Picture: Paul Feig, Instagram
Quarantine drove Paul Feig to drink. Of course, it was for charity, and for his Instagram followers, who for 100 days straight enjoyed his comical Quarantine Cocktail Time videos, in which he experimented with new concoctions and raised money for various organizations. He still does the show, though he had to end his every day streak as work picked back up on Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist, Love Life, and his other projects. (The Artingstall’s Brilliant London Dry Gin founder is also working on a cocktail book based on the videos.)
“I knew I was going to be sitting in my house for months, and I thought, Well, I can take this opportunity to get a lot of writing done, but I want to contribute also to help with this terrible situation,” says Feig, who is the creator of the cult classic television show Freaks and Geeks and the director of the hit comedy Bridesmaids. An added bonus to the whole situation is that he was able to put his guesthouse bar to good use. Below, he tells AD about the interesting inspiration behind the space, and shares his tips for anyone looking to step up their home bartending game.
Architectural Digest: Tell me a little about the part of your home where you filmed the show. Did you already have a bar area set up?
Paul Feig: I love bars around the world, and one I really love is Harry’s Bar in Venice, Italy. We had this guest house that we hadn’t really done anything with. It was very blank looking. So my wife and I decided we should have a bar out there, because we don’t have a bar in the house. We showed our woodworker pictures of Harry’s Bar, and he was like, “Yeah I could do something like that!” On the show you only see kind of the back shelf, but there is this really beautiful counter that has the tan wood that they use at Harry’s. It has a very specific look and is very ’70s. He did a gorgeous job.
AD: So you had the bar ready to go, but did you have to stock up on supplies and ingredients?
PF: Thank God for Drizly is all I’m going to say. I’d go on the app and say I need crème de cacao and all these things. It would be delivered to the house in a few hours. With the ability to summon forth all of these ingredients, I started looking for more and more recipes that had weird ingredients. My wife said it looks like I’m a bottle hoarder, but I refer to it as my test kitchen. Sometimes I just go out there and am like a mad scientist.
AD: What was the strangest ingredient you used?
PF: Crème de violette? A lot of crèmes. Crème de Noyaux, Parfait Amour. Allspice dram.
AD: For people who aren’t ready for those ingredients yet, what supplies or ingredients would you tell them to start with for their bar cart?
PF: Get the basics. If you are doing this because eventually we will be able to have people over again, you want to be able to make drinks to please a lot of different palettes. You should get vodka, gin, rum, tequila, scotch, a sweet vermouth, and a dry vermouth. If it is just for you and you know what you like, then you can have things like Campari so you can make a Negroni, or simple syrup for a whiskey sour. And you need citrus, so I’d have lemons and limes. And a bottle of bitters.
AD: Are you someone who finds yourself buying a lot of interesting cocktail glasses?
PF: Yes. I am obsessed with all forms of martini glasses, including Nick and Nora glasses. Those are kind of my favorite glasses in the world. The other thing I am absolutely obsessed with collecting are those drink sets from the ’50s and ’60s. A lot of them are made by a company called Culver. They did these metallic paint designs on the sides. They were in this rack that you could carry to the table. When my parents would have their bridge club I would come around holding the set and pour everybody a drink.
AD: Thats where it all started!
PF: Exactly. They are all over Palm Springs, because it is so midcentury. And I have been collecting them for years on eBay.
AD: What does cocktail culture mean to you?
PF: I love cocktail culture and what it represents. It doesn’t represent getting drunk. To me it means being an adult. Being sophisticated. A big part of my book is about trying to bring back the cocktail party, where you get together, and there’s music, but it is sort of in the background. There are drinks and conversation. I long for the days of people putting on suits and ties and nice outfits—like those pictures from the ’50s and ’60s of Truman Capote’s apartment. Cocktails are the oil in the machine of that kind of sociability and grown-up interaction. Also, my biggest rule is never drink alcohol out of plastic—you’re better off not drinking.
AD: What is your favorite drink?
PF: I am such a martini fanatic. But I really fell in love with dessert drinks [while doing the show]. Drinks that are made with heavy cream—which, if you are lactose intolerant, all bets are off—like the Grasshopper or a Brandy Alexander.
Written by Rachel Wallace.
This article originally appeared on Architectural Digest.
