Indeed, many of his customers would come from Normandie Court a block away. Drunk patrons would dance on the bar top, well before Coyote Ugly, which would open in January of 1993, had popularized such shenanigans. Poets ruled the evening Tim Dlugos, still a few years from writing his haunting G-9 poem about an AIDS ward, was Bernadette of Lourdes. And by 1991 a good dozen of the neighborhoods bars were offering similar ladies night deals. When Flashdance came out in 1983, Paramount put me up in the Carlyle Hotel to do promotion. It was an incredible contrast from the last time I had lived in New York, when I was 17, during the summer of 1981, in a $500-a-month sublet loft that my boyfriend and I had found paging through our bible, the call to another life The Village Voice in his basement in Evanston. Some of them were lying about their age and I knew it, but I didnt care. . It was established, owned by and named after Elaine Kaufman, who was indelibly associated with the restaurant; Elaine's shut down several months after Kaufman died. It was the only Xerox machine below 14th Street, so every artist used it. We could each get a full breakfast scrambled eggs, hash browns, whole wheat toast with an endless cup of coffee for $5 with tip. At that time, Chelsea was unexplored territory. All the music [in the atelier on 125th Street] came from the VCR. Rare images of NYC nightclubs from the 1980s and '90s - AmNewYork Some of them were open 24 hours a day, or they were closed maybe four hours a day for cleaning. 1 place sorted by traveler favorites. Upper East Side Bars - Directory of the Best Bars on the UES But something wasnt right. In 1981, I suggested a bacchanal a night of pagan merriment as spring was coming. No ID check, nothing. Team Infatuation August 19, 2022. The robust economy powered unfathomable riches into New York's in the late 90s: In SoHo restaurants, Madison Avenue boutiques, and East Side real-estate offices, no price is too high for the lords . The city was different then. She was the ultimate ballerina, and she became that on Fame. I was excited that I would be able to introduce this new band of gypsies to the Hollywood scene. Jumbo-sized martini glasses smeared with ruby lipstick. These 1980s Restaurants Didn't Stand the Test of Time - Eat This Not That They are not obliged to talk to anyone. Not only did we dress in wigs and dresses from 14th Street, but we took on personas to match. A group of artists, friends and a few colleagues, including Marcia Tucker, the founder of the New Museum, demolished what remained of a former meatpacking company and converted it into JAMs new space. I was breaking up with somebody a long, slow breakup. Denzel had just gotten St. He needed someone he trusted. Youd think he would have been the most outrageous-looking person there, but he looked like a businessman. Up the street from my apartment was 8 B.C., a club run by two friends of mine. I served eggplant parmigiana and a stupendous chocolate cake that everyone always wanted. A walk across the Williamsburg Bridge just to save a subway token. We finished that scene around 6 oclock in the morning. My days changed depending on what show I was putting on, what sort of rehearsal schedule I had and how late Id been up the night before, though I had a rule for myself: Always be back before sunrise. I think that free drinks for women is discriminatory and a bad idea, wrote Cynthia Heimel, a feminist columnist, in the November 1991 issue of Playboy. There was . 68. I chose a very mournful, elegiac, orchestral piece of music, and I created a gray-scale portrait of three heads: Bills head in the middle, and my two profile heads coming out of either side of his. You couldnt get people to go to a club before midnight. If I were going out that night, Id go see Garren to fix my hair. East 80s, NY Restaurant Guide. Tuesday Trivia. I remember the smell of the theaters so well popcorn and weed. If you wanted fancy, youd go to La Grenouille. We were such fashion victims. I tried never to leave my ZIP code. It must have been late spring of 1981. My fantasy was to rent one of these theaters on 42nd Street and show my movie alongside Mad Monkey Kung Fu. If we werent in a group, I would walk over the bridge, because money was scarce and I wanted to have a token to go back out the next night. Wed say, Theyre not up in the morning, so dont go to them or They have kids, so maybe theyre up because the kids wake up. Wed visit people in the morning, early. There were no movie theaters, bookstores, galleries or photocopy shops, so my entrepreneurial idea, which failed, was to open one, Chelsea Copy. The crass reason, of course, is because since the beginning of time, straight men have wanted to be drinking in the same place women are drinking because, yes, men are pigs. I slept when I was exhausted and awoke when I was refreshed. Back uptown, Mortimers restaurant was a huge place for me. Youd sit at the bar and someone would say: Hey, were going to Danceteria. Or theyd have a car and youd find yourself in the East Village, which was a total war zone, with junkies passed out and men building fires in trash cans. Best Upper East Side bars in NYC. I had gone to a place when I was a kid called Hamburger Express, and the hamburgers used to come around on a little choo-choo train. 1. I had the gallery in L.A., and I had just bought a house in Venice, so I was completely overextended, and it worried me. Reagan really ruined it for me. Then you checked to see if there was anything in the theater papers for auditions. It needs to be said that, technically, ladies nights were illegal in New York and had been so for quite a time. My first photo lab was called Hy Photo. There were others: the Venus, and down in the 14th Street area, the Variety Photoplays, a Spanish one called The Jefferson, The Metropol [Metropolitan]. Our club-hop starts with the titular Limelight, Gatien's firstand still favoriteNew York club. But, most women slugging free beers at Brother Jimmys or complimentary Champagne at Jungle Jims or on-the-house Slalom Shots at Ski Bar arguably enjoyed these ladies night deals. Its basically the most conscious, relatable record. As told to Kate Guadagnino,Elizabeth Gumport,Merrell Hambleton and Erin Sheehy. It was almost a surreal experience, because I had the feeling that this person is only vaguely here. If you remember Flemings, this event is for you: Saturday, December 4 Fleming's Reunion Party We did a deep dive into the most avant-garde, atonal jazz. We blacked out the skylights and windows and painted most of it gold very Warholian. So in April we held the Rites of Spring Fertility Bacchanal. People would drop change in your hands, turn their heads when you tried to kiss them. A crack den lined with books. Since no ones making them, they dont.. You did a lot of the auditions immediately. Photograph courtesy of Charlie Ahearn, whose groundbreaking hip-hop feature film Wild Style (1983) featured Grandmaster Flash, Lee Quiones and Fab 5 Freddy, among others. Nan Goldin was a block up, and William Burroughs lived downstairs. Within 18 months, several more "singles bars" were opened on 1st Avenue. (By the time we filmed Desperately Seeking Susan in 84, New York was already beginning to become more gentrified.) It didnt have a name. Yorkville, Manhattan photos from the 1980s Yorkville, Upper East Side Manhattan in the 1980's, all photos by Gary Lenhart E. 86th St., NYC [Best_Wordpress_Gallery id="204 gal_title="E 86th St NYC Photos"] York Ave., NYC [Best_Wordpress_Gallery id="205 gal_title="York Ave NYC Photos"] 1st. These parties inevitably blur together in my mind, but I remember that night because a week later, Abbott stabbed and killed a waiter at the Binibon cafe, a few doors down the block. The original Murray Hill restaurant expanded to this location in 2011, and in 2017 added an upstairs cocktail bar to entice a younger crowd. Le Relais, on Madison and 63rd, was more everyone my age and everyone from Europe. 2. Honestly, my mind was empty, but I wanted to be consumed by that emptiness. I started spending a third of my time there. Silently. The Ladies Auxiliary of the Lower East Side sort of a punk rock version of my mothers Junior League group, which I started with some other girls from the East Village hosted several events at the club. He had always been like a surrogate father to me, and when his manager quit midway through the tour, he called me to come and just make sure people werent ripping him off at the venues every night. Money was secondary to being able to have this playground we could create. Pretty girls in pajamas peeked in on my occupied space. We cant put the money out for something this queer. Then [writer and editor] Bob Colacello saw the project and said, Andy Warhol has a three-book deal with Houghton Mifflin. When I was 15, I was in the clubs. In the 1980s, the restaurant began to decline, as it switched up menu items in favor of more chicken and fish. I moved to Leonard Street and stayed there until five or six years ago when I was made to leave my rented loft. Peter lived on the absolute margins he never had anything. What New York Was Like in the Early '80s Hour by Hour Hearing hip-hop on the street, minimalist new music, free jazz it all added to this fabric that was a landscape. Where To Drink On The Upper East Side - The Infatuation I was just out of high school. Even by the early 1990s, the Upper East Side remained haunted by what had happened there in 1986, when the infamous Preppy Killer, Robert Chambers, had pounded tequila and beer chasers at. Write a Review! Chloe 81 Night Clubs Dance Clubs Bars 6.7 Website Amenities: (212) 677-0067 Columbia Pictures had given me this SX-70 camera at a conference, and I started documenting life in the Fire Island Pines [an area of Long Island known as a haven for gay life], which just seemed very important to me. One of his favorite pieces was the Alto Rhapsody of Brahms, sung by Dame Janet Baker. Pierre Francillon and Richard Alvarez, both artists and friends of fashion designer Andre Walker, in 1983 at the Middle Collegiate Church, where Walker held a fashion show. East Side Extra: Footloose: A virtual walk through the 1980s Upper East Sorry.. Hip-hop artist Prince Whipper Whip of the hip-hop group Grand Wizard Theodore & the Fantastic Five at the Sparkle in the Bronx. Im a child of the Midwestern upper-middle class. Open in Google Maps. He was with his editor Erroll McDonald, a good friend of ours, but he refused to come into the room, remaining near the door with his back against the wall. Although it didn't hold up against Chili's, TGI Fridays, and Applebee's, there was a time when it was fairly ubiquitous throughout the states. I did not know what my passions or imagination would lead to. Sometimes you would cry, but most of the time you were just stunned, like it wasnt real. Courtesy of John Kelly, photograph by John Dugdale, John Kelly, performance and visual artist. They had gotten the idea that it was a very good headquarters. I really loved those people the heroism of their everyday lives was palpable, and that was woven into the tapestry of the East Village. My dormitory was at the corner of East 14th Street and Union Square. I started JAM in 1974 to show the work of African-American artists and other artists of color. I remember I was drawn to the ad for the loft because it was in a place that sounded like trifecta; my father had taken me to the track, so that seemed comforting and familiar. Hed come around maybe at 7 oclock. The Roxy was on Fridays, when the party was Wheels of Steel, which initially started at Negril in the East Village. He said he was going to lunch with some friends, and did I want to join? Of course, it wasnt just rising rents, Mayor Giuliani, and smart phones that would kill ladies night on the Upper East Side. Answer (1 of 6): While not classy in haute cuisine, these long-gone restaurants were very popular in the 70s and 80s too: * The Caramba! Then our leading lady, Susan Berman, broke her leg, and we had to wait for her to get out of the cast. That was the start of the end of this era, says Block. The original flier for Kellys show at the Pyramid Club in 1981. I had glasses, so I put these flip-up sunglass visors on them. I was 16 when we started going to the Roxy, and my guest list was 100 people, and we were kind of like the ornaments on the tree. I just wanted to be in New York. If it was a Thursday, Id be rushing to get all my work done, because that was the night I went dancing. So wed be starving. And Dynasty. Ive never gotten over Dynasty. And then people started dying. And then we had Robert Rauschenberg, a rascal and a great man. Sometimes, after the clubs got out, people would see a kung fu flick on 42nd Street, which we called the Deuce Were going to the Deuce, whats up? At night, if you headed south through long dark blocks to the meatpacking district, there were clubs and leather bars. Peter cant keep going that way, not in the city that its becoming now. The Oldest Bars on the Upper East Side East 86th St Association The legendary Tommy Rowles at Bemelman's (photo credit: VictoriaMcGinley.com) The Oldest Bars on the Upper East Side April 08, 2017 Tracking down the oldest bar on the Upper East Side is no easy task! We recorded at a studio called Greene Street Recording Studio on Greene Street between Houston and Prince. There is a two drink minimum. There was a great camaraderie. We were both rather exotic in each others eyes. He claims the resort-area locals didnt know what to do with him when he began offering the same all-you-can-drink, ladies night-type deals. Sometimes I didnt eat for two days. Like Clubhouse on York Avenue, which intentionally offered a frat house-like atmosphere. Hey, I said. He slowed and turned around: Yeah, you too.. They would shy away with confused expressions, whispering to their friends. Ever since I moved out of my parents house in Astoria to live in the city, Ive always lived within the same two or three blocks of the Upper West Side. Blocks bar was ski-themed, natch, with a Ski-Doo hanging from the ceiling, bartenders wearing neon-colored ski pants in the winter and bathrooms labeled Unload Here (mens) and Grooming in Process (womens). Photo by James & Karla Murray from their book NEW YORK NIGHTS After its appearance in Woody Allen's 1984 film, Broadway Danny Rose , Carnegie Deli became a classic. One (Instagram) showing somebody stumbling out of your bar and youre out of business, he believes. Friday's location on the Upper East Side. I would drink quite a lot of wine. It was a restaurant a modest place, like an Italian restaurant but really it was an actors hangout. We just called it The Bar, which morphed into Ze Bar, like with a fake French accent.