As a vegetarian and automaton-phobic, I cannot say that a steakhouse full of wax figurines is something I would gladly go into. But I am grateful for the way Peter Luger leaned so expertly into our dystopian reality and presented a charming surrealist landscape through a collaboration with Madame Tussauds. It’s like that Black mirror episode of each season that is offered in an almost normal, cheerful-looking universe, where something is a little wrong. Sinister, even. In this case, they are wax mannequins depicting customers in a restaurant where real humans are no longer allowed to be close to each other because of a deadly virus that plagues the world.
This is life now.
Madame Tussauds
In a press release today, sent before the indoor dinner reaches 35% capacity in the city on Friday, Peter Luger Steak House announced the effort, which will help “ensure that guests continue to follow social security measures” filling the empty seats with wax portraits of Jon Hamm, Audrey Hepburn, Jimmy Fallon and Al Roker. (Charles Entertainment Cheese was unfortunately unavailable.) The statuettes will not be there forever, however, they will only be available until March 1st.
I love to see these two legendary New York City institutions coming together – that’s why we live here, folks.