Legal Eagle Wedding Watch 2.3: Sterling Reputation

onFebruary 6, 2008 at 10:50 AM

Yes, LEWW hears the howls of protest from our readers about the weeks we skipped recently. We’ll do a makeup post soon, we promise. The weddings pages have been such a wasteland lately that it’s been hard to pull together the kind of legal and nuptial excellence you’ve come to expect here. And it’s crushing our spirit.
Take this week. The NYT featured just seven weddings total, with only two LEWW contenders and one Ivy degree (from U. Penn). Here are the two finalists:

1.) Robin Rosenthal and Richard Rothfeld

2.) Erin Conroy and Thomas Welling Jr.

More about these newlyweds, after the jump.

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From Pilot and Above The Law

1.) Robin Rosenthal and Richard Rothfeld
(Buy them a $295 perfume bottle.)
The Case:
– We like how each person brings something to this union. Richard offers his family’s wealth — his dad is a former apparel manufacturer who’s on the board of Syracuse University — while Robin sports blindingly white teeth and a degree from the Fashion Institute of Technology. (Richard went to Penn and NYU Law.)
– The wedding was in the Bahamas, a location of which LEWW greatly approves. If you must get married in February, by all means do it in an atmosphere conducive to bikinis and hooking up. Your wedding party and recently divorced uncles will thank you.
The Case Against:
– Richard, who was once an associate at Proskauer Rose, now works full-time at “managing the family’s investments.” Of course he does. What a great euphemism for unemployment: “No, I didn’t get laid off by Cadwalader. I quit to manage my family’s investments.” Robin has eschewed her family’s business — her stepdad owns Great Neck Plumbing and Heating — for a career in “merchandise display and promotional events.”
2.) Erin Conroy and Thomas Welling Jr.
(Buy them a $925 decanter.)
The Case:
– Erin went to Boston College and works for Deutsche Bank. Thomas went to Williams and Brooklyn Law School and is now an associate at Simpson Thacher & Bartlett.
– You can watch a video about them here. The video doesn’t make us hate Erin and Thomas, but it does make us wonder why the NYT even bothers with multimedia if it’s going to be so pointless and half-assed. We’ve seen edgier stuff on the security-gate channel.
The Case Against:
– Their wedding registry is . . . ambitious. LEWW was exhausted after perusing just their Bloomingdale’s list (they have two others), but we got out our calculator and added up their guests’ tab: $12,086 in fine china, $7,635 in stemware and barware, $13,170 in silver, and $7,792 in other loot. Grand total: $40,863.18. They’re probably the type of people who whine to their friends that they would’ve gotten something simple from Crate & Barrel, if only their parents hadn’t insisted on all this ridiculous expensive stuff. And then they roll their eyes at those silly, status-obsessed parents. But secretly, they get aroused just looking at their $615 champagne cooler. (Technically, it’s the idea of the champagne cooler, because nobody’s actually bought it for them.)
The Verdict:
Excruciatingly close. STB > Proskauer Rose, but NYU > Brooklyn. And BC + Williams > FIT + Penn, but on the other hand, plastic smile > 12 ($400 place setting + $200 cake plate + $160 wine glass + $1,005 silverware = $1,765 just to sit down at the table). We’ll give a nod to alliteration and hand this one to Team Rosenthal-Rothfeld!