‘Seinfeld’ dinner and trivia night
Fort Lauderdale restaurateur Anthony Bruno says selecting a favorite episode of “Seinfeld” is a challenge on the order of choosing “a favorite Beatles song,” and he admits using classic lines from the show as much as he quotes “The Godfather.”
But the “Seinfeld”-themed Festivus for the Rest of Us Dinner being served on Thursday, Nov. 14, at Bruno’s wellreviewed Andy’s Live Fire Grill & Bar is not necessarily a Boomer nostalgia trip to relive the heyday of Jerry Seinfeld’s hit sitcom, which left prime-time TV more than 20 years ago. “Seinfeld,” apparently, is a young man’s game.
“It was the guys in the kitchen, they’re all in their 30s. They came up with the idea for the dinner,” Bruno says. “They love the show. They may know more about it than I do.”
For Bruno, who presides over the iconic Runway 84 restaurant like a character out of “Seinfeld,” the TV sitcom has long been a stress-relieving, “Serenity now” balm at the end of a night shift. He has watched every episode of the show multiple times, but, like his young staff, he’s only been able to see them on replays, first DVR and now Hulu.
“You know, it makes you laugh. You had a bad day? You put a ‘Seinfeld’ on,” Bruno says.
If pressed to name a favorite episode, Bruno cites No. 86, “The Opposite,” in which George achieves unforeseen success by doing the opposite of what his instinct tells him. (It’s a theme Bruno says he uses when betting on the Dolphins.) The “Seinfeld” quote he most likes to employ is more obscure.
“The one about the coke machine. [Jerry] tells Elaine, ‘Breaking up is like knocking over a Coke machine. You can’t do it in one push. You’ve got to rock it back and forth a few times, and then it goes over,’” Bruno says, laughing.
The Festivus gathering, “a dinner about nothing,” takes place at Andy’s Live Fire Grill & Bar 6-10 p.m. Thursday, and includes trivia, a costume contest, prizes and yada-yada-yada. It begins with an open-bar cocktail hour on the rooftop, with passed hors d’oeuvres including mini calzones, shrimp cocktail and clams casino, of course.
The four-course dinner starts with Elaine’s Big Salad and includes three entrée choices: Kenny Roger’s Roast Chicken, Banyan’s Swordfish (“The best!”) and Better Than Sex Seafood Risotto. The meal also will feature an assortment of desserts with obvious lineage, including chocolate and cinnamon babka, black-and-white cookies, Snickers, Junior Mints and more. The cost is $130 per person (all inclusive).
There will be prizes in the trivia contest, which will have multiple questions ranging from easy and intermediate level to trivia best left to grad students in the Anthony Bruno School of Seinfeldian Research.
In keeping with the theme, Bruno is offering a head start to readers of the Sun Sentinel, the hometown paper of the fictional Helen and Morty Seinfeld in the perhaps fictional Del Boca Vista. Here are three questions that will be part of the contest:
Easy: What is Kramer’s first name? Intermediate: What fictional character is mentioned or shown in every “Seinfeld” episode?
Grad school: What book did Jerry never return to the library when he was in high school?
In the case of a tie, you may be asked to dance like Elaine. The Festivus for the Rest of Us Dinner is 6-10 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 14, at Andy’s Live Fire Grill & Bar, 1843 S. Federal Highway, Fort Lauderdale. Price is $130 per person, all inclusive. For tickets and RSVP, call 954-903-9945 or visit AndysLiveFire.com.