Quick Takes: Guy Fieri's NYC spot blasted

L.A. Times Archives

Nov. 15, 2012 12 AM PT

Guy Fieri is known to most TV viewers as the louder-than-loud host of Food Network’s “Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives,” cruising the country in a red ’67 Chevy convertible and looking for spots serving good old-fashioned down-home food. But based on one major review of his latest restaurant, not even Fieri would park the car for a bite to eat.

Guy’s American Kitchen & Bar opened in New York City’s Times Square in September, and on Tuesday, the New York Times published its review. And unlike most restaurant reviews, this one is making serious waves.

The review, written by Times food critic Pete Wells, is a series of increasingly hostile questions directed at Fieri. It’s one of those one-time-only critical stunts that grabs a lot of eyeballs but rarely bodes well for the subject of the review.

And with questions such as, “Does this make it sound as if everything at Guy’s American Kitchen & Bar is inedible?” it’s unclear how Fieri could possibly answer them with anything other than possibly a middle finger.

Other questions raised in the review include, “And when we hear the words Donkey Sauce, which part of the donkey are we supposed to think about?” And “Is this how you roll in Flavor Town?”

Wells’ final summation of Fieri’s Times Square restaurant? “Poor.”

—Patrick Kevin Day

$75.1 million paid for Rothko work

A highly coveted painting by Mark Rothko has sold for $75.1 million at auction in New York. “No. 1 (Royal Red and Blue),” which the artist created in 1954, didn’t break a record, but it did command the second-highest price for a Rothko, according to Sotheby’s.

The auction house had expected the painting to bring in between $35 million and $50 million. The painting had been in the collection of former Sotheby’s president John Marion since 1982, according to the Wall Street Journal. The buyer’s identity hasn’t been disclosed.

In May, another Rothko painting, “Orange, Red, Yellow,” sold for $87 million at a Christie’s auction, setting a record for the artist.

On Tuesday, Sotheby’s also auctioned off a Jackson Pollock drip painting for $40.4 million. “Number 4 (1951)” came from the collection of Sidney Kohl, a financier, and his wife, Dorothy. Bloomberg reported that Kohl purchased the painting in 1974 for $105,000.

A “pope” painting by Francis Bacon brought in $29.8 million, and a Willem de Kooning painting, “Abstraction,” sold for $19.7 million at the same auction.

—David Ng

Channing Tatum is sexiest man

Channing Tatum has worked some magazine magic: He’s been named People’s Sexiest Man Alive for 2012.

And it’s only charming that he told wife Jenna Dewan-Tatum about the honor right after they’d finished giving their just-skunked dogs a super-sexy bath.

“My first thought was, ‘Y’all are messing with me,’” the 32-year-old told the magazine. (The “sexiest” news leaked last week, and in case Tatum wasn’t convinced of his hotness, he was also named a GQ Man of the Year on Tuesday.) The annual People honor puts him in the company of last year’s sexiest, Bradley Cooper.

The “Magic Mike” actor — whose own story inspired that raucous male-stripper movie — said he likes to stay lean: He’s currently at 195 pounds and in training, playing Olympic wrestler Mark Schultz in “Foxcatcher,” which will be released next year.

Dewan-Tatum, his wife since 2009, wasn’t complaining: “He is such an open-hearted person; what you see is what you get.” What she gets might be a family, if Channing has his way. “I’m ready; I think she’s ready,” he said. “The first number that pops into my head is three, but I just want one to be healthy and then we’ll see where we go after that.”

People’s sexiest man issue hits newsstands Friday.

—Christie D’Zurilla

Swift’s ‘Red’ again tops charts

Taylor Swift’s “Red” easily held on to the top spot on the national album chart for a third week, selling 196,000 more copies. The total is almost double the number sold by the newest “Now That’s What I Call Music” compilation, which entered the chart at No. 2, according to figures released Wednesday.

“Red” has sold nearly 1.75 million copies in three weeks, making it the top-selling album released in 2012. Over the weekend, Swift also collected three trophies at the European MTV Awards: female artist, live act and best look.

“Now That’s What I Call Music 44” sold just under 99,000 copies, one of four albums to debut in the Top 10 of this week’s chart. Ne-Yo’s “R.E.D.,” which sold 66,000 copies, landed at No. 4, and Aerosmith’s “Music From Another Dimension” was right behind at No. 5 with sales of 63,000 copies. “Miracle” by Christian rock band Third Day entered at No. 10 with sales of 29,000, according to Nielsen SoundScan.

—Randy Lewis