Ty Jennings
7 min readMay 2, 2021

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Olympia Dukakis. Photo by Joanna Tzetzoumis

The Night I Had Dinner With Olympia Dukakis — Sorta…

This morning I read about the passing of film & stage legend, Olympia Dukakis. Like many people, I was flooded with memories of her brilliant roles, her dedication to the craft and, yes, a litany of delicious scenes and epic one-liners that will be forever-associated with her. I also thought of a special memory, that is quintessential New York City: the night I (kinda, sorta) had dinner with Olympia Dukakis. Here’s the story, as I remember it, nearly 23 years later...

New York City, Fall 1998 — I was meeting a friend for dinner at some Italian place she chose, deep in The Village, on Bleeker or Carmine or Bedford (it’s been decades, yet I’ve still never managed to fully memorize that area). With a couple of hours to kill beforehand, I walked around, but it was getting cold. I decided to sit at the bar for the last hour and people-watch. However, when I got there, the place was nearly empty, still a few hours away from the NY dinner rush.

I ordered a glass of wine that, at 23 years old, I knew NOTHING about but it made me feel very adult as I sat there in Greenwich Village. I looked around at the two occupied tables (out of maybe ten), only to see Olympia Dukakis sitting at one of them, by herself, maybe 6 feet behind me. I immediately turn back around to leave her alone, but then I convinced myself that I must be wrong, it’s not her… — so, trying to be subtle, I turn back around to check, it’s her. A rush of appreciation hits: It’s Clairee Belcher from Steel Magnolias. It’s Cher’s mom, Rose, from Moonstruck. It’s Anna Madrigal from Tales of the City!

Trying to ignore my giddiness, resolving not to look again and let her eat in peace — I hear a voice — her voice: “It’s pretty clear that you know me, but I don’t know you.” There’s silence. I take a minute to register whether she’s on the phone or not before cautiously turning around. When I do, she’s staring right at me, munching on breadsticks or something, before repeating herself with a familiar smirk and candidness. I’m silent, still confused that she’s talking to me. With one raised eyebrow, she says, “It seems a little silly that aside from that table over there (people oblivious to us), you & I are the only ones here. We’re each sitting alone, and it’s now pretty clear to me that you know who I am, but I don’t know you are. So who are you?

A warm smile spreads across her face. I nervously give her the 30-second version of who I am and why I’m there. In these moments, I feel bad for getting caught stealing glances at her in the first place. We talk for about 3 or 4 minutes, mostly me answering her questions, before she says, “Why don’t you join me, at least until your friend gets here?” At that point, I sit down at the table with Olympia Dukakis and keep her company while she has dinner.

Besides telling me that she’s doing some benefit in town, there isn’t much small talk. We share how we both don’t mind being alone, especially in NYC — because there’s such great people-watching to do. I resist the urge to ask her for stories of my favorite roles she’s played, though they come up a bit…

Of Tales of the City, she shared how she was proud she was to be part of it, yet surprised by the demand for more, referring to the recent sequel she had done. She hadn’t expected that role, or the series, to connect so deeply with so many people. What didn’t surprise her was that it wasn’t even on the radar of ‘mainstream’ American audiences — the dichotomy of the experience was interesting to her. I suspect she was also referring to the dichotomy of the American audience.

Parallel thoughts on Steel Magnolias, though different because it was more accepted and available in the mainstream. She loved the various archetypes of the women portrayed; they weren’t all just ‘mothers’ — they had their own backstories, hopes, disappointments. Their lives were so very different that they may never have found each other to even become friends if it weren’t for this uniquely feminine, shared ritual of the beauty parlor.

She shared that if men are fans (of hers), it’s often one of two situations: if they’re straight men, it’s usually only for Moonstruck (and they’re usually not aware of the mother-complex irony of becoming fans of hers because of that role), but in most cases, they’re gay men, which was fine by her. She opined that the roles she tends to play often resonate with gay men because “they like a powerful woman — gay men don’t tend to find powerful women intimidating…” which was refreshing to her. She offered the theory that gay men actually like to see feminine characters also be powerful; it’s part of a not-so-secret kinship between strong women and gay men, because neither is expected or encouraged to be powerful by the average straight man. She saw allyship to be found in mutual under-estimation.

But mostly, she wanted to ask questions of me — which, at the time, truly surprised me. My gut wondered something like, what could I offer her? She kept referring to me as ‘young man’ or ‘young person’ — which I didn’t feel like at the time. ‘Young’ seemed to imply a naïveté and innocence that I didn’t identify with. (In hindsight, I had the naïveté of youth, but the innocence was long gone.) Several times I wanted to circle back to her career, but we were two random strangers peeking into each other’s lives for an hour, and I was happy to let her run the direction of the conversation.

She reminded me of my amazing grandmother, who I proudly told her all about. She asked questions about her and our relationship; what my grandmother meant to me… I was happy to answer; it warmed my heart to talk about her, helped me to feel connected. I was aware of the similarities between the two women: 20 years apart in age but both strong personalities who had the knowledge and experience, manners and warmth of an older woman, but none of the self-deprecation, pretense, or saccharine-sweet grandmother-archetype that so often went with being a woman of their generations. These were interesting, strong, thoughtful, dynamic, curious women, unapologetic in their experience or for their wisdom.

We talked about the word stoic and its modern meaning… How stoicism can be useful to get through the chaos of life. We talked about being content alone, in our own space, with our own thoughts. But also finding contentedness with people, the right people. We talked a bit about acting and performing, from the point of view of storytelling, “observing other people was great for character development.” I wondered what she was getting out of observing me. We talked about New York, but mostly she was curious to ask questions, probing my thoughts and opinions. Listen. Nod & eat. Dig deeper into my answers, nod & eat.

Then we were done, she had to go. I felt a sense of disappointment that our time was up already. She paid her check and picked up her coat, telling me, “How nice this was, to have dinner with a young man.”

I remember noticing the smile she gave me as she stared at me while putting her coat on. My grandmother had it too sometimes — it was warm and intimate but not necessarily joyful. With my grandmother, it was the result of balancing hope with worry, lightness with concern, it was full of thoughts behind the eyes as she looked at me. This smile in front of me was in the same family. I’m sure that I read into it… Still, there was a validating sense of safety, care, and interest from this woman, something I was often missing at the time.

With her coat on, she pushed that smile wider, still looking me directly in the eyes, and grabbed my hand to say goodbye: “You’re a deep soul. You’ve got a lot of stories to tell. Protect your heart…” — and with a squeeze of my hand and a smirk, she finished: “But not too much.”

She waved to one of the restaurant staff and left.

Suddenly I realized a few more people had entered the restaurant. I moved back to the bar and sat there for another 10 minutes or so, processing the last hour of my life before my friend arrived. Once there, I recounted my experience; she was distracted by her own day, thought it was cool — and moved on. As though it were a mere celebrity sighting. She didn’t understand, and I didn’t try to force it. I went to pay for the 2 glasses of wine before moving to our own table but was told they were paid for by Ms. Dukakis, though I’m not sure how that was communicated since I never left the table. I felt terrible that I hadn’t known that, to thank her. But she was gone. That shock of platinum hair and those intense, piercing eyes had already integrated into the sea of dark coats floating the Greenwich Village on a crisp fall evening…

Whenever I’m walking around those little streets, I think about it: two random, creative souls peeking into each other’s lives for an hour. That’s all it was. One of them just so happened to be an Oscar-winning, beloved actor, ally, and occasional activist — the other was 23-year-old me. Just one of the many reasons I love New York City.

Rest in Peace, dear Olympia Dukakis, and may I say, all these years later: Thank you for the wine and the time.

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Ty Jennings

Writer. Storyteller. Podcaster. Community Builder. Snarky Optimist.