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\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
Froma Harrop<\/p>\n
Fifth Avenue swarms with tourists grinning at the fabulous scene as retailers cash in on the cheer. Christmas in New York is a Rockettes kick line of store windows awash in fantasy and light spectaculars. But something is missing from the big show this year. <\/p>\n
That would be Donald Trump. In truth, the president hasn\u2019t made much of a Gotham showing in years \u2014 striking, given how hard he once worked to make Christmas in New York all about him, before he moved on to making the world all about him, all the time. <\/p>\n
Sure, Trump Tower still looms over Fifth and just a few steps from the gilded Plaza Hotel. Earlier in his presidency, Trump Tower was itself one of the sights, with tourists taking selfies with the armed guards behind. Now it is just another of the notable buildings on the avenue. <\/p>\n
However, the Christmas movies featuring Trump as grantor of holiday cheer get replayed every year around this time. The most famous is \u201cHome Alone 2: Lost in New York\u201d from 1992. <\/p>\n
Lost boy Macaulay Culkin finds himself in an ornate corridor of the Plaza as enchanting children\u2019s music plays in the background. As Trump is about to pass him, the boy says, \u201cExcuse me. Where\u2019s the lobby?\u201d A pointing Trump says, \u201cDown the hall and to the left.\u201d The boy says, \u201cThanks.\u201d <\/p>\n
That\u2019s the scene. Trump owned the Plaza at the time (though his creditors held a reported 49% of the equity). Trump demanded that the director include a cameo starring him as the price of permission to film there. <\/p>\n
Another example of Trump inserting himself into a Christmas movie as the quintessential rich and benevolent New Yorker comes in the 2011 film \u201cMr. Popper\u2019s Penguins.\u201d In the story, crates containing live penguins are delivered to the posh apartment of Mr. Popper, a divorced father played by Jim Carrey. The penguins lead Popper on adventures containing references to Trump. <\/p>\n
Popper and the penguins go skating at what was then the Trump Wollman Rink in Central Park. The camera pauses on the name TRUMP, virtually leaving out Wollman. The rink has since gone back to its original name, simply, the Wollman Rink.<\/p>\n
A film reviewer for the National Catholic Register wrote at the time: \u201cWhat is up with this Donald Trump as product placement?\u201d Product placement is a marketing deal where a brand\u2019s product or name is inserted into a movie as part of a scene. It\u2019s a sneaky form of advertising.<\/p>\n
There\u2019s another sequence in the landmark Tavern on the Green where Popper quips, \u201cYou can\u2019t even get a reservation here unless you\u2019re dating The Donald.\u201d <\/p>\n
The real story back then was that the famed Central Park restaurant had fallen on hard times. Trump was then talking big to the New York media about plans to spend $20 million to rebuild Tavern and make it \u201cthe highest-grossing restaurant on the planet.\u201d But when the city Parks Department asked potential operators to submit bids, Trump was nowhere to be seen.<\/p>\n
\u201cBizarrely, the movie pretends that Trump already has something to do with the place,\u201d the reviewer complained.<\/p>\n
As Christmas movies go, \u201cMr. Popper\u2019s Penguins\u201d was no \u201cMiracle on 34th Street,\u201d a film about an elderly man named Kris Kringle whom Macy\u2019s hired to play Santa but who insists he\u2019s the true Santa Claus. Though \u201cMiracle\u201d appeared to be a ginormous ad for Macy\u2019s, the store apparently didn\u2019t pay 20th Century Fox for its essential role. On the contrary, Macy\u2019s demanded that Fox show the movie to its executives before they allowed its name to be used.<\/p>\n
What a different culture it was back in 1947. <\/p>\n
Follow Froma Harrop on Twitter @FromaHarrop. She can be reached at fharrop@gmail.com<\/a>. To find out more about Froma Harrop and read features by other Creators writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators webpage at www.creators.com.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Froma Harrop Fifth Avenue swarms with tourists grinning at the fabulous scene as retailers cash in on the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":80021,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[2692,39682,39681,9,11,10],"class_list":["post-80020","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-columns","tag-froma-harrop-trump-plays-mr-new-york-christmas-only-in-the-movies","tag-froma-harrop-trump-plays-mr-new-york-christmas-only-in-the-moviesopinion","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-headlines","tag-new-york-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/80020","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=80020"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/80020\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/80021"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=80020"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=80020"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=80020"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}