We stopped at Faces and Names, a contemporary pub serving sandwiches & bar food, for a bite before heading to City Center around the corner to see a Prayer For the French Republic, a play that friends raved about.

We were seated in the cozy back room, replete with couches in front of a fireplace and TVs.  My friend went retro with a Tito’s Cosmo, I  had an Old Fashioned. We then shared their Buffalo chicken salad ($16) with chopped romaine, sliced cucumbers, crisp apple slices, grape tomatoes and walnuts topped with warm, moist, well-seasoned chicken breast cut into strips. I highly recommend.

Also good is their Cubano sandwich ($16) with roasted pork, prosciutto, Swiss cheese and chopped pickles on a baguette that came with fresh, thickly cut (yummy) French fries. $16.

Off we went around the corner to City Center where we saw the three-act, two-intermission power play,  The Prayer for the French Republic, a show about antisemitism that toggles between  a contemporary Jewish family and their ancestors in the early nineteen hundreds. We both felt that the show could have been edited to cut at least 30 minutes and one intermission.

That said, I do recommend a visit to Faces and Names. Next time, I’d try their Pat LaFrieda short rib burger.

Faces and Names
midtown west
59 W 54th St
New York, NY 10019
(212) 586-9311
facesandnames.com