The comedian and actor reveals his love for Liza and pizza

By Angela Barbuti

Mario Cantone will poll the audience demographic at his show at Gotham Comedy Club this weekend—but he already knows what to expect. “Older, younger, black, white, some gay, mostly straight,” said the 53-year-old comic, who celebrated his birthday this past Sunday. Although a Boston native, Cantone has fully embraced life in New York City, appearing regularly on The View, dining at Per Se and bumping into his Sex and the City costars on Broadway.

Our Town: Where did you get your comedic start?
Cantone: In junior high and high school, doing talent shows with Robert Klein and Lily Tomlin’s material. By my senior year of high school, I started writing my own stuff. I went to Emerson College and got into the Emerson Comedy Workshop that Denis Leary started. He brought me into it my freshman year, and it was the most popular thing on campus at the time. It was huge.

How do you think of material for your stand-up?
It just depends on what hits me. I usually can’t talk about something that I’m not really passionate about. Either I love it or I hate it. It’s got to be one or the other. If I just don’t care about it, or it doesn’t affect me in any way, it’s hard to talk or write about it. Most of the impressions I do, I love all of them.

Which are your favorite impressions?
Liza Minnelli and Bette Davis. Those are two fun ones to do.

Do most people recognize you from Sex and the City?
It depends. If it’s young, crazy, screaming girls, it’s Sex and the City. If it’s a young black or Puerto Rican kid in my neighborhood, it’s Chappelle’s show. If it’s middle-aged women, it’s The View, which I like the best because then they really know what I can do. If you just see me on Sex and the City, you have no idea what I do, although I loved doing that show. I loved that character. It was a thrill and it made me internationally famous.

What was it like to work on that show?
It was a great thing; I had a great time. I came in on the third season and I got to be a part of it through the last movie. I was lucky. If you’re doing a half-hour show or two-hour movie, and you have four leading ladies, you have to give every one of them a storyline. When you’ve got these guys coming into the picture who are not even romantically involved with them, who are just gay friends, and they laugh, become popular, and remain—it’s a big deal.

Are you still in touch with the girls?
Once in a while, I speak to Kim and bump into Sarah and Cynthia at the theater. Kristin lives in L.A., so I don’t really see her too much. But the director and creator, Michael Patrick King, I’m in touch with a lot. I’ve known him for, gosh, 27 years.

What’s it like to be part of The View?
A blast. That keeps me afloat. I love it. I love all those girls. I get to sing, co-host and do commercials. I’ve been the lead guest, the second guest—I’ve done everything. If someone is supposed to co-host and doesn’t show up, they call me. On Dec. 21, I’m doing a Christmas-musical number.

Your Broadway debut was in Love! Valor! Compassion! in 1995. Will you be on Broadway again?
Yeah, I’m working on a new one-man show for 2013, which will be directed by Joe Mantello, who directed Love! Valor! Compassion!, Assassins and Laugh Whore, the one-man show I did on Broadway from 2004 to 2005.

What’s it like doing a one-man show? Do you get nervous?
Yeah, it’s terrifying. It’s also exhausting, cause it’s just you out there. I do six different musical numbers, so it’s like doing a musical on your own.

Where do you live? What are your favorite restaurants in your area?
On the border of the Chelsea-Clinton area. I love food very, very, verrrry much. For pizza, across the street is Co., which is the Sullivan Street Bakery’s pizzeria. It’s the greatest pizza in the world. Divine. Another great pizza place is Tavola. I love the Red Cat, which is on Tenth. If I want to go upscale, I go to Del Posto, which is my number one. I like the upscale restaurants, you know—I’m a hoity-toity diner. My other place is Scarpetta. Delicious. I do my little birthday tour of restaurants.

What is a birthday tour of restaurants?
My birthday was Sunday, and the whole weekend I go to dinner. Felidia, Per Se, Esca.

You mostly go out for Italian food. Do you think your Italian-American background affects your comedy?
Yeah, it’s certainly a part of who I am, and not only in the material, but in the way I speak and deliver sometimes, the cadence and the rhythm of it is very Italian-American.

What is the crowd like at your shows?
I would say 75 to 80 percent straight, sometimes even 90. It’s very interesting. I always say this: The gay crowd doesn’t really come to see stand-up as much. They like the women, which I get, cause I do too! And I poll it every time. I’ll say, “Where are my straight women?” Big applause. “Where are my straight men?” Big applause. “Where are my gay men?” Like 12. When I am put in front of a mostly gay audience at a benefit or something, and they’re forced to see me, it’s amazing. They love it. I wish they’d come out more, but they don’t for me. But anyway, it’s okay. I love my people.

Mario will be performing at Gotham Comedy Club on Dec. 13 through 15. For more information on Mario, visit www.mariocantone.com

In the past year, bullying has become not only a pervasive danger for students to dodge in the hallways but a hot topic of debate in the media, among parents and around dinner tables nationwide. Tragic stories of bullied kids committing suicide show up alongside activists’ best efforts to combat the problem, but still it persists.

Lee Hirsh’s documentary Bully, which follows a handful of kids and families from around the country who have dealt with severe bullying, caused a stir before it was even widely released when the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) refused to grant it the PG-13 rating that would allow it to be shown in schools. Dozens of news stories and a petition half a million signatures strong later, the MPAA relented and will change the rating.

It’s clear that people care about bullying, but the question is, who can stop it?

One former local student and his attorney are asserting that schools are responsible for preventing their students from being subjected to bullying. Eric Giray, a former student of the prestigious Calhoun School on the Upper West Side, recently filed a lawsuit against his alma mater and his alleged former bully, classmate Daniel Dworakowski, centered on an incident that occurred eight years ago. He’s seeking damages of $1.5 million for what his attorney says was a blatant failure on the part of the school to protect Giray as a student there.

“The school was notified over time, several times, that bullying was taking place,” said Ric Cherwin, Giray’s attorney. “The former principal kept on saying, ‘We’ll take care of it, we’ll handle it, don’t take matters into your own hands.’ But the school, in fact, didn’t really do anything.”

According to Cherwin, what began as students taunting Giray with names like “elephant ears” and calling him “gay” escalated to one harrowing incident on which their case rests.

“My client was dramatically singled out by the defendant, who violently pushed him with malice into the bleachers, and he suffered a serious injury: broken nose, 18 stitches and pretty serious psychological trauma,” Cherwin said.

Dworakowski’s mother told the Daily News that the scuffle was just an accident, which is how the school may have characterized it at the time as well. Calhoun could not elaborate on what policies they have in place to prevent and address bullying, either then or now. Several other private schools also declined to comment on their bullying policies.

“We are not able to comment on the matters under litigation, but Calhoun has clear standards regarding bullying and a long record of being sensitive and responsive to the physical, emotional and psychological needs of all of our students,” wrote Calhoun’s head of school, Steve Nelson, in an email.

Giray is now in college and his attorney explained that he and his mother didn’t want to file a lawsuit against the school until he was through the college admissions process—the statute of limitations on this type of personal injury does not begin until the victim turns 18. His case has ignited interest in who’s to blame for bullying, even while schools struggle to keep their classrooms safe and civil places.

For public schools, the city’s Department of Education (DOE) enforces a discipline code that prohibits all forms of bullying and has trained some educators in how to teach respectful interaction to their students.

“We launched Respect for All training programs in 2007, and to date, more than 6,000 teachers, counselors, parent coordinators and other staff members have participated in various components of the Respect for All training program,” said DOE spokesperson Marge Feinberg in an email.

“Each school has a Respect For All liaison that helps ensure schools comply with the regulation and work with the DOE central staff on programs that embrace differences in others.”

According to the DOE, the number of bullying incidents has remained fairly steady over the past 10 years, but experts say many students won’t always report bullying to authority figures and sometimes teachers don’t know the best ways to handle the problem.

“Teachers and school administrations need to be prepared to notice both the child who bullies and the child who is being bullied,” said Nancy Silberkleit, a former educator who has launched her own anti-bullying campaigns. “I have seen, too many times, teachers pushing children away for ‘tattletelling’ instead of encouraging them to come forward and dealing with their concerns.”

Upper West Side Assembly Member Daniel O’Donnell has been working for years to pass legislation that would help teachers become better equipped to handle bullying. Last year, after many years of pushing the bill, the Dignity for All Students Act passed the state Legislature and was signed into law. It will take effect July 1.

“It requires training of professionals; there needs to be somebody onsite who understands that bullying is not just kids being kids,” O’Donnell said. The law also requires localities to report bullying to the state Department of Education so effective strategies can be compared and tracked.

O’Donnell, who said he has faced plenty of bullying himself, finds it especially important to protect kids in an age when bullying is ever-present—kids don’t escape harassment when they leave the school building anymore and can be driven to despair by a particularly pointed Facebook post.

“I think the changes in the culture, the changes in the exposure to information and the ability to immediately communicate without thinking, which is what 13- and 14-year-olds do, creates this explosive environment,” O’Donnell said. Since the Dignity Act passed, he has also authored an amendment that addresses cyberbullying.

He also said that kids are exposed to sex, and are thus defining their own sexual and gender identities, at earlier ages, making young children who identify as gay or somehow different potential targets.

“This was the first time in New York State history that gender identity and expression were written into state laws,” O’Donnell said. “I know all too well that those children who violate gender stereotypes are the first targets.”

While the law will expand the requirements for how teachers and administrators address bullying, some say that it will be difficult to implement if parents and communities don’t also get involved.

“Teachers are overwhelmed with outside requirements to get students through tests and standards,” said Silberkleit. “There is very little time and energy left to deal with the social aspects of the students’ lives. Bullying occurs primarily before and after school.”

Kat Eden, communications director for Education.com, which works on anti-bullying issues, said that according to the results of a nationwide survey they conducted of 1,000 principals, many schools don’t have the resources they’d like to have to combat bullying.

“Principals surveyed reported a lack of resources to prevent and manage bullying—only 38 percent of principals report that they have sufficient resources to effectively implement bullying programs, curriculum and policies in their schools,” Eden said.

O’Donnell acknowledged that that is a particular challenge for many cash-strapped school districts, but insists that changing behavior is mostly a matter of awareness and education for current educators.

“We need to get rid of the idea within school environments that kids will be kids with regard to bullying,” O’Donnell said. “That’s just not OK.”

I recently read that Christopher Hitchens’ upcoming memoir tells of his passionate love affairs with boys in boarding school in England. No big deal for the now-married, smart-as-a-whip pundit and gray eminence.

Have we missed the boat? I think so.

We post-Stonewall generation of Americans seem to believe that a man or woman is either 100 percent homosexual or 100 percent straight. This is despite the fact that a few years ago, Drew Barrymore casually declared herself bisexual, as do some students at all-girl colleges. Recently, Anna Paquin, the New Zealand actress who won an Academy Award for her role in The Piano, the film starring the great Holly Hunter, has declared herself bisexual and in a relationship with a man.

During my years as a Ms. editor and writer (workaholic that I am, I wrote more byline features than anybody), I became intensely puzzled about women’s sexuality. After much reading, I found the most satisfying hypothesis in the writings of researcher Alfred Kinsey, who believed that female sexuality was “plastic,” i.e., malleable. He believed that women were capable of sexual response to a person of either sex. Because of what he saw as our sexual passivity, he decided it just depended on who came on to us.

This satisfied me vis-à-vis the formerly married women I knew who were declaring themselves lesbians—several of whom shamefacedly had abortions after they came out.

But what about men? I assumed they were homosexual or heterosexual.

But for a few years now I’ve been facing the absolutely amazing Scotsman Craig Ferguson, late-night talk-show host extraordinaire and autodidact who writes high-brow, totally honest books and who can respond to anything with a pertinent joke—like Louis Armstrong riffing on a new melody.

Craig is obsessed with sex—and speaks of having had affairs with both sexes. I was beady-eyed for a long time, thinking he was homosexual and trying to hide it. When a female guest touches his knee, he mumbles “do that again, please.” And whenever he mentions Orlando Bloom he makes it clear he’s attracted to him big time. Craig recently married a third wife (much younger and richer). Is Craig lying to us? To his wife?

By way of explanation he says only, “Hey, I’m European.”

Then my brain sprang into action (finally). Craig means that “the English vice”—which is what the French call homosexuality and which is practiced by upper middle class and married Englishmen, as well as boys in English boarding schools, somewhat routinely—is simply that: a sort of vice that is practiced without stigma by otherwise heterosexual men. (Oddly, little is known about Englishwomen and their secrets or vices—the society is, alas, not designed for them; men dress better, have the right to sleep with men on the side and have exclusive men-only private clubs.)

In general, Europeans seem way ahead of us on this matter and other sexual issues. Yawning and in general unperturbed about distinctions regarding his own sexuality, Craig is probably wiser and more sophisticated and less hypocritical than we are—we who kvell and gossip every time a public person is outed as an adulterer, philanderer or homosexual—when in fact there’s probably almost no one who hasn’t practiced one of the three aforementioned sexual behaviors.

I believe bisexuality is our natural state and as we loosen up a bit, it will be become more and more commonplace. 

–
Susan Braudy is the author and journalist whose last book, Family Circle: The Boudins and the Aristocracy of the Left, was nominated for a Pulitzer by publisher Alfred Knopf.

In order to maintain power, the clique that is running the State Senate acceded to Sen. Ruben Diaz’s demand that the equality in marriage bill never reach the Senate floor. That type of unprincipled blackmail can only lead to more of the same. When the lust for power overcomes doing what is right, the acquisition of power becomes far more important.

Of course, if it is true that something like one out of every 10 Americans is gay or lesbian, this is risky business for this unprincipled crew. I once worked at a TV station where they polled and decided that only 12 percent of the people wanted sports. They cancelled regular sports in favor of something else and soon learned that the “only 12 percent” were passionate about sports and switched the channel. If all of the gay people were willing to a) turn out for the election and b) vote out the scoundrels who had deprived them of their civil liberties, it could be “bye-bye” for the fear mongers.

To cut to the chase, why would any of us want to deprive anyone else the right to enter into a loving marriage with another person? Hey, you don’t want to marry someone of the same sex, don’t do it. But why take the civil rights of another away? We know that some of these very politicians who voted against the bill have gay relatives who will be terribly hurt by all of this. As always, there will be that moment when they have to look in a mirror and say, “What have I done?”

–
Alan S. Chartock is president and CEO of WAMC/Northeast Public Radio and an executive publisher at The Legislative Gazette .