Last night at the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s gala dinner honoring Geoffrey Rush’s performance in Diary of a Madman, we inadvertently discovered that Rush’s fellow Australian Baz Luhrmann is a regular at Roberta’s. Normally, when we go to BAM galas and ask the famous folk about the last time they’ve been in Brooklyn, we get some amusingly shame-faced response about their busy schedules and how nice BAM was to have sent a car to Manhattan to pick them up. Luhrmann, on the other hand, could work for Marty Markowitz.
“I was in Bushwick recently at a fantastic pizza restaurant I love out there. It’s called … ” he began, then drew a blank and turned to his wife, production designer Catherine Martin. “C.M., what’s that crazy great, awesome, brilliant pizza restaurant in Bushwick where we go to?” Roberta’s, she said. “Roberta’s! Where they grow their own organics,” Luhrmann went on. “It’s just awesome and we have a great time and they grow all their stuff out of the back. And my kids go to school here and I really like the fact that they see where their food comes from. And most of my team are in Brooklyn. So I’m there a lot.” We continued to pepper him with questions about his upcoming adaptation of The Great Gatsby, which he answered in circles, with hints and caginess.
But he seemed so enthused about food and restaurants in general that it was obvious he should try his hand at a food movie. “Funny you should say that … ” he said, his eyebrows raised and a smirk starting to form. We began to ask another question, but he laughed and stopped us right there. “Uh-uh. I didn’t say anything!”
