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when i was 13, I somehow convinced my parents and three siblings to go to a Saturday afternoon showing of the latest Woody Allen movie, Annie Hall. To say this selection was an unusual one for my family would be the single biggest understatement I can make. My dad loved The Three Stooges and Wonder Woman (Lynda Carter, oh my!); my mom was into romance and epic tales (Doctor Zhivago, Love Story); my brother was all about Star Wars, Star Trek, “Star” anything, really, and my sisters were impressed by The Goodbye Girl, an early rom-com with terrific turns by Richard Dreyfuss and Marsha Mason. Woody Allen didn’t noises off Actor Alan Cumming has conquered the even enter the realm of the planet’s biggest stages in London, Hollywood and NYC and, like me, has chosen this region as his respite from the plausible in my Cuban-American intensity and relentless cacophony Manhattan serves up. suburban household. But by Here, the Tony Award-winner chills after the magazine allowing me to choose the film, photo shoot at Love Studios NYC in midtown. I think my mom was respecting my latest intellectual pursuit: As luck (fate?) would have it, my aunt invited reading the epic novels One Hundred Years Of my brother and me to spend the rest of that Solitude (Gabriel García Márquez) and On The very summer with her and my cousins in NYC Road (Jack Kerouac). Not exactly Spider-Man (they lived in Washington Heights at the top territory. Annie Hall makes a bit more sense in that context. So, off we went. of Manhattan). I couldn’t believe my good To say the Pérez-Ferias were aggressively fortune. I’ll never forget the first time I saw the unimpressed and, importantly, incredibly mythic skyline from my plane window. I mean, unamused by this movie would again be can anyone ever forget that moment? It was underselling a point. My family didn’t utter a incomprehensibly exciting and that feeling, that sound throughout the entire movie even as I wonderment still hits me now after literally could hardly stay in my seat from my guffaws hundreds of times bearing witness to that and howls of laughter. I mean, is anyone same bird’s-eye view of Gotham. Once there, funnier than Woody Allen in his groove? the greatest city on Earth lived up to its billing: It was that afternoon riveted by Annie Hall Bergdorf Goodman! Rockefeller Center! The Plaza! that convinced me of an even bigger truth: Central Park! My goodness, I was irrevocably and Miami was too small for me. I had to go—and unquestionably in love with New York. conquer—Manhattan. And that’s where my After graduating from Tulane University love of megalopolises began. The bigger in New Orleans, I did indeed move to NYC the city, the quicker I fell. New York City was for decades before finding my way to calling, and I was ready. So ready. Los Angeles after years of visiting and, yes,
