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I
was born in New Jersey and raised in Los Angeles, and have lived many places
in between, but I never pine for any city in particular - maybe because I
naturally tend to focus on what's unique wherever I find myself. Take Soho,
for instance, a London neighborhood that changes character more frequently
than a schizophrenic method actor in a one-man show. Although it's in
central London, its character is Wild West in that the good, the bad, and
the ugly congregate there every day and that for a fistful of dollars you
can buy pretty much anything you want. Here you'll find more cultures
than on a petri dish: The gay community drinks alongside hardened football
fans, students dine alongside the cream of capitalism, Lefties talk to
Tories, and rumor has it that even the French are welcome. If Soho were used
as a model for the rest of the world, there would be no Guantanamo Bay,
Michael Moore would have no more documentaries to make, Saddam Hussein would
still be on Donald Rumsfeld's Christmas card list, and Osama Bin Laden would
just be a guy in Afghanistan with a bad kidney and a slight dislike for
American foreign policy. Soho has it all, from A to Z, but don't try
to buy E - this isn't Amsterdam!
Now
that I'm living in London, my journeys through the city are more frequent
and I'm more often on the tube than behind the wheel of a car. London
summers are not nearly as hot as those in New York, where the subway
stations can feel as steamy as a sauna, and the tube is a convenient,
refreshingly anonymous form of transportation where anyone can ride
unnoticed. People are too busy reading the sports pages--or nursing the
early-morning hangover that the English hide so badly - to make much eye
contact. They say that the tube helps keep cars off the streets, but once
you're caught in a London rush hour, you'll begin to doubt that there
are any tunnels below ground at all.
If
you do find yourself stuck in a swarm of black taxis moving nowhere - and
you're up for it - my other favorite way around London is on an electric
scooter. It's like riding a surfboard with handlebars. Some come with a seat
that you can remove; others are standing room only. They're fuel-efficient,
and there's nothing quite like the freedom of zipping past honking cabs at
16 miles per hour, the wind in your face and a
smile on your lips. Bike shops around the city rent them by the day, and
navigating through traffic on a scooter is about as close to adventure
travel as you'll find in London.
However
you decide to get around the city, there is no end to the expeditions
it
offers. "When a man tires
of London, he tires of life, for there is in London all that man can
afford." So wrote Samuel Johnson more than 200 years ago, and the same
is true today. Another thing that hasn't changed much since Johnson's time
is the traditional English breakfast - the tradition being to find a plate
that contains more fat than a butcher's dog. One of the best can be had at
the Ritz Hotel, in Piccadilly, but for a more proletarian "fry
up," you can't do better than a cafe, where builders and brokers join
in a team effort to raise the bar on the world's cholesterol level. Ask for
"best" and you'll receive bacon, egg, sausage, and tomato; ask for
muesli and at
best you'll receive a quizzical look, and at worst a punch in the
mouth.
The
London cafe is something everyone should experience at least once, but
don't
come expecting glamour: Tea is served white with two sugars, and usually in
a chipped
mug reading WORLD'S BEST DAD or emblazoned with the name of an English
soccer team. Pleasantries here have been discarded in favor of grunts, and
the windows are usually covered in more steam than the back of a teenager's
car. My personal favorites for a great morning start are in the small
cobbled streets and
walkways of Mayfair's Shepherd Market.
It
takes the average person two to three weeks to digest an English breakfast,
although you can significantly reduce this time by walking it off shopping.
The obvious choices - Harrods, Fortnum& Mason, and Liberty - may come to
mind, but beware: These stores can decimate a credit rating faster than a
war in South America. For the more prudent shopper, there are the flea
markets of Camden, where the odd lost Picasso can still be found among the
bric- a-brac. Hiding your American accent here is a must, unless you want to
walk away 200 pounds lighter and carrying the lost Van Gogh self-portrait.
You'll be back at home before you've discovered that he's got two ears. My
favorite buys at Camden Market have been from the rare T-shirt
collections.
Notting
Hill, made famous around the world by the movie, swarms with tourists, but
its Portobello Road market is worth a stroll for the stalls crammed with
antiques. At the bottom of Portobello is Ladbroke Grove, a small
neighborhood with all the funkier London shops, including Heidi Klein -
where women in the know go for the world's best bikinis.
For
a man to go home looking like James Bond, two stops are a must: Savile Row
and Jermyn Street. In Savile Row, every shop sells suits, and these are
indeed where James Bond buys his. The tailors here tell you what to wear and
cater to royalty, businessmen, and the landed gentry. For an
off-the-rack suit, take your credit card; for bespoke duds, take someone
else's. When you first don a suit from the likes of Gieves & Hawkes,
you'll feel like a member of Her Majesty's Secret Service. The same is true
on Jermyn Street, which sells only shirts and also caters to princes and
kings. Don't worry about the APR on your credit card when you buy a shirt
here; by the time you've put it on, you'll believe that you're the one
setting the interest rates. Top this off (or rather bottom this off) with a
pair of Church's shoes and your next assignment to save the world is in the
mail.
British
food has been so long and so vigorously
maligned that it still comes as a surprise to many that London boasts more
top French chefs than Paris does. At the high end is Gordon Ramsay at both
Claridges and The Ivy, but there are more fine restaurants than you can
count; some have Michelin stars on the door, others have Hollywood stars at
the tables. Of course, if you want gastronomic excellence, you'll have to
pay astronomic prices. Gordon Ram say will serve you the finest fare in
London for the highest fare in London, while Sketch will serve you a great
steak in surroundings that appear to have been designed by Lenny Kravitz
during an acid flashback.
Getting
a seat at Fifteen is as likely as getting an invite to the pope's wedding,
but should you be lucky enough, this is a must. Fifteen was created by
England's most famous chef, Jamie Oliver, when he took 15 unemployed
teenagers with no culinary experience and trained them for months. Some fell
by the wayside, but those who remain have won the hearts, mouths, and
stomachs of every discerning epicure in London. When in Covent Garden, try
Joe Allen's, a favorite of the theater crowd for years, with a combo that
plays in the corner.
For
live music and ambience, you can't beat Ronnie Scott's nightclub on
Frith Street. All of the greats have played here over the years, and it
still packs in music lovers of every stripe. Pete King is always at the
door, ready to welcome you with open arms or to throw you out, depending on
your demands. The dust on the lamp shades is decades old, but how many times
in your life will you be in the same room where Ella Fitzgerald, Miles
Davis, and Charlie Mingus rocked the night away.
Alternatively,
scrap all of the above (warning: shameless plug ahead) and go directly to
the Old Vic to see the new Dutch play Cloaca, by Maria Goos. We are
presenting it in September as our first production, with a wonderful
company of the finest British actors. Or, wait for the holidays and see Sir
Ian McKellen as the Widow Twankey in Aladdin. If you can't make it
over until next year, you can still watch yours truly strut his funky stuff
on the boards in National Anthems and The Philadelphia
Story.
The
Old Vic is only four blocks from the banks of the Thames, so don't listen to
those who say it's too remote. It is an accessible and elegant way to spend
an evening - although we do matinees, too. Call me biased, but I believe it
to be one of the hotter sights in this wonderful town.
Old
Vic Theatre: 44-870-060-6628; www.oldvictheatre.com; tickets,
$19-$75.
Conde
Nast Traveler
September 2004
