NEW YORK CITY – It was 1981 when Ronald Colbert, who had just returned from service in the Navy as a junk specialist aboard the USS Cavalla, went to Times Square to drop the ball in person for the first time.
It was a lifelong dream come true that year, and since then he goes there almost every year.
“My younger brother and I would stay with whoever was watching to drop the ball at the moment. Everyone was wearing their party hats, streamers. Dancing in tiaras and tuxedos. The initial ball was just a little white – probably so big “Like a bowling ball on a flagpole. Now they’ve turned it into this electronic monster,” Colbert said.
“The excitement is incredible, the energy that everyone has during the last minute. I don’t know how many people I kissed or kissed strangely on New Year’s Eve.”
Colbert was scheduled to visit Times Square for the last time on December 31, and the new year with more than a million strangers from around the world gathering in the heart of the Big Apple for the final seconds of the year. .
Ronald Colbert celebrates New Year’s Eve on December 31, 2019 in Times Square, Manhattan. As a longtime connoisseur, he hopes to return to the square to see The Ball fall one last time.
(Ronald Colbert)
“I was already planning everything, my Kentucky Fried Chicken in my Ziplocs and I was ready to stay just all day,” says Colbert, a deckhand for the Staten Island Ferry.
For the first time in 114 years, the New Year’s Eve spectacle is being held in Times Square without a live audience due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.
That would have meant Colbert’s 40th birthday party during New Year’s Eve celebration at Times Square.
“I was waiting for it to be my last year. I’ll have to make it next year,” he says. “It’s a disappointment, but it’s not a disaster.”
As usual, there is a live TV broadcast for the New Year’s Eve 2020 celebration in Times Square. In addition, the opportunity will be accessible to watch in an app called VNYE, where users can also explore the virtual world of Times Square.
‘We also add a whole virtual kind of version of it [TV]. It’s always been virtual in some ways, “said Tim Tompkins, president of Times Square Alliance, which is one of the makers of the NYE event. You’re going to be able to create a virtual world of Times Square, your own avatar, and then place yourself within a virtual Time Square to experience New Year’s Eve as if you were there and in real time. ‘
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VNYE was created by Jamestown, the group that owns the building that houses the 11,875-pound New Year’s Eve ball, which is covered by 2,688 Waterford Crystal triangles illuminated by 32,256 LEDs.
So far this year, there have been more than 18 million cases of coronavirus and since February, more than 318,000 deaths have been reported in the United States. Tompkins says the staff and organizers of the New Year’s Eve gathering are working hard through the pandemic to make this event special for people watching at home as COVID-19 numbers continue to rise.
A worker in Times Square is disinfecting the booth where people can write their New Year’s wishes on confetti that will plunge the Crossroads of the World on New Year’s Eve.
(Countdown Entertainment)
“One of the challenges is just the uncertainty regarding the changing health situation. The people who set up the stages, build the stages – they are all going to be tested. They have to be socially distanced,” he said.
The Times Square Alliance and Countdown Entertainment recently announced that TV personality Jonathan Bennet, host of ‘Holiday Wars’ and an actor who starred in ‘Mean Girls’, is hosting the event this year, with performances by artists such as Jennifer Lopez, Billy Porter and Cyndi Lauper.
“Gloria Gaynor is going to sing ‘I Will Survive,’ which is kind of a theme by 2020, metaphorically and unfortunately literally,” Tompkins said.
People like Muhammad Ali and Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor have been honored in Times Square on New Year’s Eve in the past. But this year, the many ‘Heroes of 2020’ on the grounds of Times Square are being honored for their efforts on the front lines of the COVID-19 pandemic, especially those who risked their lives on the track every day.
No crowds: around the holidays this time of year, the streets of Times Square are packed with people walking shoulder-to-shoulder. This year will look very different without the millions of visitors.
These honors include mass transport workers, doctors, nurses, delivery workers, first responders and other essential workers who will be staged within limited capacity, sealed areas, at a distance from other guests, artists and staff.
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“We honor the heroes of 2020, the people who helped us get through this year with their courage or creativity. They are all going to be New Yorkers who are going to represent people from all over the world,” Tompkins added.
“2020 was something of a drain,” Colbert says. ‘Let’s hope we can return to some normalcy again. This is a new beginning. Let everyone be included in this. ‘