While the dreaded McKinsey recommendations are still weeks away, Conde Nast is in full cost-cutting mode. Examples: Graydon Carter is now lunching in the cafeteria with commoners and the free Fiji water will soon be replaced by tap water. Yeah.

Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter has an interest-free $5.3 million mortgage on his four-story greek revival townhouse in Greenwich Village, courtesy of his sweetheart deal with Condé Nast. What's he pay? Oh, $2,083 a month.

You know the Times' Styles section was eventually going to pitch in on the fiscal trials and tribulations of Annie Leibovitz. They delivered, filing a quote-happy roundup on the matter, starring Tina Brown and Graydon Carter, defending their friend.

"The Manhattan social scene is dead in the summer," which explains why Vanity Fair has introduced its very own board game called Socialitopoly. "Hunker down in your Park Avenue pad, grab your sterling-silver Maybach roadster, Christian Louboutin shoe, or Panama hat," the site advises. Guess this means if you were hoping to play along with a "Little Graydon" piece, you're on your own. [Vanity Fair]

"Socialitopoly," from Vanity Fair. Its unbiased rankings: Graydon Carter's Monkey Bar has above-average prestige, but the disgustingly easy-to-enter Waverly Inn is nowhere to be found. Take heed, board game-playing social climbers. Click to enlarge. [VF]

Monkey Bar is Graydon Carter's Exclusive Lair of the Famous and Awesome. It's so exclusive, even NY Times dining critic Frank Bruni had a tough time getting in. You know who didn't? Levi Johnston. And two of his bodyguards.

It's a good thing that author Fran Lebowitz is so tight with editor/restaurateur Graydon Carter that she can walk into Monkey Bar (or the Waverly Inn) without a reservation and get a table a moment's notice. If she had to use the phone—or Monkey Bar's email reservations system—she'd be in serious trouble. WWD asked her if Lebowitz if she spent any time using Twitter or Facebook and this is what she had to say:

• Graydon Carter turned 60 on Tuesday, and Frank Bruni was kind enough to give him a gift—an unflattering review of his Monkey Bar. Carter: "Frank Bruni's review in The Times was the perfect nightcap to the perfect birthday." [WWD]
• Speaking of Bruni, a long excerpt from his forthcoming memoir, which appears in this Sunday's New York Times Magazine, is now online. [NYT]
• Are restaurants like Minetta Tavern the city's new nightclubs? [BB]
• Word has it Cafe Boulud will be undergoing a major renovation and expansion sometime this summer and will be close for about a month or so. [Eater]
• A new cocktail lounge could be coming to Bryant Park next year. [Crain's]
• Philippe Massoud's ilili showcases Lebanese wines for the next month. [NYT]
• Le Cirque's Sirio Maccioni will undergo open heart surgery next week. [P6]

Vanity Fair overlord Graydon Carter just turned 60, and his staff rewarded him with a positively Vanity Fair-ish birthday party! The highlight was sung to the tune of 'A Few of My Favorite Things'...

• The Spotted Pig sells an estimated $1.2 million worth of cheeseburgers a year, making it NYC's top-grossing dish. Balthazar's steak frites is No. 2. [GS]
• Frank Bruni doesn't have too many good things to say about the food at Monkey Bar in his one-star review today, not surprisingly. Graydon Carter's "social pulpit," Monkey Bar merely "affirm[s] his ordination as the high priest of a certain fame-focused, power-obsessed sect of Manhattan society." [NYT]
• Related: Illustrator Edward Sorel talks about his Monkey Bar murals. [Zagat]
• Other reviews today: Danyelle Freeman gives three out of five stars to DBGB; Time Out's Jay Cheshes hands over four out of six to Marea; and Alan Richman makes the case that Bruni should make Marea the Times' first four-star Italian restaurant before he steps down next month. [NYDN, TONY, GQ]
• Chodorow is denying that he ever considered reuniting with DiSpirito. [TFB]
• 7-Eleven says it plans to open 44 new stores in NYC this year. Ugh. [NYT]

It's a big day for Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter: He celebrates his 60th birthday today! (Gifts, flowers, and cards can be directed to 4 Times Square, 22nd floor.) Others marking off another year today: hedge fund manager Phil Falcone (and the husband of Lisa Maria) is turning 47. Music impresario Tommy Mottola is 60. Movie mega-producer Scott Rudin is turning 51. Fellow film mogul Joel Silver is 57. Howard Lutnick, the CEO of Cantor Fitzgerald, is turning 48. Upper East Side plastic surgeon Sherrell Aston is 67. Actor Matthew Fox is turning 43. Tech luminary Esther Dyson is 58. Hudson News chief Jimmy Cohen is 51. Legal powerhouse Barry Ostrager is turning 62. Actor Harry Dean Stanton is 83. Interior designer Benjamin Noriega-Ortiz turns 53. Artist Lee Friedlander is 75. And actor Vincent "Big Pussy" Pastore celebrates his 63rd birthday today.

Most magazine editors spend their days discussing story ideas with writers and editors, reviewing copy, and deciding what pieces will appear in upcoming issues. Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter? He does that, too, but the part-time restaurateur also carves out a chunk of time every day to tend to the "daily process of populating the dining room" at Monkey Bar, a "choreography" he performs in conjunction with an associate editor at the magazine. (So, yes, while Condé Nast is currently laying off staffers, it's also pays one to manage the seating chart for Carter's little side project.) So how does Carter go about performing this pleasureless ("I'm like the guy with the sandbags") and clearly unhealthy task, one that's especially challenging since so many people want a reservation, the restaurant has been reduced to only accepting table requests by email?

Caricature-coiffed Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter co-owns two restaurants where Manhattan's most insufferable douchebags go to get their "look at me" on. Each day these establishments field "thousands" of table requests and Graydon alone decides where the arses will park.

• A look around Ward III in Tribeca, which opens tomorrow night. [GS]
• Lever House on Park Avenue will reopen as "Casa Lever" this fall. [NYP]
• Frank Bruni downgrades JGV's Spice Market in the Times today, giving the spot owned by the "clone-happy" chef one star instead of two. [NYT]
• The New Yorker's Lauren Collins doesn't have anything good to say about the Armani restaurant located inside the designer's Fifth Ave flagship. [NYer]
• Ryan Sutton is of a similar mindset, concluding that Montenapo, "like Armani Ristorante across town, serves mediocre hotel-Italian at absurd prices. [BN]
• Restaurant Girl gives Monkey Bar (otherwise known as "Graydon Carter's uptown dinner party) two stars out of five in the News this week. Over on her own site, she sits down with Keith McNally for a chat. [NYDN, RG]
• Lobster prices haven't been this low in more than 20 years, FYI. [Atlantic]
• Gansevoort Café opens in the former Florent space next month and the dining conglomerate New York City Restaurant Group will have a hand in it. [TFB]

• Graydon Carter's Monkey Bar is no longer accepting reservations by phone. In other Carter news, Carter's Vanity Fair has very nice things to say about Carter's Waverly Inn, which you'll no doubt be surprised to hear. [Eater, VF]
• Celebrity settings: A roundup of restaurants where celebs were spotted eating this week (or at least where gossips said they'd been spotted). [GS]
• Osteria del Circo is closed due to a gas leak. But Sirio Maccioni will be happy to seat you at Le Cirque instead and he'll give you 25% off, too. [Eater]
• JGV clears the record: He did not cook for four presidents past and present last week. Just one ex-president, a mayor, and UN Secretary General. [JGV]
• Teany caught fire today and will probably be closed for several weeks. [Eater]

Graydon Carter: Scandalously scant honoree introducer.

It's really a shame there haven't been cameras at the trial of Anthony Marshall, the son of Brooke Astor who now stands accused on plundering his mother's fortune. Hundred (thousands?) of Upper East Siders would have been glued to their TV sets the past few weeks. Sketch artist Jane Rosenberg has been in attendance the past few weeks to document the goings-on with paper and colored pencils. Can you identify the notable people above who've appeared on the witness stand? As always, answers below.

Ha, Vanity Fair just put out their NYC summer guide, but hey—don't ask them for a reservation at Monkey Bar! Owned by Vanity Fair's Graydon Carter! Because they can't get you one! Eh? Their guide also features errors:

Vanity Fair was kind enough to put together an "all-access" guide to summer in New York City, a document the magazine handed out to its advertisers recently as a token of Graydon Carter's affection. The PDF, which you can download here, is full of advice on places to eat and drink, summer concerts to attend, and even songs to download to your iPod before hitting the beach. But don't let the words "all-access" fool you. While Carter's Monkey Bar makes the list (naturally!), advertisers who just dropped a six-figure sum buying glossy ads in the mag should not automatically assume they're entitled to a reservation at Carter's celeb hangout. That's clearly not the case, as editor Jessica Latham makes clear. [VF All-Access Guide, PDF download]

Newspapers have been having problems, and whatnot. Why have they not asked Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter's advice sooner? Despite this error, Carter has deigned to stop having amazing sex for a few minutes to tell you how to save newspapers: