A Stage Deli Memory From 1969

The Stage Deli in midtown Manhattan closed last Thursday after 75 years in business, the victim of rent hikes and a bad economy. To show how much New York character the place had, enjoy the New York Times write-up from July 5, 1969:

Jewish waiters—who are used to giving the orders—turned polite and deferred to astonished customers yesterday.

It was Independence Day, and the independent Jewish waiter marked the day in the most signal of ways, with a startling change of face.

It has been said that Israel won the Six-Day War by putting guns into the hands of Jewish waiters—but yesterday they laid down their arms. Snarls were out; smiles were in. Waiters grown irascible on endless chopped liver and chicken soup beamed with good nature. From every pore oozed the sour cream of human kindness....

At the Stage Delicatessen on Seventh Avenue between 53rd and 54th Streets, a waiter tried earnestly to explain the startling change. "It's Independence Day," he said brightly, "and who could be more independent than the Jewish waiter?"...

But it was difficult. When a customer asked a waiter at the Stage why he wasn't wearing a name badge, he replied: "Why should I wear my name? Everybody calls me names, anyway."...

A policeman who walked into the Stage Delicatessen looked incredulously about him at the strangely happy multitude. Then the manage said playfully, "You're under arrest."

"All right," said the man in blue, "as long as you keep me in here."

Lost City Asks "Who Goes to Stage Deli?"

A trip to the Carnegie Deli—the Stage's longtime rival—might have been more appropriate at the moment, given the rumors of that place's possible closing. But the Stage is where I went, mainly because, well, the photos had already been shot. I'll get to the Carnegie soon.

Who Goes There? Stage Deli

It was not quite fair of me, I thought, to visit Midtown's Stage Deli on a Tuesday night at 8 PM during a snow-rain storm, when the joint was certain to not be at its vibrant, pulsating best. But, then, it was a good time to see what the 74-year-old sandwich palace is when it's not its usual self—that it, a tourist-clogged cliche.

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An Awkard Stage

What to do about the Stage Deli.

Typically, when the Department of Health shuts down a classic New York restaurant these days—as the DOH did today with the Midtown matzo ball soup mecca—I suspect overzealous grandstanding. The City department has been trying to prove itself worthy ever since the Village KFC-rat debacle.

But this time I shake my head over the behavior of the deli's owners. The Stage was similarly shut down in March 2006, you remember, so they're repeat offenders. This time, the City appears to have bent over backwards to help the institution. It inspected the deli on March 12, found vermin and such, but gave the restaurant two days to clear up the problem. Returning on Friday, the problem was just as bad. So, El-Shuttero.

In my book, a living public landmark is a public trust. The Stage Deli doesn't just belong to its owners; it belongs to the city. And it's the owners responsibility to keep it in good working order, so that it may flourish and continue for many years to come. If the owners can't manage that, they should sell it to someone who can. It's not like New York has so many classic delis left that it can afford to have one be killed by ineptitude.