Steve Cuozzo

Steven D. Cuozzo
Born Steven D. Cuozzo
(1950-01-17) January 17, 1950
Ocean Hill, Brooklyn, New York, United States
Residence Upper East Side of New York City
Education B.A., English, Stony Brook University 1971
Occupation Editor and writer/journalist
Years active 1972 – present
Employer New York Post
Home town Manhattan
Spouse(s) Jane Hershey Cuozzo (November 29, 1980 – present)
Parent(s) Lillian and Joseph A. Cuozzo
Relatives Lenore Hershey (mother-in-law)
Website nypost.com

Steve Cuozzo, (born January 17, 1950) is an American writer and newspaper editor who writes as a restaurant critic, real estate columnist, and op-ed contributor at the New York Post, a daily newspaper primarily distributed in New York City and its surrounding area. A lifetime resident of New York, Cuozzo spent his career at the Post, working his way up from his entry-level copy boy position in 1972, through positions including copy editor in the newsroom, entertainment editor, assistant managing editor in charge of features, and executive editor. In 1996, he summarized his experiences at the Post in his book, It's Alive! How America's Oldest Newspaper Cheated Death and Why It Matters. As of 2013, Cuozzo writes as a restaurant critic, real estate columnist, and op-ed contributor at the New York Post and lives with his wife Jane on the Upper East Side.

Early life

Steven D. Cuozzo was born on January 17, 1950,[1] in Ocean Hill, Brooklyn, New York. He and his brother, Joseph G. Cuozzo, were children of Lillian (February 19, 1922 - April 1970) and Joseph A. Cuozzo (November 14, 1916 – November 29, 1996), a Brooklyn electrical parts factory worker, and lived at 137 Hull St.[2][3] In describing growing up in the Italian-Irish neighborhood of Ocean Hill near the J/Z line over Broadway,[4] restaurant critic Cuozzo noted in 2009, "I recall stoop sitting with neighbors and a happy blur of maternal grandparents, uncles, aunts and cousins living in the building next door. I had my first pizza at a joint I recall as Jimmy's, on a corner lost to time a few blocks from home. The place boasted one big window, and the pies were a sublime fusion of gooey cheese and fragrant thyme, an herb I much prefer to oregano."[3][5]

Cuozzo attended kindergarten at a Brooklyn Catholic school and, when he was about six years old, his family move to North Babylon in Long Island, New York, where he would live for the next 17 years.[6] In 1967, Cuozzo began attending The State University of New York at Stony Brook, a public research university located in Stony Brook, New York. In April 1970, when Cuozzo was 20, his mother Lillian died.[7] In 1971, Cuozzo graduated from Stony Brook University as an English major.[8]

Career

1970s–1980s

After graduating from Stony Brook University, Cuozzo began his first city job in 1972 as an administrative assistant at the Space for Innovative Development performing arts center.[9] Located at 344 West 36th Street, the former home to a garment center Presbyterian church now included The Open Theater, an experimental theatre group active from 1963 to 1973.[9] In addition, the performing arts center included the dance company of American choreographer Alwin Nikolais.[9] Cuozzo moved into a Riverside Drive apartment in Manhattan and described his new experiences as marking his "portal of entry into Manhattan," where he had his "first whiff of big-city glamour and grit."[9][10]

On December 18, 1972, Cuozzo began working as a copy boy in the city room at 210 South Street at the New York Post,[11] an American daily newspaper founded in 1801 by federalist Alexander Hamilton and primarily distributed in New York City and its surrounding area. In a 2012 interview, Cuozzo noted about his entry level job that "In those days, it literally meant, besides getting coffee for the editors, it meant carrying pieces of copy around."[12] For the next four years, Cuozzo worked in the business run by Dorothy Schiff,[13] an owner and publisher of the Post for nearly 40 years. Cuozzo later would characterize the Post during these four years as a "bastion of principled liberalism" that produced a "stunted broadsheet" with "the graphic appeal of a pothole"[14] In 1976, liberal[13] Schiff sold the Post to conservative Australian American business magnate Rupert Murdoch for a reported $31 million (equals $129 million in 2015).[15] Cuozzo subsequently worked for Murdoch for many years and, in 1996, would be described as viewing Murdoch as "part Santa Claus, part William Randolph Hearst and always larger than life."[16]

In August 1977, the core of Cuozzo's childhood Brooklyn neighborhood of Ocean Hill was destroyed by looters and arsonists during the New York City blackout of 1977.[6] Cuozzo would describe this in 2012 as one of his worst memories.[6]

Cuozzo eventually was promoted at the Post from copy boy to copy editor in the newsroom and, in early 1979, entertainment editor with the title arts and leisure editor.[12] On November 29, 1980, Cuozzo married Jane Hershey, daughter of Solomon G. Hershey, a professor of anesthesiology, and Lenore Hershey, editor-in-chief of the Ladies' Home Journal.[8] At the time, Cuozzo's father lived in North Babylon and Jane, a summa cum laude graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, was a New York-based writer and editor who would go on to contribute to a variety of periodicals, including Good Housekeeping, Fodor's Travel Publications, and Hollywood Magazine.[17]

In the fall of 1981, Cuozzo was promoted to assistant managing editor in charge of features.[18] In addition to performing the duties of features editor, Cuozzo also was organizing contests and sweepstakes in the paper.[12] On a weekly basis, his job was to come up with a prize, which included a trip to Hawaii and "win breakfast with the baby elephant at the Bronx Zoo."[12] By January 1988, Cuozzo had been working at the Post for about 16 years and held the position of assistant managing editor.[13]

Commenting in September 1981 on a widespread concern that the Post would close, Cuozzo noted, "We were seemingly on the brink of extinction about 12 times in a much more heart-stopping way than this has yet become. I have full confidence in the boss (Murdoch) to somehow steer us through this as long as he is legally able to."[13] In 1983, the autobiography of Cuozzo's mother-in-law, entitled Between The Covers: The Lady's Own Journal, was published.[19]

1990s

In August 1990, Power Partners: How Two-Career Couples Can Play to Win,[17] written by Cuozzo's wife Jane, was published.[20] As both Cuozzo and his wife had careers as writers, the book focused on how dual-career couples can enhance their relationships by promoting each other's careers.[20] The book played on tennis analogies and suggested that couples behave as coordinated doubles teams—for instance, providing their spouses' business card at opportune times to help them acquire new clients or accounts.[20] About two years later, in November 1992, Cuozzo's father-in-law Solomon G. Hershey died.[21]

In 1993, Cuozzo held the position of managing editor of the paper.[22] However, in early 1993, Cuozzo and Gerard Bray, the paper's previous interim editor, were appointed co-executive editors, with Marc Kalech, the former metro editor, being elevated to managing editor.[22] Each would be working under Pete Hamill, the new editor-in-chief of the New York Post.[22] About a month later, on Monday, March 15, 1993, the 400,000-circulation New York Post filed for bankruptcy protection.[23]

Hamill and 72 other staffers had been fired the previous Friday, with Hamill and 50 of the staffers being rehired on Wednesday, five days later.[23] With the Post down to its last 11 rolls of film, and lacking any money to develop any film, executive editor Cuozzo said, "We are in imminent danger of shutting down unless we can get help quickly. We're probably out of money."[23] He noted how prior Post owner Abraham Hirschfeld refused to pay overdue bills for vendors, delivery, or security guards, or to pay Social Security taxes and pension contributions.[24] Cuozzo arranged to have rival newspaper, the Daily News, lend the Post film.[25]

At the end of March, Rupert Murdoch signed an agreement to reclaim the Post.[24] Predicting that Murdoch would become less abrasive, as compared to his prior ownership of the Post, Cuozzo noted, "He is a different Rupert Murdoch than six or seven years ago. I suspect in his second coming he would be less involved in the affairs of the paper because he now has a television network and a studio to look after."[26] Cuozzo took the story to Times Books and, in April 1993, signed a contract with them to write an anecdotal memoir about the Post.[27]

In October 1993, the Newspaper Guild labor union went on strike and Cuozzo was put in the position to help publish the paper with only editors and managers.[28] At the time, he felt that the union failed to recognize that, without Murdoch, there would be no Post and no jobs for anyone at the Post.[28] Cuozzo saw the Guild's 1993 strike actions as "bullheaded and intransigent."[28]

In June 1996, Cuozzo's book, It's Alive! How America's Oldest Newspaper Cheated Death and Why It Matters, was published.[29] In the book, Cuozzo uses his experiences from when he joined he Post as a copy boy in 1972 through his mid-April 1996 receipt of the Post’s new Sunday edition to present an anecdotal memoir that traces modern history at the then-195-year-old New York Post and describes its effect on America's news culture.[29][30] In addition, throughout the book, he expresses his views, such as the Post "asserted the importance of human emotions in the affairs of the world" and the newspaper's "emphasis on individual accountability" instilled discipline in American society,[16] crediting the Post for capturing "the energy" of New York City and originating what he characterizes as the United States' positive trend towards tabloidization of the news.[29][31]

Cuozzo described the Post's Page Six gossip column as "a meaner brand of gossip, and more personal," saying it was used to settle scores "not unlike that of nuclear aircraft carriers in the U.S. Navy: to intimidate Third World nuisances."[32] He described former Post owner Abe Hirschfeld, who four years later would be convicted of soliciting murder,[33] as "a squat bundle of free-floating hostility."[34] Four months after the release of It's Alive, Cuozzo's friends and fans attended a dinner at Central Park South Restaurant in New York to celebrate the success of his book.[35] In 2004, New Zealand-born Australian newspaper editor and journalist Frank Devine stated that the September 2003 book, The Murdoch Archipelago, drew extensively on Cuozzo's It's Alive! book for the Murdoch Archipelago's account of Murdoch's experiences with the Post.[36]

In October 1996, Cuozzo appeared on Think Tank, a discussion program that aired on Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) and was hosted by Ben Wattenberg.[37] The show, entitled Is Public Journalism, Journalism?, set out to discuss whether there was a new journalism that "sets out to go beyond just the facts and tries to shape the agenda."[37] In commenting on conventional journalism during the show, Cuozzo noted that an underlying assumption of its journalistic elitism is "that the public is incapable of making up its own mind or listening or applying any critical thinking to issues in an environment in which there are many voices being heard."[37]

During the show, Cuozzo contrasted tabloid journalism with the area in which he works, noting, "Tabloid journalism is journalism driven by a focused concentration on individuals as distinct from the workings of institutions. So even if we cover institutions, such as government or the Federal Reserve, we tend to do so from the point with the perspective that they're run by individual men and women."[37] Cuozzo noted that monopoly newspaper markets tend to publish articles that "march in lock step with the advertising community," and newspapers that promote or tolerate public journalism do so with the hope of selling more advertising rather than selling more papers.[37] In describing the Post and its place in New York public journalism, Cuozzo noted,

"But my sense of public journalism is this, that in New York City, a very different and unique market, we practice a very different form of public journalism altogether, which consists in having three daily newspapers, at least five television stations broadcast, plus cable channels, and maybe a half dozen odd weekly magazines, monthly magazines. And all of us, so to speak, wake up every morning and scream our brains out about everything, each from a different perspective and a different ideological each pursuing, more or less blatantly, a different ideological agenda. Out of that cacophony of voices emerges something resembling truth or reality.[37]

A month after appearing on the Think Tank, in late November 1996, Cuozzo's father Joseph died in North Babylon, New York.[2] Three months later, Cuozzo's mother-in-law, Lenore Hershey, died of complications from Parkinson's disease.[21][38]

In November 1998 at the age of 48, Cuozzo took on the assignment as the Post's restaurant critic, in addition to his position as executive editor.[39][40] As a new restaurant critic, Cuozzo said that he would aim to "appeal to the great body of restaurant goers who are passionate about dining out without necessarily being food specialists."[39] Cuozzo planned to review one dining establishment each week.[39] In November 1999, Cuozzo awarded Danube restaurant[41] a four-star rating.[42] It would be four years later before Cuozzo would award another four-star rating (to Oceana's Cornelius Gallagher).[42] In November 1999, Cuozzo began his weekly commercial real estate column, "Realty Check".[12] In the first column, entitled Ross Ready To Set Sail on Columbus, Cuozzo interviewed real estate developer Stephen M. Ross.[12] By 2012, Cuozzo was characterized as developing a view that "restaurant folk are meaner than brokers and developers."[12]

2000s

In August 2000, Cuozzo served as one of eight food experts to provide their choices for the 10 elite chefs of Manhattan.[43] Cuozzo and the panel selected in their top 10, chefs including Daniel Boulud, Jean-Georges Vongerichten, Nobu Matsuhisa, and Gray Kunz, as well as Christian Delouvrier, Mario Batali, Eric Ripert, and Alfred Portale.[43] In 2003, gossip columnist and writer Cindy Adams described her longtime boss Steve Cuozzo in an article entitled Leave Me Alone!, writing: "[In 1981], Steve Cuozzo was dispatched to spy on me. Keep me on track. A lifetime later, he's still spying on me. Forget keeping me on track. He's now trying to derail me. The man has just gleefully sent me a tub of e-mails, each of which deposits bodily fluid upon my person. I mean, thank God he's my friend. Imagine if he didn't like me."[18]

In 2005, the Post stopped running classic reviews directed towards "eating one's way through a new place every week," which was part of a trend in United States newspapers at that time.[44] Cuozzo attributed the decline of the newspaper restaurant critic to the dilution of the power of the critic through the numerous websites and blogs that allowed people to express their opinions about their meals.[44] Cuozzo also noted that restaurants had become bigger, more complex, and more press-savvy as other factors in the decline of the newspaper restaurant critic.[44] In July 2008, Cuozzo appeared on Just in with Laura Ingraham,[45] a news program broadcast on the Fox News Channel.

2010s

In early 2010, Cuozzo and his wife Jane donated, on behalf of Jane's mother Lenore Hershey, to the Lenore Hershey School Fund for Girls at Surprise Lake Camp,[46] a non-profit sleep-away camp located in Cold Spring, New York. In August of that year, New York City restaurateur Keith McNally publicly equated Cuozzo to a "centipede" who was an "illiterate, low-life hack" and "gutter journalist" in reply to Cuozzo's characterization of McNally in Cuozzo's Whine And Dine[47] and Eat's a Bad Year for New Places[48] columns.[49] In reply, Cuozzo stated, "I've long suspected Keith McNally had a secret crush on me, and I'm thrilled he's finally found the courage to confirm it."[49]

By March 2012, Cuozzo was writing his weekly "Realty Check" real estate column, was the Post's top restaurant critic, and edited the paper's Page Six gossip page.[12] In describing his experience with brokers and developers in writing his "Realty Check" column, Cuozzo note in a 2012 interview, "Most [brokers and developers] really care about the city. They really love New York City and they love what they do and they derive extraordinary gratification from participating in the transactions that bring beneficial change to neighborhoods and alter perceptions about different parts of the city."[12] In July 2012, Cuozzo was ranked No. 96 in The New York Observer's list of The 100 Most Powerful People in New York Real Estate,[50] a subject he knows well.[51] As of 2013, Cuozzo writes as a restaurant critic, real estate columnist, and op-ed contributor at the New York Post and lives with his wife Jane on the Upper East Side in New York.[52]

Publications

See also

References

  1. ↑ "Free Birthday Database", Free Birthday Search, birthdatabase.com, 2013, retrieved December 10, 2013
  2. 1 2 "Death Notice", Newsday, p. A32, November 30, 1996
  3. 1 2 Cuozzo, Steve (November 30, 1999), "Find dining", New York Post, retrieved December 10, 2013
  4. ↑ "Steve Cuozzo", Twitter, Self published, April 2, 2013, retrieved December 10, 2013
  5. ↑ "Find Dining - Hunger For Lost Youth Uncovers Few Eats in Boyhoodb'klyn Nabe", New York Post, p. 42, September 2, 2009
  6. 1 2 3 Cuozzo, Steve (April 15, 2012), "Will we continue to feel safe in NYC?", New York Post, p. 23, retrieved December 10, 2013
  7. ↑ Lillian Cuozzo (1922 - 1970) Genealogy - Family Tree and History, AncientFaces, 2013, retrieved December 10, 2013
  8. 1 2 "Bridal for Nov. 29", The New York Times, p. 1, July 13, 1980, retrieved December 10, 2013
  9. 1 2 3 4 Cuozzo, Steve (April 26, 2006), "The Block That Time Forgot - Thanks To Zoning Laws, The Fashion District Is in Tatters", New York Post, p. 60, retrieved December 10, 2013
  10. ↑ Cuozzo, Steve (April 7, 2013), "In your facelift, LA! When the 'Tonight Show' moved west, it kicked New York City when it was down. Now we return the favor.", New York Post, p. 29, retrieved December 10, 2013
  11. ↑ Matthew Hay Brown (September 19, 1996), Paean To Post Rich in Detail, Light on Thought, Hartford Courant, p. A4, retrieved December 10, 2013
  12. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Daniel Edward Rosen (March 6, 2012), "The New York Post's Steve Cuozzo Knows Your Every Move", The New York Observer, retrieved December 10, 2013
  13. 1 2 3 4 Howard Kurtz (January 22, 1988), "The N.Y. Post's Hard Decline; Scrappy Tabloid's Staff Keeping the Faith Despite Threat of Closure", The Washington Post, retrieved December 10, 2013
  14. ↑ Theodore L. Glasser (November 17, 1996), "Just the Morals, Please", The New York Times, p. 35, retrieved December 10, 2013
  15. ↑ Carmody, Deirdre (November 20, 1976). "Dorothy Schiff Agrees to Sell Post To Murdoch, Australian Publisher; Dorothy Schiff Agrees to Sell Post To Murdoch, Australian Publisher". The New York Times. Retrieved December 10, 2013.
  16. 1 2 Mark Jurkowitz (September 13, 1996), "True-Blue Take on Yellow Journalism", Boston Globe, p. D14, retrieved December 10, 2013
  17. 1 2 Jane Hershey Cuozzo and S. Diane Graham (1990), Power Partners: How Two-Career Couples Can Play to Win, MasterMedia, "About the Authors" page, ISBN 0942361172, OCLC 21374958
  18. 1 2 Cindy Adams (September 28, 2003), "Leave Me Alone!", New York Post, p. 14
  19. ↑ Lenore Hershey (1983), Between The Covers: The Lady's Own Journal, Coward-McCann, ISBN 0698112261, OCLC 477184160
  20. 1 2 3 George L. Fleming (October 15, 1990), Tips For Two-Career Couples Don't Offer Balanced View, St. Petersburg Times, p. 19, retrieved December 10, 2013
  21. 1 2 "Lenore Hershey, 78, Ex-McCall's Editor", The New York Times, p. B10, March 3, 1997, retrieved December 10, 2013
  22. 1 2 3 David Henry (February 11, 1993), "Pete Hamill Named To Top Post Post", Newsday, p. 26
  23. 1 2 3 Howard Kurtz (March 17, 1993), "Coup De Tabloid; N.Y. Post Editor Reclaims Office Paper Skewers Its New Owner", The Washington Post
  24. 1 2 Howard Kurtz (March 26, 1993), "Judge Opens Door For Murdoch to Reclaim N.Y. Post", The Washington Post
  25. ↑ Elizabeth Sanger (March 17, 1993), "'I'm the Editor. Amen' Fired Post chief defies Hirschfeld", Newsday
  26. ↑ Howard Kurtz (March 29, 1993), "The Post's Man Rings Twice; When The Deal's Done, Rupert Murdoch Gets His N.Y. Paper", The Washington Post, retrieved December 10, 2013
  27. ↑ "Cuozzo on Post, Ovitz on Toast", New York, 26 (17), p. 8, April 26, 1993
  28. 1 2 3 Howard Kurtz (October 1, 1993), "Journalists Out in Cold as Others Cross Picket Line at N.Y. Post", The Washington Post, retrieved December 10, 2013
  29. 1 2 3 "It's Alive! How America's Oldest Newspaper Cheated Death and Why It Matters.", American Heritage, 47 (4), p. 103, July 1, 1996, retrieved December 10, 2013
  30. ↑ Paul D. Colford (October 3, 1996), "JFK Jr.'s Wedding Gift to the Suffering Tabs", Los Angeles Times, p. B2, retrieved December 10, 2013
  31. ↑ Keith Love (July 21, 1996), "Of Headlines and Bottom Lines", Los Angeles Times, p. 3, retrieved December 10, 2013
  32. ↑ Timothy McNulty (April 12, 2006), "Scandal Alive and Well in Gossip Columns", Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, p. C1, retrieved December 10, 2013
  33. ↑ "Obituary of Abe Hirschfeld Property tycoon who pioneered the multi-storey car park and hired a hit-man to murder a business partner", The Daily Telegraph, London, August 17, 2005, retrieved December 10, 2013
  34. ↑ Larry McShane (March 10, 2001), "Still Eccentric, After All These Years", Newsday, p. A33, retrieved December 10, 2013
  35. ↑ Liz Smith (October 27, 1996), "Bogart Is No. 1", Newsday, p. A13
  36. ↑ Frank Devine (January 17, 2004), Mogul monstering, Weekend Australian, p. 12
  37. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Ben Wattenberg (October 17, 1996), Is Public Journalism, Journalism?, Think Tank, retrieved December 10, 2013
  38. ↑ "Paid Notice: Deaths Hershey, Lenore O", The New York Times, p. 111, March 1, 1997, retrieved December 10, 2013
  39. 1 2 3 "Post Adds 2 Critics", New York Post, p. 69, November 17, 1998
  40. ↑ Cuozzo, Steve (August 24, 2008), "Urban Myth - What Wikipedia Gets Wrong About NYC", New York Post, p. 25, retrieved December 10, 2013
  41. ↑ Cuozzo, Steve (November 24, 1999), "Tyrolean Thrills in Bouley's Trapezium", New York Post, p. 40, retrieved December 10, 2013
  42. 1 2 Barbara Hoffman (November 19, 2003), "Meet The 4-Star Kid! Oceana's Cornelius Gallagher Is Gotham's New Topchef", New York Post, p. 49, retrieved December 10, 2013
  43. 1 2 Braden Keil (August 27, 2000), "Top 10 Chefs in Town - Our Survey of Leading Food Experts Shows That These Kitchen Magicians Are The Best in the City", New York Post, p. 46, retrieved December 10, 2013
  44. 1 2 3 Bret Thorn (November 6, 2006), "Forget the newspapers and guidebooks; cook for the critics who really matter", Nation's Restaurant News, 40 (45), p. 28, retrieved December 10, 2013
  45. ↑ Just in for July 2, 2008, FOX: The Big Story, July 2, 2008
  46. ↑ Celia Baczkowski (Spring 2010), Gifts to our Endowment (PDF) (2), Re-Echoes, retrieved December 10, 2013
  47. ↑ Cuozzo, Steve (May 19, 2010), "Whine And Dine - Restaurateur Should Shut His Yap", New York Post, p. 39, retrieved December 10, 2013
  48. ↑ Cuozzo, Steve (August 18, 2010), "Eat's a Bad Year for New Places", New York Post, p. 36, retrieved December 10, 2013
  49. 1 2 Austin Smith (August 19, 2010), "Call Anytime!", New York Post, p. 14, retrieved December 10, 2013
  50. ↑ Naftali Group (July 11, 2012), "The 100 Most Powerful People in New York Real Estate" (PDF), The New York Observer, p. 7, retrieved December 10, 2013
  51. ↑ Cuozzo, Steve (November 17, 2013), "Ignorance is Wikipedia Even as it becomes the de facto source for knowledge, it's terrible about facts", New York Post, p. 24, retrieved December 10, 2013
  52. ↑ Steve Cuozzo on Twitter
  53. ↑ Steven Cuozzo (June 18, 1996), It's Alive!: How America's Oldest Newspaper Cheated Death and Why It Matters, Times Books/Random House, p. 31, ISBN 0812922867
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