BLOOMSDAY BREAKFAST to Offer Star-Studded Costume Contest

A new, juried costume contest will be the centerpiece of this year's 3rd annual Bloomsday Breakfast celebration at Midtown's Bloom's Tavern, 208 East 58th Street, on Thursday June 16 beginning at 8am.

As its special way of commemorating the 2016 centennial of Irish Independence, the "Origin's 3rd Bloom... @ Bloom's Tavern of Course!" produced by Origin Theatre Company, will feature music by the Irish-folk-rock troubadour Alan Gogarty, actors in costume, musicians, politicians and visitors on their way to work and other endeavors, all coming together, as is the tradition, to recreate the summer morning chronicled by James Joyce in "Ulysses" set in Dublin on June 16, 112 years ago. The spontaneous group "performance" is fueled by a traditional Irish breakfast, with blood sausage and kidney pie among the edible delicacies, and refreshing summer drinks. Among the notables in the cast are Malachy McCourt, author Colin Broderick and actors Terry Donnolly, Patrick Fitzgerald, Brenda Meaney, and Fiona Walsh.

This year the "Best Dressed Molly and Leopold Bloom" will be selected from among the guests by a blue-ribbon panel of Irish fashion and design figures chaired by the internationally recognized image strategist Margaret Molloy. A $1000 Dinner and NYC Fun Package will be offered to each of the winners.

Playing off the theme "Bloomsday Then and Now," contestants will be invited to come period-attired, or in a summer festive outfit that is a modern interpretation of a Dublin morning 1904.

Bloom's Tavern kicks off a week-long Bloomsday Celebration with a special New Irish Cuisine cooking demonstration at Bloomingdale's, 1000 Third Avenue, on Saturday June 11 from 11am to 3pm. At this special cooking event a number of chefs will join forces to create deliciously innovative, wholesome Irish dishes based on traditional recipes.

New York's celebration of Bloomsday -- the international tradition of June 16 observances goes back to 1924 -- has lately lost a bit of its bloom. Readings still occur across the city, but outdoor, public observances have more or less disappeared. A staple of the Bloom's Tavern celebration is a rollicking roster of writers, actors and business leaders who read passages from James Joyce's groundbreaking novel "Ulysses," while enjoying the company of their friends and a delicious breakfast.

James Joyce first serialized "Ulysses" beginning in 1918. Considered a masterpiece of modernism, it was banned in the U.S. before the book was published in its entirety in France in 1922.

Blooms Tavern's special week-long Bloomsday Celebration, from Saturday June 11 through Thursday June 16 is produced by Origin Theatre Company. The Bloomsday Breakfast is on Thursday June 16 from 8am to 11am. FREE EVENT. For reservations go to www.origintheatre.org.