Off-Third: That new NYU building should really be named after Sarah Paulson instead
NYU will unveil a new building, the twist? Each floor is an American Horror Story themed haunted house.
(Illustration by Kevin Wu; Kevin Wu for WSN)
December 15, 2022
Off-Third is WSN’s satire column.
Yesterday, hedge fund billionaire John Paulson gave a $100 million donation to NYU. His name will be plastered upon the university’s monolithic new building on Mercer Street. I have a better idea — there’s a different, far more interesting Paulson who deserves the glory of having thousands of half-asleep, unenthusiastic students pass under a wall bearing their name: Sarah Paulson. Yes, that one. Of the Ryan Murphy Cinematic Universe.
This could be NYU’s first building to not be named after a dead white man, but rather a lesbian star of the small screen.
Students would be expected to refer to the new building at 181 Mercer Street as the Sarah Paulson building, or the “Paulson Pavilion” for short. It will be home to 58 new classrooms, state-of-the-art theaters and athletic facilities, dining, student and faculty housing, and outdoor communal spaces. The courses taught at the Paulson Pavilion will be new additions to the NYU course catalog. Students are especially excited about an Open Arts acting course called “How to Play the Girl Who Dies Last.”
The new building will also be home to the first ever NYU Law-Tisch School of the Arts hybrid course, “I’m Not a Lawyer, I Just Play One on TV,” a deep dive into the true crime genre of television. The class is expected to conduct case studies on Marcia Clark and Linda Tripp, Paulson’s roles in “American Crime Story.”
The exciting part: Each floor is haunted house-themed after a different “American Horror Story” season. Students will walk into “Murder House,” where they’ll have to run away from an NYU security guard dressed in the Rubber Man suit chasing them for their Violet Go Pass. The seventh floor will be inspired by American Horror Story’s “Cult” season, based on the 2016 election. The entrance of this floor is guarded by the College Republicans. To proceed, you have to listen to them explain why trickle-down economics works. On this floor, students will send emails back and forth with the politics department begging for a course that is clearly about politics, but the credits don’t count towards a politics major.
The Paulson Pavilion is also home to brand-new theaters. Students will be able to rent these spaces solely to practice the iconic Sarah Paulson scream. Rumor has it that Ryan Murphy has installed cameras in each theater to find his next big scream queen.
Students who live here will get one amenity that no other NYU first-year has had: encouragement to smoke indoors. Sarah Paulson’s career was built on smoking cigarettes in different wigs. She told NYU upon donating the money that “cigarette smoke is the foundation of theatrical success.”
NYU will open the building soon. Let’s petition to rename it after Sarah Paulson — the better Paulson.
WSN’s Opinion section strives to publish ideas worth discussing. The views presented in the Opinion section are solely the views of the writer.
Contact Alexandra Cohen at [email protected].
