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Forget the Edge of Glory — on opening night, “Lady Gaga restaurant” Joanne on West 68th Street was close to the edge of collapse.
You don’t expect a brand-new eatery to be running on all cylinders. But Joanne, owned by the pop superstar’s parents, last night was running mainly on acrid-smelling burnt vinegar wafting intermittently through the raucous dining room.
Half-expecting to be kicked out of the place at its no-press-allowed debut, I plotted where we’d go for dinner nearby if we got the boot. Alas, no such luck — and thus began a 2 1/2-hour meal that seemed like as many days.
I felt sorry for Art Smith, the fine chef who somehow hooked up with Lady Gaga’s parents, Joseph and Cynthia Germanotta. Unlike many other chefs who enjoy TV fame, Smith is a genuinely major talent.
Having eaten at his marvelous, Southern-inspired Table 52 in Chicago, I’m baffled that he’s lending his name, prestige and presence to an Italian “trattoria” that last night wasn’t ready for prime time — or even the wee hours.
Hey, it just opened! Not fair to “review” a place so soon! But the Germanottas, Smith and Gaga herself, with the windiest hype machine east of the Pacific, have been trumpeting the joint for months. For Day One, couldn’t they at least get some people who act like they’ve seen the inside of a restaurant before?
Joanne is a brick-walled affair of the sort considered cozy in certain Brooklyn neighborhoods, but which in these parts registers as plain cramped (and loud as an avalanche). Big Joe Germanotta — a fellow so large, Lady Gaga could fit inside one leg — prowled the narrow aisles.
“I bought four chairs from Yankee Stadium and put them in my garden,” he told a table of friends.
Much of the staff, including the crew toiling in the open kitchen, seemed plucked from the ’burbs. Clueless busboys wandered the floor, performing no other function than to pour tap water into sparkling.
At one point, Smith himself cleared tables, including mine. Poor Smith — another time, he stood before the kitchen counter instructing cooks.
“That is a very important task,” he said patiently.
Appetizers took 50 minutes to arrive. Grilled calamari with bitter greens and radicchio were the worst I’ve had in a lifetime of squid-mongering, the salad unseasoned and the calamari like leather.
One-note orecchiette with shellfish recalled the flaccid pasta commonly doled out along Long Island’s Jericho Turnpike — or at 35,000 feet.
Unspeakably fatty veal osso bucco was $38. In a review the other day, I criticized the same dish at new Caffe Storico, where it cost only $28. Come back, Caffe Storico! All’s forgiven.
There was no sign of Lady Gaga, presumably busy with the upcoming Grammys on the Left Coast. But her pal Tony Bennett popped in, looking radiant and drawing oohs at the bar.
Gaga and Bennett dueted on “The Lady Is a Tramp” on his new album. They’re not bad together.
But if Smith plans to stick with the Germanottas, he should worry about that calamari — and his career.