Tea “Shop”
“Little Shop of Horrors” made Broadway history with a special performance celebrating its longest run ever — but one audience member planted the seed for an especially succulent subplot. Liz Gillies – who is Ariana Grande’s longtime bestie and starred in the show Off-Broadway – was spotted near the front watching Ethan Slater play Seymour.
The seating was perhaps a little thorny – given Slater and Grande broke up earlier this year after three years together. (The scandalous romance began to blossom while they filmed “Wicked” — with Slater leaving his wife, Lilly Jay, and their infant son amid the fallout). Still, Gillies appeared to take it all in stride, with no visible bam-booing from the “Little Shop” alum. She later worked the afterparty with her “13” co-star Graham Phillips and posed for red-carpet snaps.
The Sept. 27 performance marked the musical’s 2,210th, matching the original 1982 Orpheum production and making the current run the longest in its history. Alan Menken surprised the cast at curtain call, while “Little Shop” alumni including Jordan Fisher, Nicholas Christopher, Nikki M. James, Phillips, Jeremy Kushnier and James Carpinello joined the celebration. Guests then flocked to the ILA Penthouse, where Ari Groover DJ’d and partygoers made flower bouquets. Slater, however, was notably absent.
Seat in the front rochambeau
Tony winner Ali Louis Bourzgui says he and his fellow vampires performing aerial stunts in the hit show “The Lost Boys” have a way to bring themselves back down to earth — and it involves a kids game. Bourzgui said during an event at Greene Space with the Grammy Museum that when the bloodsuckers are getting set to do an upside-down moment, “It’s terrifying because you are 70 feet in the air, up where the props and electrics are supposed to be, not humans. So you are up there and you have to flip upside down and pray.” He revealed that “In order to trick the nervous system we play rock, paper, scissors. It’s this goofy game to make your brain not think about what you are doing.” Sean Grandillo, who plays the vampire Dwayne, is normally the winner.
Italian wedding scoop
Move over George and Amal! Luxury consultant Eric Viner — whose father Cliff founded the III Offshore Partners hedge fund and was previously a co-owner of the Florida Panthers — wed anesthesiologist Jordan Scott Wise in an over-the-top wedding on Lake Como that included drunken shenanigans and a near caviar catastrophe.
Guests including designer Christian Cowan, “Real Housewives of Salt Lake City” star Meredith Marks, her son, “Next Gen NYC” star Brooks Marks, celebrity publicist Anna Rothschild, and Spotlight Magazine editor Sydney Sadick partook in the three day fête. A source tells us that after dinner the first night, attendees staying at the famed Villa d’Este — where Emily Blunt and John Krasinski, and Nina Agdal and Logan Paul, said ‘I Do” — “completely took over the legendary hotel, raging until 3 a.m.” A source tells us there was “champagne flowing and guests climbing onto tables and dancing everywhere they could find a surface.”
They called it a “very wild after party.” We hear one drunken guest lost her phone in the lake, jumping into the water in her gown but failing to retrieve it. Saturday’s black-tie wedding included a lavish seated dinner, sparklers, and fireworks. A source tells us that the wedding actually cleared out all the caviar in the area. Luckily, Marks, who has her own caviar line, had arrived with a full kilo of her own, swooping in with an emergency supply. A source says Cowan, sporting his massive canary diamond from his fiancé, the singer Sam Smith, is prepping for his own wedding next June. Viner and Wise had another smaller ceremony this August in Southampton.
Serving more than dinner
Charlize Theron brought plenty of star power to Malibu Food & Wine’s swanky bash at Saddlerock Ranch, held in support of her Charlize Theron Africa Outreach Project.
The Oscar winner (above) looked knockout in a white pantsuit as guests sipped and bid on bottles with winemaker Baron Ziegler, who offered up reserve magnums and an absurdly luxe prize: He’d personally fund the winner’s airfare and fly in a private sommelier. Chef Marcel Vigneron offered to cook a private dinner to pair with the vino, while Anthony Villegas of the Meat Cellar threw in premium tomahawk steaks.
Ziegler, a dad to five daughters, got sentimental, saying Theron’s mission — including her work addressing violence against women — deeply moved him.
Bollywood superstar gets a little me Times
Times Square is rarely a place people go to get away from it all — but it does the trick for Shreya Ghoshal. Ghoshal is one of the most famous singers in India, but has yet to reach Swift-like levels of superstardom in the US, which means she can go to 42nd and Broadway for a little time to herself.
“I was in Times Square very bravely last night,” she told Page Six’s Talia Levy. “I don’t think that is possible back home . . . that’s why I like coming to New York . . . no one will even look at you twice!” She’s here on her Unstoppable tour, and she’s just added 14 dates to the massive global series.
Mouse in thirst trap
It’s a murine sign of the times! Page Six has written countless stories about luxury stores and offices getting mice, and standard procedure is for the afflicted establishment to make a swift call to the exterminator. But this is 2026. This time we got a tip that a trendy Soho boutique found a furry intruder . . . and, rather than putting out traps, they turned it into an influencer, reports Page Six’s Talia Levy.
When a web-based reality TV show, “Fishtank,” became a hit, its producers — Sam Hyde, Jet Neptune and Benjamin Taylor — decided to open a store nominally to sell merchandise from its stars, creators and collaborators. But, more than anything, the storefront at 93 Canal St. was intended as a place to make even more video for the show. As one insider put it, it’s “basically an open invitation for artists, musicians, etc. to do whatever in there for 24 hours a day,” saying the focus is on “organic events that transpire into real-time content.”
Then one night in early September, livestream viewers noticed a mouse scurry across the floor of the otherwise empty store. Followers started chatting about the rodent and named it “Ratthew,” so the producers put up a camera for it and even put out food to tempt it in front of their lens.
A family affair
Struggling to raise a teen? Consider recording an album together. Grammy-winning singer Falu and husband Dr. Gaurav Shah found that working with their 15-year-old son, Nishaad, on their new album “Offering: Ancient and Timeless Chants” came with a side benefit of a little family bonding. “It was so nice to watch. I let go of his wings and let him fly in this album . . . I saw that magic of letting go . . . I didn’t know I could do that as a mother, you know, you always want to hold on to your children,” Falu told Page Six’s Talia Levy. “The roots are from us,” she added of Nishaad’s performance, but “he adds his own style.”
Air craft before takeoff
Even cultural behemoths have to start somewhere. Before “American Idol” became one of the biggest shows on TV, its sets were held together with glue, according to Clay Aiken. The Season 2 runner-up in 2003 recently returned to the show to perform a song from his album, “Rewind,” and told Astra on the Air from “Hollywood Hamilton and the KTU Morning Crew” how the set had changed during his 23-year absence.
He said that in his time, “there were big structural metal pieces and papier-mâché between them” — and there wasn’t even a proper light rig. “They used flashlights!” he quipped.
He won’t be Water’d down
Political correctness has gone mad, says John Waters. “You can’t say ‘Happy birthday, Fatso!’ ” he exclaimed at the premiere of the new season of “American Horror Story.” “The F-word used to be one thing; now it’s ‘fat.’ ”
Meanwhile, Waters says he’s great friends with “AHS” hon cho Ryan Murphy. “We’re drawn to things that maybe repel us and we can’t understand . . . We both read a million newspapers a day; I think we’re current-event hags.”
Who’s the LGBTQueen?
Leslie Grossman was livid when Page Six asked her and Billie Lourd who had the bigger gay fan base. “You just pointed at Billie, which I resent, because excuse me? Did you say, ‘Bigger gay fan base’?” Grossman (above) told PageSix.com’s Nicki Gostin on the “American Horror Story: 13” red carpet. “I was Mary Cherry 30 years ago,” she said, referring to her “Popular” character. “I’m her elder!” Lourd then played her cards. “I come from generations of gay icons,” she said, referring to grandmother Debbie Reynolds and mother Carrie Fisher. “I come from a gay family,” she said, bringing up her dad, agent Bryan Lourd, who is married to Bruce Bozzi. “That’s true,” Grossman said. “Having a gay dad is the most gay thing.”