The title of this blog is actually something that someone typed into a search engine and then came up with my website as a result.
The Rusty Scupper used to be a restaurant in New Haven. It didn't have the best food, the service wasn't always that great, but it had a super location: Right on New Haven Harbor. You could sit outside and smell the salt water and fresh air. Seagulls would hang out, hoping you'd throw them a French fry. It was a good place to take people who didn't know New Haven and impress them.
I once took a LAW & ORDER director and producer to the Rusty Scupper for lunch. Out of the blue, I'd gotten a call from the director. He'd somehow gotten his hands on a copy of my first Annie Seymour book, SACRED COWS, and he wanted to talk to me about a possible TV show set in New Haven based on the series. You can't imagine my excitement. The second book wasn't even out yet and someone who was attached to a REAL TV show was interested in my characters. I started thinking that maybe I'd even make some money with this gig.So I took him and a producer to lunch at the Rusty Scupper to impress them.
We had a lovely time. They were really nice. But in the end, the director told me that "no one wants TV shows about a reporter." I'm still not sure why. It seems ripe for possibilities. But I couldn't argue with the powers that be. I'd had a nice lunch. I have a good story to tell.
The Rusty Scupper closed a few years back. Right before my third Annie Seymour book, DEAD OF THE DAY, came out. In that book, Annie goes to the Scupper and has lunch with Vinny. In SECONDHAND SMOKE, the second in the series, Annie gets a sub from Frank & Mary's Deli on Wooster Street. Frank & Mary's Deli closed before the book came out. I started to get a complex about writing about real restaurants in New Haven.
Another restaurant opened in the Rusty Scupper's spot: Leon's. It's an old New Haven restaurant, first located in the Hill section, then on Whitney Avenue in Hamden. I don't think it could help itself by opening in such a great spot. I'm not going to write about it.
Oh, and the question about the Rusty Scupper having cameras in its parking garage? There is no parking garage. It's just a parking lot.
Do you have a favorite restaurant spot?
8 comments:
Karen, here is my Rusty Scupper story. In 1976, long before you were born, the Queen of England came to the United States to help celebrate the country’s 200th birthday. She arrived in New Haven harbor on her yacht the Britannia which docked on the east side of the harbor, about where one of the scenes from your book DEAD OF THE DAY takes place. She then boarded a tender to cross the harbor to a small dock behind the Rusty Scupper which the city built for the occasion at a cost of a million dollars. Unfortunately, the dock was too low and she had to make an unqueenly jump from the tender as the locals watched from the I-95 embankment. From there her motorcade took her through the city past the green and then went to the airport to fly to Philadelphia. She was probably here all of 45 minutes.
Ang Pompano
www.ajpompano.com
LOL, Ang! And while I most certainly was born then, I was a teenager and didn't pay much attention to current events so don't remember this.
That is a good story! And people would want to watch a show about a reporter, why not?
I saw your comment about the butterfly smuggling book. That sounds very interesting!
If I EVER get around to finishing that book of mine, I'm going to name-drop every establishment that I don't like just to see what happens...
John
Were there cameras in the LOT???
Favorite restaurant spot: anywhere near the ocean.
Jeff, I don't think there were cameras in the lot. Although I do know from my research for DEAD OF THE DAY that there ARE cameras that focus on the harbor in that area and you can monitor activity on screens at the police station.
John, you really need to finish that book!
Chris, definitely check out WINGED OBSESSION.
We used to grab lunch at the Rusty Scupper midway to Chicago when I worked at title corporation company which has since located RIGHT here in Pensacola with the Sacred Pelicans.
A quick fix of a lunch.
Thanks for all the like mindedness in this world of incivility. When will you start your own publishing company so I can send you a manuscript? SA
Love Cafe Amici in Hamden!
My husband and I think our marriage has doomed several New Haven businesses: reception at 500 Blake Street, invitations from Elm City Fine Stationers, flowers from Glen Terrace (Hamden) - all closed a year or two after our wedding!
Post a Comment