Brian Williams’ reputation has taken a solid thwacking since misremember-gate, but is his celebrity still intact enough to get him a table at New York’s hottest restaurants? Alex Pareene and the astute social scientists over at Gawker conducted an experiment to see who -- Brian Williams, his daughter Allison Williams, and Geraldo Rivera -- had the best luck getting a table at fifteen of New York’s most elite establishments. The results are fascinating — at least for those interested in the politics behind luxury restaurant reservations. (I particularly liked the footnotes detailing the host’s varied responses: "At the casual room, not the formal room;" "Literally any other night…” and "He is no longer with NBC, is he?”)
While their methodology is a little suspect -- they called for Brian on Thursday, for Geraldo on a Friday, and for Allison on Valentine’s Day Saturday -- there were still some interesting takeaways. They found that Williams had luck approximately 33% of the time, Geraldo 40% and Allison 20% (still, not bad for Valentine’s Day). While notoriously exclusive Polo Bar told Big Williams they were booked for the month, they made room for his daughter and three friends at primetime two days later. Williams senior was the only one who had luck at Per Se and Daniel, while Geraldo had the most luck all round, but at crappy times -- although he was the only one who got into hot new ticket Dirty French.
Check out the full study here, and accept the fact that if the "Girls" can't get into Chef's Table at Brooklyn Fare, you probably never will.
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