World-renowned wine and food critic Jonathan Cristaldi will be hard to miss today in Napa Valley, as he’ll be wearing an Italian Waterford orange vest, “perfect for fall tastings,” says the prolific critic.
“Although I didn’t win the Nobel Prize for wine writing, I did have an encounter with Robert Redford that I’ll never forget,” he told a Cristaldi & Co representative while standing on line at Gott’s for a Turkey Cheeseburger. “It was in the locker room at Meadwood. I see this guy who looks familiar. Thankfully, not a winemaker. Those run-ins are certainly awkward. It hit me as I was walking to my car in the parking lot: That was The Great Gatsby. I regretted not saying ‘Here’s lookin’ at you, Old Sport.’”
Fans and those obsessed with Cristaldi’s work as a performance artist in New York City fondly recall him carrying around a copy of The Great Gatsby, and pulling it out for readings at random times. “Once, we couldn’t get a table at Balthazar,” recalled a Cristaldi friend from college, “so he whips out Gatsby and starts reading, and wouldn’t stop until they gave us a table.”
A hostess who worked at Balthazar at the time actually recalled the episode. “He was so charming, all dapper in a blue suit, and kept reading lines from Gatsby. I had to call security and have him escorted out, of course. He kept yelling about being an ‘Oxford man.’ I think I might have married him if I’d gotten to know him.”
