Jorge provides the entertainment at Puglia in Little Italy.
NEW York has two kinds of quality cheese: The kind that goes for $15.99 a pound at Murray's on Bleecker Street or becomes part of a savory dessert plate at a restaurant like Artisanal; and the kind that fills the photo albums of tourists who think the height of New York City culture is found in Times Square and Little Italy.
Only the lactose-intolerant can deny the appeal of the first kind, but the second kind is generally shunned by those who consider themselves sophisticates. Is that a smart move? What exactly makes a place cheesy may be up for debate. It is some combination of corny, tacky, showy and goofy. But that can also make it blithely satisfying, even if it comes with a high dose of I-hope-nobody-I-know-sees-me-doing-this.
Some cheese is better left untouched in the back of the tourist refrigerator, like the $40-per-half-hour that will get you clip-clopping through Central Park in a horse-drawn carriage, or a stop at one of Times Square's few remaining live peep shows. (Especially with the recent closing of the Playpen on Eighth Avenue, which added an extra dose of cheesy classlessness by keeping a few Beaux-Arts architectural details from its days as a theater high above the booths. Or so they say.)
But at its best, cheesiness can make for a darn good time. The ultimate example is a trip to Coney Island for a walk along the Boardwalk, a trip to the freak show and a ride on the clackety Cyclone roller-coaster. But closer in, and an equally good time, is the 1980s-themed Culture Club nightspot on Varick Street in Manhattan.
Music from the '80s itself is inherently cheesy (“In a big country/Dreams stay with you/Like a lover's voice/Fires the mountainside”) but the club goes all the synthy way. There's a wall-size painting of Adam Ant, a replica of Duran Duran's “Rio” album cover, an oversize Rubik's Cube hanging from the ceiling and a dance floor that looks inspired by the memory game Simon.
By 11 on a Saturday night, about the time many clubs are just selling their first drink, it's an inferno of people: bachelorette parties, an occasional Mohawk, and Slim-Jim-thin ties, but mostly just people sipping their God-awful Madonna and Smurf drinks, singing their hearts out about fighting for their right to party, and Safety Dancing till dawn. And it may be the only place in the city where a guy wearing baggy overalls with no shirt underneath and coming on to a girl with a line like “With you in that dress, oh, my thoughts I confess, verge on dirty ... come on, Eileen!” might stand a chance.
Another cheesy classic is Puglia, the restaurant where the singer known as Jorge belts 'em out (without disturbing one Elvis-like hair on his head) to the joy of clapping, sometimes dancing, diners in the heart of Little Italy — which sort of makes it like a cheese sandwich on cheese bread. Solely with the help of a Casio WK1250 keyboard, Jorge does everything from Elvis's “Don't Be Cruel” to a near-perfect cover of the theme from “The Love Boat,” much to the delight of the crowd, which, it might be added, did not come for the most-certainly-not-made-to-order pasta.
It's easier not to like two spots that go queso a queso on opposite sides of Broadway at 51st Street: Mars 2112 and Ellen's Stardust Diner. Here, the cheese is thick and goopy, more Velveeta than Zabar's.
At Mars 2112, you take a “spaceship” on a jolting stationary ride accompanied by 1980s-quality graphics and emerge in a cavernous dining area straight out of the terrible 1950s sci-fi movie of your choice. Sounds promising, but the monotone service, and Martian Momma's BBQ Meat Loaf that tastes like it came come from a planet far, far away from the city's restaurant scene, make it at best a place for kids.
The food is equally mediocre at Ellen's, where young waiters and waitresses take turns crooning into a wireless microphone to a crowd bursting with bridge-and-tunnel adolescents and entire families beamed in from the Mall of America. They clap along, and love it when a spindly white waiter named String Bean does his best James Brown as he begs, screams and sits on the laps of various birthday girls.
Also not to be missed on your Times Square cheesefest: Having your photo taken with the guitar-playing, briefs-not-boxers-wearing Naked Cowboy; and a dip into Madame Tussaud's wax emporium.
Just one more stop. You've got to head down to Lower Broadway, to the classic “Charging Bull” sculpture, where you're almost certain to find a mob of tourists taking pictures. And, of course, there are always a couple of jokers who go around to the anatomically correct back end of the bull, and pose in every position you can imagine — and some you cannot.
So cheesy. But, come on, pretty funny, too.
