{"id":96652,"date":"2016-04-07T17:19:54","date_gmt":"2016-04-07T21:19:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=96652"},"modified":"2016-04-07T17:35:23","modified_gmt":"2016-04-07T21:35:23","slug":"passing-strange","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2016\/04\/07\/passing-strange\/","title":{"rendered":"Passing Strange"},"content":{"rendered":"

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Photo: Alan Light<\/p><\/div>\n

Earlier today,\u00a0the New York City Council voted to restrict the antics of the various costumed characters in Times Square. As the\u00a0New York Times<\/em>\u00a0delicately put it, \u201cAfter an uproar last summer over nudity and aggressive tip-seeking in Times Square, city officials said they were aiming to restore order to the plazas<\/a>. The rules could go into effect by the beginning of the summer.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

You may recall that part of said uproar involved the groping of women, the pushing of children, and a fracas between a dancing giant baby and a man dressed as a pot leaf. The characters and\u00a0desnudas<\/em>\u00a0(women in body paint) have proliferated at such a rate that they\u2019ve quickly become, if not an institution, a part of the landscape: tourists pose with Olafs and Buzz Lightyears as readily as they do the Statue of Liberty or the cops from the local precinct. It\u2019s there, so why not? And for those who mourn the Disneyfication of Times Square\u2014those who are always howling about lost grit and cheap rents\u2014surely this must serve as some sort of grotesque, ironic palliative?<\/p>\n

I feel we\u2019re living in a unique moment. Beyond the obvious and real ways, I mean. Five years ago, these characters were a novelty. In another five years, I\u2019m betting they\u2019ll be a thing of the past. One of the few virtues of\u00a0Birdman<\/em>, to my mind, was the fact that it managed to capture that moment in history: as Michael Keaton\u2019s character runs through Times Square in his underwear, he\u2019s observed by a phalanx of leering, looming toons at the height of their numbers and power. I have not yet seen them committed to the pages of fiction; I would urge novelists to work fast.\u00a0Their days are numbered.<\/p>\n

A friend of mine works in the area, and as we walked across Times Square and he rebuffed the hugs of several characters, he said, \u201cIt makes me feel bad every day. Not just that this is their lives\u00a0but\u00a0that these immigrants have come to America and have to make a living this way. Also, it doesn\u2019t help that I\u2019m only ever approached by the really second-tier characters. This morning I was hugged by, like, a Luigi and a Robin.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Sadie Stein is contributing editor of <\/em>The Paris Review, and the <\/em>Daily\u2019s correspondent.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  Earlier today,\u00a0the New York City Council voted to restrict the antics of the various costumed characters in Times Square. As the\u00a0New York Times\u00a0delicately put it, \u201cAfter an uproar last summer over nudity and aggressive tip-seeking in Times Square, city officials said they were aiming to restore order to the plazas. The rules could go […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":178,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13115],"tags":[21875,21874,1257,1831,21877,2861,14130,21876,125,21873,5859,10608],"class_list":["post-96652","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-our-daily-correspondent","tag-birdman","tag-cartoon-characters","tag-costumes","tag-disney","tag-disneyfication","tag-history","tag-mascots","tag-michael-keaton","tag-new-york-city","tag-new-york-city-council","tag-times-square","tag-tourism"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nThis Is Your Last Chance to Be Hugged By a Cartoon Character<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Sadie Stein on the changes afoot in Times Square.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2016\/04\/07\/passing-strange\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Passing Strange by Sadie Stein\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"April 7, 2016 \u2013  Earlier today,\u00a0the New York City Council voted to restrict the antics of the various costumed characters in Times Square. 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