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T.G.I. Wedding!

Huppah Dreams

by
Marc Tracy
October 24, 2011
Michael Stillman and Allison Levine.(NYT)
Michael Stillman and Allison Levine.(NYT)

Each Monday, we choose the most interestingly Jewish announcement from that Sunday’s New York Times Weddings/Celebrations section. This week, it’s that of Allison Levine and Michael Stillman. Had this been 45 years ago, though, they may have met at Stillman’s father’s restaurant on the Upper East Side, a little joint called T.G.I. Friday’s. Stillman’s father, Alan, has one of my all-time favorite Jewish-American success stories, having founded the T.G.I. Friday’s empire as the only public joint where young men and young women could go with no prior excuse and no invitation, meet each other, and see where the night took them. (Stillman has acknowledged his luck in opening it in the same year, 1965, that the pill debuted.) Stillman long ago sold Friday’s, and now runs the other restaurant chain he started from scratch, Smith & Wollensky’s; his son works in the family business. His son’s new wife, meanwhile, is a lawyer. No word on who catered the wedding. Mazel tov to the happy couple!

Marc Tracy is a staff writer at The New Republic, and was previously a staff writer at Tablet. He tweets @marcatracy.