Martin Scorcese Honored at 2012 Moth Ball

As director Martin Scorcese accepted the 2012 Moth Award last week, he paused to take in the opulent locale of the annual Moth Ball: Capitale on the Bowery. Capitale, the former home of the Bowery Savings Bank, is a Beaux Arts national landmark that boasts 65-foot ceilings supported by a series of columns, the entryways decorated with sumptuous red curtains. Scorcese, who pointed out that most of his stories take two to three hours to tell, offered a tale from his childhood involving the bank. As a young neighborhood kid, Scorcese, along with his classmates, was afforded a field trip to the building, where they were each allowed to touch a $1,000 bill. Now celebrating its 15th year, The Moth was started by poet and novelist George Dawes Green, who hoped to recreate the summer evenings he had spent in Georgia on a friend's porch telling stories amongst a big group. While the first official Moth event was held in Green's living room, the storytelling series has since expanded to events across the country. To find the next storytelling hour in New York City, visit themoth.org. [caption id="attachment_46215" align="alignleft" width="300" caption="2012 Mothshop Scholarship Award recipient Eddie Altiere and the Rev. Al Sharpton"](http://nypress.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/Image.6.jpg)[/caption] [caption id="attachment_46214" align="alignleft" width="210" caption="Tyra Banks"](http://nypress.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/Image.4.jpg)[/caption] [caption id="attachment_46213" align="alignleft" width="187" caption="Darryl "DMC" McDaniels, Co-founder of Run-DMC"](http://nypress.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/Image.3.jpg)[/caption] [caption id="attachment_46212" align="alignleft" width="200" caption="George Dawes Green, founder of The Moth, and Catherine Burns, artistic director of The Moth"](http://nypress.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/Image.1.jpg)[/caption]