Elaine’s in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 163.
Lillian Hellman (Playwright & Writer)
Jill Hennessy (Actress & Singer) & Chris Noth (Actor): Pictured together at Elaine’s in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 177.
Keith Hernandez (Baseball Player): Pictured with Kaufman at Elaine’s in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 203.
Abbie Hoffman (Activist)
Dustin Hoffman (Actor)
A. E. Hotchner (Editor & Writer): “It remains an adventure every time I go through the double doors and enter the preserve that is called a saloon by virtually everyone but Elaine, who despises the word… It’s the tantalizing spirit of the place, the ebb and flow of arrivers and departers, table-hoppers who plunk themselves down for a couple of minutes, the milling, amorphous bar people who lead a life of their own, the camaraderie of waiters who sometimes philosophize while discussing the menu, but more than anything it’s Elaine herself…” (23) Author of Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004).
Reggie Jackson (Baseball Player)
Mick Jagger (Singer): Jagger’s appearance at the restaurant was one of the rare occasions that left the patrons starstruck; according to Kaufman, “The room grew still.” (24)
Dan Jenkins (Writer): Pictured with Kaufman and his wife June at Elaine’s in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 195.
Jim Jensen (News Anchor & Reporter)
Derek Jeter (Baseball Player & Businessman)
James Earl Jones (Actor)
Janis Joplin (Singer & Songwriter)
Russell Kagan (Producer)
Lainie Kazan (Actress & Singer)
Caroline Kennedy (Diplomat, Attorney, & Writer)
Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis (Former First Lady of the United States): Went to Elaine’s for her first night out following her mourning period and danced with Leonard Bernstein, Richard Avedon, George Plimpton, Susan Sontag, Adolph Green, and Betty Comden. (25) In 2004, Kaufman described this night as the highlight of her forty years in business (“The night Jackie came in to dance.”) (26)
John F. Kennedy, Jr. (Attorney & Publisher)
Ted Kennedy (Former United States Senator)
Alan King (Comedian & Actor): “Elaine’s is the only restaurant in the world where I can come in alone at any hour and find the best company for the evening—Elaine herself.” (27) King also described Elaine’s decor—largely consisting of junk shop finds—as, “decorated like a stolen car.” (28)
Don King (Boxing Promoter)
Larry L. King (Writer): “I’ve had many wonderful times at Elaine’s, and I don’t suppose it’s cost me over two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. I just wish I recalled more of the details.” (29)
Charles Kipps (Film Producer): “Lower your voice…because you’re surrounded by writers and they’ll steal your material.” (30)
Calvin Klein (Fashion Designer)
Kevin Kline (Actor)
Arthur Kopit (Playwright)
Jerzy Kosiński (Writer): Pictured with Kaufman at Elaine’s in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 186.
Kenneth Jay Lane (Jewelry Designer)
Lewis Lapham (Editor): “Elaine protected her writers like a lioness protects her cubs.” (31)
Michelle Lee (Actress): “Elaine made it clear that I was to call her whenever an empty evening loomed large, and she would tell me who was in the restaurant I might like to join. She would arrange it. Or if there was no one appropriate, she herself would have dinner with me.” (32) Pictured at Elaine’s in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 86.
John Lennon (Musician)
Jim Leyritz (Baseball Player)
Jerry Lieber (Songwriter)
Bea Lillie (Actress & Singer)
John Lindsay (Former Mayor of New York City & United States Representative)
Sidney Lumet (Film Director)
Mike Lupica (Writer)
Yo-Yo Ma (Cellist)
Peter Maas (Musician)
Ali MacGraw (Actress)
China Machado (Fashion Model)
Shirley MacLaine (Actress & Writer)
Mary Ann Madden (Editor): Painted the ladies’ room for opening night. (33)
Elaine Madsen (Writer)
Norman Mailer (Writer & Journalist): Known for his fights at Elaine’s: “There was the night Elaine allegedly struck Norman Mailer’s girl… Elaine had asked Mailer to stop fooling around with a light fixture over his table or ‘I’d have put him where there was no light,’ she recalls, but Mailer, out of sorts, refused and staged what appeared to be his final exit, culminating his long series of heavyweight battles that had so enlivened the restaurant: Mailer versus Bruce Friedman; Mailer versus rock-music personality Jerry Lieber (‘Mailer and Lieber went through a wall,’ Elaine remembers good-humoredly).” (34)
Lee Majors (Actor)
Joseph Mankiewicz (Film Director & Screenwriter)
Imelda Marcos (Former First Lady of the Philippines): Having arrived at Elaine’s with six sharpshooters and four armed bodyguards, “She had a good time because Andy Warhol was there and Imelda owned one of his Marilyn Monroes—the one with six green faces. Imelda introduced herself to Warhol, sat down at his table, and suggested that perhaps he’d like to do the same thing with her face. Andy was polite but he didn’t jump at the opportunity.” (35)
Esther Margolis (Publisher)
Marcello Mastroianni (Actor)
Elaine May (Actress & Comedian)
Michael McCann (Composer)
Kevin McCarthy (Former Speaker of the United States House of Representatives)
Jay McInerney (Writer): “No one went for the food, of course, although the veal chop was pretty great. The food was just there to soak up the alcohol, and the alcohol kept the conversation flowing and, occasionally, the fists flying.” (36)
Mark Messier (Ice Hockey Player)
Lorne Michaels (Television Writer & Film Producer): Pictured in the Elaine’s kitchen with Saturday Night Live cast members Dan Aykroyd, John Belushi, and Chevy Chase in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 204.
Arthur Miller (Playwright)
Liza Minnelli (Actress & Singer)
Helen Mirren (Actress): Pictured at Elaine’s in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 79.
Robert Mitchum (Actor)
Willie Morris (Writer & Editor): Pictured at Elaine’s giving a toast in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 98.
Frederic Morton (Writer)
Robert Motherwell (Artist)
Joe Namath (American Football Player)
LeRoy Neiman (Artist): Neiman’s sketch of Kaufman is pictured in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 152. Another sketch, ‘Elaine at Table 21’ (2004), sold for $1,100 in the 2011 Doyle auction of Kaufman’s estate (lot 1007).
Willie Nelson (Musician): Notably kissed all the women at the bar. (37)
Paul Newman (Actor & Film Director) & Joanne Woodward (Actress)
Mike Nichols (Film Director & Comedian): While filming across the street, Nichols and Jack Nicholson came to Elaine’s for an afternoon snack. Nichols commented on the lack of customers, to which Kaufman responded, “I’ve been to some of your movies in the afternoon too.” (38)
Jack Nicholson (Actor)
Kenneth Noland (Artist)
Jessye Norman (Opera Singer)
Rudolf Nureyev (Dancer & Choreographer)
Laurence Olivier (Actor & Director)
Aristotle Onassis (Shipping Magnate)
Jerry Orbach (Actor & Singer)
P. J. O’Rourke (Writer): “The great thing about Elaine’s is the safety. For instance, I’m safe from the food. Every other place in New York seems to be specializing in some horrible gustatory fad… But Elaine never serves me a fish that isn’t dead yet or a Bolivian guinea pig terrine.” (39)
Peter O’Toole (Actor)
Al Pacino (Actor)
Gwyneth Paltrow (Actress): Pictured at Elaine’s in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 91.
Dolly Parton (Singer-Songwriter & Actress)
George E. Pataki (Former Governor of New York)
Luciano Pavarotti (Opera Singer): In a rare instance of a guest impressing the Elaine’s clientele, when Pavarotti entered the restaurant, according to Kaufman, “Everyone stood up and applauded.” (40)
Ron Perelman (Banker & Businessman)
Valerie Perrine (Actress)
Bernadette Peters (Actress & Singer)
Michelle Pfeiffer (Actress)
Nick Pileggi (Writer): Pictured at Elaine’s with former wife and fellow writer Nora Ephron in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 102.
George Plimpton (Writer): “It was my feeling that Elaine charged too much, and one night, when I was served an artichoke the size of a walnut that cost five dollars, I went up to her and said, ‘Elaine, at “21” they charge the same and their artichokes are the size of a melon.’ She screamed out at the top of her voice, ‘Take the artichoke off the gentleman’s check!’ I was so humiliated that I couldn’t go in for six months.” (41) Pictured at Elaine’s with fellow writer Irwin Shaw in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 67.
Christopher Plummer (Actor)
Roman Polanski (Film Director): Pictured at Elaine’s in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 118.
Sydney Pollack (Film Director)
Michael Pollard (Actor)
André Previn (Pianist & Composer)
Mario Puzo (Writer & Screenwriter)
Sally Quinn (Writer & Journalist)
Jean-Pierre Rampal (Flautist)
Charles Nelson Reilly (Actor & Comedian)
Muriel Resnik (Playwright & Writer)
Jack Richardson (Writer): Credited with first introducing the writer community to Elaine’s. Finding that Kaufman’s original clientele consisted of a rough crowd due to its Second Avenue location, Richardson suggested she bring in some “sensitive types,” or writers:
“‘What would you say to some steady customers who don’t have to get up in the morning and can therefore be plied with drinks until closing time? Who will eat anything put in front of them—and enjoy it?’
…’Do they spend?’ was her circumspect question.
‘An indifference to money is the hallmark of their profession.'” (42)
Pictured at Elaine’s with Pete Townshend of The Who in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 105.
Don Rickles (Comedian & Actor): Pictured with Kaufman in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 113.
Pat Riley (Basketball Player, Coach, & Executive): Pictured kissing Kaufman in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 28.
Molly Ringwald (Actress & Writer)
Geraldo Rivera (Journalist & Attorney): Pictured with Kaufman in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 123.
Joan Rivers (Comedian & Actress)
Jason Robards (Actor)
Jackie Rogers (Fashion Designer & Model)
Andy Rooney (Radio & Television Writer)
Mark Rosenberg (Film Producer)
Diana Ross (Singer & Actress)
Mstislav Rostropovich (Cellist & Conductor)
Vince Sardi (Restaurateur)
Arnold Schwarzenegger (Actor & Former Governor of California): Pictured entering Elaine’s in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 108.
Irwin Shaw (Writer): Pictured at Elaine’s with writers Frank Conroy and William Styron in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 25, and with writer George Plimpton on p. 67.
Sam Shepard (Playwright & Actor)
Brooke Shields (Actress)
Bobby Short (Singer & Pianist)
Bud Shrake (Journalist)
Neil Simon (Playwright & Screenwriter)
Norton Simon (Industrialist & Philanthropist)
Paul Simon (Singer & Songwriter): Pictured in the Elaine’s kitchen in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 101.
Daniel Simone (Writer)
Frank Sinatra (Singer): Pictured with Kaufman at Elaine’s in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 140.
Christian Slater (Actor)
Liz Smith (Actress)
Stephen Sondheim (Composer & Lyricist)
Susan Sontag (Writer)
Terry Southern (Writer)
Larry Spangler (Film Producer)
Phil Spector (Producer & Songwriter)
Steven Spielberg (Filmmaker)
Sylvester Stallone (Actor & Filmmaker)
Rod Steiger (Actor)
George Steinbrenner (Businessman & Owner of the New York Yankees): Pictured with Kaufman at Elaine’s in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 115.
Isaac Stern (Violinist)
Martha Stewart (Businesswoman & Writer)
Sharon Stone (Actress)
Barbra Streisand (Singer & Actress) & George Segal (Actor): Pictured with Kaufman in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 121.
Elaine Stritch (Actress): Worked as a bartender at Elaine’s in the 1960s, compelling comedian Bea Lillie, costume jewelry designer Kenneth Jay Lane, and Noël Coward to come to Elaine’s to watch the famous actress work behind the bar. (43)
Donald Sutherland (Actor)
Anthea Sylbert (Film Producer & Costume Designer)
Gay Talese (Writer) & Nan Talese (Editor): “Homer would have benefited on his second Elaine’s evening by watching Gay Talese. Gay, getting up from his chair and setting sail for the men’s room, embarks on an odyssey to the ‘nth power. It’s a voyage so wondrously labyrinthine in its table-hopping, so brilliant in its detours, so rich in swordplay and ingenuous laughter, so mythic in its encounters with archetypes, sex symbols, major gods, and minor demons, that Homer would have been much more of a mensch of an epicurist just for the watching of it.” (44) Pictured together at Elaine’s in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 172.
Jacques Tati (Filmmaker & Actor)
Elizabeth Taylor (Actress)
Hunter S. Thompson (Journalist & Writer)
Cheryl Tiegs (Model & Fashion Designer)
James Toback (Screenwriter & Film Director)
Pete Townshend (Musician): Pictured at Elaine’s with writer Jack Richardson in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 105.
Liv Ullman (Actress)
Kurt Vonnegut (Writer) & Jill Krementz (Photographer)
Mike Wallace (Journalist & Game Show Host)
Eli Wallach (Actor)
Andy Warhol (Artist): Pictured with Kaufman in the Elaine’s kitchen in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004), p. 197.
Harvey Weinstein (Film Producer)
Raquel Welch (Actress)
Dr. Ruth Westheimer (Sex Therapist & Talk Show Host): “The best quality about Elaine’s is that nobody talks about the weather. The discussions at Elaine’s are literary, intelligent, challenging, outrageous, bawdy, and quite likely to spread across table boundaries, but they’re never banal. You can be as loud and boisterous as you want as long as you’re not boring. It’s an atmosphere that I cherish, and I feel privileged that I am able to enter Elaine’s magic kingdom when the need arises.” (45)
Robin Williams (Actor & Comedian)
Tennessee Williams (Playwright & Screenwriter)
Mary Wilson (Singer)
Tom Wolfe (Writer): “The most incredible thing that ever happened, is that I was there one night and someone listened to what was being said at the table! I don’t remember what it was. I wasn’t listening myself. I was too busy looking at the people at the next table.” (46)
Stuart Woods (Writer)
Jamie Wyeth (Artist): Wyeth’s painting of Kaufman in honor of the restaurant’s 30th anniversary (pictured in Hotchner’s Everyone Comes to Elaine’s, p. 149) hung on the wall of Elaine’s and featured as the menu cover. A comic ink and watercolor sketch of Elaine’s by Wyeth sold for $1,500 in the 2011 Doyle auction of Kaufman’s estate (lot 1220).
Bobby Zarem (Publicist)
Sidney Zion (Writer)
Notes:
After breaking up with lover and co-owner of Greenwich Village’s Portofino Restaurant, Alfredo Viazzi, in 1963 (a “slam-bang fight” in which she “smash[ed] every glass and plate in the place”), Kaufman went in search of a restaurant of her own with new business partner Donald Ward. She took the cheapest place she could find, an Austro-Hungarian bar called Gambrino’s in working class Yorkville, “way beyond where people went to eat.” (47) To save money, Kaufman “left everything just as it was—the fixtures, the old paint, the bar.” (48) Within eight years, and following a scene in which Ward turned away Truman Capote, Elaine “had bought out her partner and taken over sole ownership.” (49)
When “king of paparazzi” Richard Galella stood outside the restaurant waiting to grab photos of Carrie Fisher, Richard Dreyfuss, Liv Ullman, and Cheryl Tiegs, “[Elaine] opened the door and said ‘Beat it, creep! You’re bothering my customers!’ When Galella declined to leave, she encouraged movement by throwing a garbage can lid at him — and then a second one. Galella got a picture of the second garbage can lid coming at him — and sold the photo to New York magazine.” (50)
Elaine Kaufman was named a “Living Landmark” by the New York Landmarks Conservancy in 2004. The award is granted to “New Yorkers who have made outstanding contributions to the city.” (51)
The restaurant is mentioned in Billy Joel’s 1978 song, “Big Shot”:
They were all impressed with your Halston dress
And the people that you knew at Elaine’s.
And the story of your latest success
Kept ’em so entertained.
An excerpt from Betty Comden’s “Sonnet to Elaine”:
When in disgrace with luck and critics’ eyes,
I all alone beweep my outcast state,
And trouble deaf agents with my bootless cries
And hate the way I look, and curse my fate…
Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising,
Haply I think on thee, and then my state,
Knowing thou’lt smile and seat me well, starts rising
From Doll’s Life gloom, and I rush to thy gate;
For thy Good table to remembered such wealth brings,
That then I scorn to change my state with kings. (52)
An excerpt from “An Ode to Elaine’s” by Roy Blount, Jr. (c. 1980):
Then once I had fried calamari
With the board of PEN,
A midget from E.T. who was very
Drunk, and the Hollywood Ten.
Why go where the waiters don’t know you?
The late scrambled eggs are just right.
Cher. Cuomo. Alfonso Bedoya.
And so on into the night. (53)
Author of Everyone Comes to Elaine’s (2004) A. E. Hotchner attempted to stage a musical about the restaurant in 2005, entitled Elaine’s Domain. Disliking how she was portrayed in the show, Kaufman put an end to the project and banished Hotchner from Elaine’s. As of 2022, a new musical based on Hotchner’s book was in the works, produced by musicians Robert and Steven Morris. (54)
Objects from the restaurant and the estate of Elaine Kaufman—ranging from artwork and signed books to checkered napkins and the famed restaurant tables—were auctioned off by Doyle on September 20, 2011. (See auction lots, here).
From 2013 to 2020, the Elaine’s space was occupied by the literary-themed bistro The Writing Room. Since then, Café d’Alsace moved into the space from its fifteen-year home a block away on the corner of 88th Street and 2nd Avenue.
*Technically Elaine’s closed for the last time at 4 am on May 27, 2011.
(1) Noel Behn quoted in Cunningham, 1979: 192.
(2) Elaine Kaufman quoted in Hotchner, 2004: 62.
(3) Quoted in Hotchner, 2002.
(4) Quoted in Hotchner, 2004: 27.
(5) ibid.: 8-9.
(6) Quoted in Cunningham, 1979: 192.
(7) Quoted in Hotchner, 2004: 75.
(8) ibid.: 111-112.
(9) Barron, James. “Packing Up a Camera That Captured Years of ‘Crime Scenes.'” New York Times, December 18, 2017: A19.
(10) Sandomir, Richard. “Jessica Burstein, Whose Camera Captured New York, Dies at 76.” New York Times, April 20, 2023.
(11) Quoted in Hotchner, 2004: 125.
(12) ibid.: 87.
(13) Friedman, Roger. “RIP Father Pete Colapietro, Patron Saint of Elaine’s, and All the Actors in Times Square.” Showbiz 411, February 5, 2018.
(14) Quoted in Hotchner, 2004: 94-95.
(15) ibid.: 18.
(16) Hotchner, 2004.
(17) Quoted in Hotchner, 2004: 20.
(18) Nemy, 1983.
(19) Quoted in Hotchner, 2004: 17.
(20) Quoted in Cunningham, 1979: 196.
(21) Kaufman, quoted in Hotchner, 2004: 165.
(22) Quoted in Hotchner, 2004: 72.
(23) Hotchner, 2004: xvii.
(24) Nemy, 2010.
(25) Levy, 2010.
(26) Hotchner, 2004: 225.
(27) Quoted in Hotchner, 2002.
(28) Nemy, 2010.
(29) Quoted in Hotchner, 2004: 71.
(30) ibid.: 221.
(31) ibid.: 68.
(32) ibid.: 87.
(33) Hotchner, 2004: 6.
(34) Cunningham, 1979: 110.
(35) Hotchner, 2004: 200.
(36) Quoted in Rutkoff, 2010.
(37) Alexander, 1985.
(38) Horan, 2010.
(39) Quoted in Hotchner, 2004: 112.
(40) Alexander, 1985.
(41) Quoted in Hotchner, 2004: 68.
(42) Hotcher, 2004: 6, 8.
(43) ibid.
(44) Writer Frederic Morton quoted in Hotchner, 2004: 49.
(45) Quoted in Hotchner, 2004: 86.
(46) ibid.: 104.
(47) Hotchner, 2002.
(48) Kaufman quoted in Hotchner, 2004: 52.
(49) Nemy, 1983.
(50) Szanton, 2023.
(51) New York Landmarks Conservancy website.
(52) Quoted in Hotchner, 2004: 7.
(53) ibid.: 153.
(54) Kilgannon, 2022.
Cover photo: “Original watercolor drawing depicting the facade of Elaine’s.” (1938). Doyle. “The Estate of Elaine Kaufman” [Auction #7725], September 20 2011: lot 1196.
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