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Speaker 1: Too Much Information is a production of iHeartRadio. Hello everyone,

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Speaker 1: and welcome with Too Much Information, the show that brings

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Speaker 1: you the little known facts and secret histories behind your

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Speaker 1: favorite movies, music, TV shows and more. We are your

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Speaker 1: disco divos of details, your platform wearing pals of pedantic podcasting,

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Speaker 1: your cocaine fueled friends of ultra funky facts, escorting you

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Speaker 1: past the velvet ropes of vagary and into the basement

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Speaker 1: of banality. My name is Jordan Runzog and I'm Alex Hegelin,

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Speaker 1: and today we are talking about a modern day Sodom

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Speaker 1: and Gomorrah, a club that even a non dancing homebody

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Speaker 1: like me would have loved to have gone to and

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Speaker 1: never would have gotten past the door. Question. Yes, we

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Speaker 1: got sodomy out of Sodom.

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Speaker 2: What did we get out of Gomorra Gonnrhea asked him,

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Speaker 2: answered yeah, Moving on.

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Speaker 1: We are talking about the night spot to end all

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Speaker 1: night spots, Studio fifty four. I am so excited to

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Speaker 1: talk about this. This is an episode that I've wanted

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Speaker 1: to do for literally years now, but the research took forever.

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Speaker 1: I kicked off twenty twenty three with a deep dive

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Speaker 1: into my beloved Titanic and this is almost as intense.

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Speaker 1: It's I gotta say, it's probably one of the most

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Speaker 1: fascinating topics we've ever tackled. I just can't wait to

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Speaker 1: dive in. Hi Go God bless you. You've been encouraging

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Speaker 1: me to take this on for a long long time now,

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Speaker 1: which actually kind of surprised me a bit. What was

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Speaker 1: it about Studio fifty four that appealed to you?

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Speaker 2: First of all, Like just the time period in New York,

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Speaker 2: like the you know, Taxi driver era, Yeah, exactly, the

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Speaker 2: Ford to City drop dead Son of Sam Punk, other

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Speaker 2: things surely happening. But yeah, I mean the confluence of

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Speaker 2: like Hubris, yeah, and degeneracy and music, you know, that's

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Speaker 2: that's it. And like I did test club culture, Why

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Speaker 2: is that it's stupid?

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Speaker 1: I don't know, you don't view it as a way

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Speaker 1: for artists to get together? Yeah?

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Speaker 2: Sure, But like broadly speaking, I think I have a

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Speaker 2: hair up my ass about this date and time specifically

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Speaker 2: because it's sort of when live musicians started to get

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Speaker 2: faded out right, you know, and like live music, this

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Speaker 2: is like this era is sort of like ground zero

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Speaker 2: for middle class gigging musicians kind of their death. Knell

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Speaker 2: was like DJs, you know, and DJ culture and like

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Speaker 2: every club being like, oh, the draw is no longer

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Speaker 2: like I don't have to hire a band and promote

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Speaker 2: the band. I can just have someone play music that's

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Speaker 2: much more efficient, like and then you know, this golden

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Speaker 2: era of like this is like a pet topic I

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Speaker 2: talk about a lot, but like, I think a lot

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Speaker 2: of the reason that we've canonized a very particular era

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Speaker 2: of musicians in the States and the reason that they

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Speaker 2: are so good at what they do is because the

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Speaker 2: club circuit, through their formative era was really an incubator

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Speaker 2: for just learning how to work a crowd. The Beatles

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Speaker 2: in Hamburg, Yeah, building Choplin Circuit for Jimmy Hendrix, Yeah,

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Speaker 2: the Chitpland circuit. I mean, like, you know, I always

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Speaker 2: think of like like the jazz guys or Motown like

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Speaker 2: recording through the day and then just going to gig

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Speaker 2: at night, or like the R and B club circuit.

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Speaker 2: It was like yeah, or even like you know, I

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Speaker 2: was listening to this Creedence live album at one point

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Speaker 2: it really hit me because like.

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Speaker 1: They were kind of like an R and B.

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Speaker 2: Blues kind of cover band and just doing that circuit,

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Speaker 2: or even like Neil Young, like even these guys who

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Speaker 2: didn't have like crazy dumb chops in terms of like shredding,

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Speaker 2: you know, they knew how to craft solos and build

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Speaker 2: tension and release musically and do all of this like

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Speaker 2: higher level non chop aspects of music. And they were

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Speaker 2: able to do that because they were able to log

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Speaker 2: these insane hours where it almost didn't even matter that

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Speaker 2: they would fail or like that they might not hit

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Speaker 2: it every night, but it was like this insane intensive

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Speaker 2: that enabled them to you know, become these these musicians

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Speaker 2: that they were, and even going back to like juke

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Speaker 2: joint era with like blues musicians. So it's just like yeah,

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Speaker 2: and then like as soon as DJs became a thing,

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Speaker 2: like that just started trending downwards. And that's why you

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Speaker 2: know bands sound like dog today. Yeah, old man yells

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Speaker 2: at cloud segment over No. But I mean, like it

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Speaker 2: is a real thing, like I mean, and there's all

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Speaker 2: kinds of other shit that goes into it, you know,

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Speaker 2: like capitalism, the dismantling of the welfare state, like you know,

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Speaker 2: television in this era. Marquis Moon is like a second

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Speaker 2: or first take, and it was because they lived super

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Speaker 2: cheaply and rehearsed like six hours a day before they

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Speaker 2: went to track that album. Like you don't remember this

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Speaker 2: album too. Yeah, you just don't get to do that

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Speaker 2: as a musician anymore. You literally, it is just unsustainable

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Speaker 2: to gig and live that way like gone, you know,

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Speaker 2: completely bygone era.

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Speaker 1: Sorry, unless you're independently wealthy.

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Speaker 2: So in a way, this is like, it's very bittersweet

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Speaker 2: for me because I'm like this and you know, as

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Speaker 2: much as I love hip hop, like the DJ culture

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Speaker 2: that came out of that is just like, yep, this

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Speaker 2: is when that started to die.

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Speaker 1: So sorry, I hear that, I understand that. I validate that.

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Speaker 1: I you know, I mean taking this on, I initially

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Speaker 1: thought it would just be a great excuse to talk about,

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Speaker 1: you know, decadence and depravity and great stories of celebrities

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Speaker 1: behaving badly in a really interesting era. But the more

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Speaker 1: I learned about the development not only of club culture

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Speaker 1: in the late sixties early seventies, but also disco as

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Speaker 1: a genre, it made me respect both the club and disco,

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Speaker 1: which is kind of a punchline as being this music

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Speaker 1: that has a lot of integrity because it came from

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Speaker 1: a lot of disenfranchised yes people. Is very interesting and

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Speaker 1: Studio fifty four became really a haven for a lot

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Speaker 1: of especially the LGBTQ community. Yeah yeah, I mean that's

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Speaker 1: something we'll talk more about later. So that was something

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Speaker 1: that was that surprised me. The more I dug into it.

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Speaker 1: I expected this to be a tale of irresponsible people

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Speaker 1: being greedy and stupid, and it became a lot more.

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Speaker 2: And while it is that, well, there is at the

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Speaker 2: same time, Yes, that's true, that's true. Yeah, I mean

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Speaker 2: disco is I obviously I grew up at Central Pennsylvania Punk.

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Speaker 1: I was like disco.

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Speaker 2: But then like I had a music professor in college

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Speaker 2: who's like, I don't understand the beef with disco, and

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Speaker 2: like four on the floor, it's just like everybody deserves

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Speaker 2: to dance.

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Speaker 1: I was like, you can find this beat, and I

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Speaker 1: was like, that is a beautiful sentiment. I have changed

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Speaker 1: my mind. I love that. Yeah. Well, we'll have a

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Speaker 1: whole segment on the development of disco a little later on,

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Speaker 1: but Study fifty four as a it's been described as

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Speaker 1: many things, an American bacchan All, the Wizard of Oz

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Speaker 1: stage by Fellini, and one of My favorite descriptions comes

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Speaker 1: from a twenty twenty New York Times piece by Guy

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Speaker 1: Treblay and Ruth Leferla. It was a flash of brilliance

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Speaker 1: that glittered from the rubble of a bankrupt city. Studio

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Speaker 1: fifty four was an Aladdin's cave tucked amid the porn

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Speaker 1: palaces of Midtown. I love that like a shooting star.

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Speaker 1: Studio fifty four burned bright but fast. It's heyday lasted

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Speaker 1: a scant thirty three months before its renegade owners, Steve

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Speaker 1: Rubell and Ian Schrager were hauled off to prison for

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Speaker 1: one of the most egregious tax evasion cases in American history,

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Speaker 1: which we'll get to. But in that brief thirty three

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Speaker 1: month period, it became more than a nightclub. It became

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Speaker 1: a phenomenon, an unprecedented mix of glamorous sophistication and primal hedonism.

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Speaker 1: It was a nexus of music, fashion, and newfound social freedom.

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Speaker 1: The fact that the had previously been an old CBSTV

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Speaker 1: studio was fitting, because Studio fifty four offered a place

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Speaker 1: for anyone to live their own fantasy without persecution or judgment.

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Speaker 1: It was a place not only for a generation raised

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Speaker 1: under the pressures of Watergate in the Vietnam War to

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Speaker 1: let loose, but more importantly, a place for members of

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Speaker 1: the LGBTQ community to feel like they could fully celebrate

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Speaker 1: the act of being themselves, which is precious. Well, we

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Speaker 1: have way too much to talk about, so I'm gonna

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Speaker 1: skip the fact teases. Let's just go for it in

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Speaker 1: lieu of cocaine. I have a big mugg of coffee

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Speaker 1: right here. Here is everything you didn't know about Studio

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Speaker 1: fifty four. He's gotta plug in young hearts from free here.

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Speaker 2: I think it's got to be like Disco Inferno or

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Speaker 2: Boogie Wonderland or something like just to anything on the

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Speaker 2: Boogie Night's soundtrack.

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Speaker 1: It's just got to be as creciates as possible. Well,

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Speaker 1: to start, allow us to introduce you to the two

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Speaker 1: hosts of the Studio fifty four back of ow, Steve

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Speaker 1: Rubell and Ann Schrager. These masterminds behind the epic thirty

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Speaker 1: three month Party met as classmates at Syracuse University, but

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Speaker 1: both were Brooklyn boys. Originally, they met when Steve Rubell,

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Speaker 1: a short guy, saw Ian Schrager, who wasn't much taller,

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Speaker 1: wrestling with a six foot eight basketball player, and much

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Speaker 1: like cool hand Luke, would not stay down. This resonated

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Speaker 1: with the scrappy undergrad and they became fast friends. Ian

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Speaker 1: graduated and initially became a real estate lawyer, while the

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Speaker 1: more outgoing A Gregarius Steve Rubelle opened up a chain

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Speaker 1: of steakhouses in the New York metro area called steak Loft,

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Speaker 1: which boasted the unforgettable, if not very subtle, slogan make

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Speaker 1: love to your stomach. I don't like that.

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Speaker 2: No, I don't really because I watched Videodrome, which is

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Speaker 2: the most memorable image in is of a James Woods

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Speaker 2: tummy vagina.

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Speaker 1: So that's really gross and I hate that. It was

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Speaker 1: like on the menus and everything. Yeah, I don't like that.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, no bathing suit parts and restaurants. I mean that's

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Speaker 2: come on, man, how'd you how'd you get your how'd

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Speaker 2: you pass the food inspect how'd you get to that?

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Speaker 1: Ian Treger convinced stever Bell to ditch the whole steakhous

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Speaker 1: idea and go into the nightclub business together because he

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Speaker 1: was intrigued by the emerging gay club scene. Treger would

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Speaker 1: have vocably described what he witnessed as quote a kind

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Speaker 1: of intense, tribal like dancing. It looked like the dance

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Speaker 1: floor was some kind of living organism, rolling and pulsating

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Speaker 1: up and down, breathing in and out all together. As

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Speaker 1: one other clubs up to this point had just been

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Speaker 1: basically pick up joints, but these gay dance spots were

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Speaker 1: sensory overload with the music and the lights and the

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Speaker 1: fashion and the sexual electricity. So Stephen Ann teamed up

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Speaker 1: on an early nightclub in Boston. Of all places buying

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Speaker 1: would have been a famous back bay venue called the

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Speaker 1: Boston Tea Party, which may be familiar for some music

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Speaker 1: nerds out there, for it was where the Velvet Underground

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Speaker 1: had a very famous residency in the late sixties, so

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Speaker 1: it's a famous spot. They also turned one of Steve's

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Speaker 1: steakhouses into a club called The Enchanted Garden, and it

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Speaker 1: was a minor success, but it had the misfortune of

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Speaker 1: being located in Queen's which was not very fashionable in

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Speaker 1: the mid seventies. As one club goer later said, no

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Speaker 1: one for Manhattan was going to Queens And as my

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Speaker 1: aunt would say, you need a passport to get there.

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Speaker 1: For burgeoning club owners, Manhattan was the big leagues but

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Speaker 1: now Zoolander voice why disco. Disco clubs were becoming the

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Speaker 1: big thing by the mid seventies, and most people believe

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Speaker 1: the name disco refers to the genre of music that

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Speaker 1: was becoming popular at this time, but the term actually

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Speaker 1: predates this by a decade. Disco was short for the

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Speaker 1: French disco tech, which literally means a library of records,

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Speaker 1: similar to the French word BiblioTech or library of place

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Speaker 1: for many books Biblio's book. In the early sixties, clubs

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Speaker 1: called disco techs began to open in France that played

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Speaker 1: records for patrons to dance too, rather than employ traditional bands.

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Speaker 1: I knew this was the French's fault. I mean, as

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Speaker 1: we were talking about at the top of the episode.

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Speaker 1: This was revolutionary at the time. Clubgoers got to dance

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Speaker 1: to the original versions of their favorite songs, and club

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Speaker 1: owners got to get away with paying a single DJ

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Speaker 1: rather than a whole band.

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Speaker 2: The musicians were as everybody except for the people who

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Speaker 2: make it of course America and France.

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Speaker 1: Apparently, these were generally a European phenomenon throughout the sixties,

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Speaker 1: aside from isolated spots like LA's Whiskey a Go Goo,

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Speaker 1: which initially modeled itself after a French discothech, but by

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Speaker 1: the mid seventies they were becoming more prominent in the

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Speaker 1: United States, and this is supposedly due in part to

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Speaker 1: an influx of jet setters from Europe who were wary

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Speaker 1: of European discos. After the socialite Jpe Paul Getty the

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Speaker 1: Third was kidnapped from one in Rome in nineteen seventy three,

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Speaker 1: Hell yeah, which resulted in the poor kid's ear getting

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Speaker 1: sliced off. Hell yeah.

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Speaker 2: Poor kids would have, in bad choice of words, resulted

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Speaker 2: in the modern day Robert Baron aristocratic class wealth hoarding

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Speaker 2: dragon kid.

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Speaker 1: Sorry, I mean this event was dramatized in the twenty

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Speaker 1: seventeen film All the Money in the World and No

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Speaker 1: his grandfather was. I guess John Paul Getty the First

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Speaker 1: didn't want to pay the ransom because he I think

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Speaker 1: he just felt it was set a bad precedent, So

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Speaker 1: the kidnappers sliced the kid's ear off. Hell yeah. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: So this is kind of seems like kind of a

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Speaker 1: flimsy theory, but I'd seen it cited in numerous sources

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Speaker 1: that this actually was one of the reasons that sparked

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Speaker 1: the discothech influx of the United States because Europeans were

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Speaker 1: scared of something like that happening. Again. Good, they should

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Speaker 1: be rich anyway, No, not me. He also heard an

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Speaker 1: interesting theory that the oil crisis and resulting economic downturn

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Speaker 1: in the mid seventies helped increase the popularity of discos

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Speaker 1: because the fee to get into discos was a lot

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Speaker 1: cheaper than going to a rock concert, which had been

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Speaker 1: the primary focal point for youths to meet in the sixties.

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Speaker 1: So that was some of it too. It is all

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Speaker 1: about economics. You're right, I suppose I buy that, he

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Speaker 1: said angrily. Well, this is a good time as Annie

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Speaker 1: to go a little deeper and look at the development

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Speaker 1: of the much malign genre we called disco. The representative quote,

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Speaker 1: aside from just disco sucks, comes from Bob Colaccio, the

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Speaker 1: editor of Andy Warhol's Interview magazine. He said, disco came

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Speaker 1: along at the moment when the baby boomers stopped protesting

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Speaker 1: and started dancing. And while this is true, it undersells

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Speaker 1: the genre's rich and fascinating backstory. It's really interesting to

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Speaker 1: me that disco's a reputation of being politically vapid, corny

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Speaker 1: cash in music, since it was born of the mo

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Speaker 1: most artistically authentic beginnings with disenfranchised social groups who were

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Speaker 1: forced out of the mainstream. The story of disco is

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Speaker 1: bookended by two riots that took place a decade apart,

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Speaker 1: first the Stonewall Riots in the summer of sixty nine,

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Speaker 1: and then Disco Demolition Night at Chicago's Kaminski Park in

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Speaker 1: the summer of nineteen seventy nine, which you recall, piles

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Speaker 1: of disco records were hauled into the outfield and blown

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Speaker 1: up in a mock ceremony overseen by a local shock jock,

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Speaker 1: before a crowd of thousands, including future actor Michael Clark Duncan,

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Speaker 1: rushed the field. The first of these riots was steeped

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Speaker 1: in a desire for social justice and equality all The

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Speaker 1: second of these riots was a knee jerk and really

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Speaker 1: quite stupid reaction to cultural shifts, steeped in racism and homophobia.

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Speaker 1: Some like Sheik guitarist Nile Rodgers, have likened the event

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Speaker 1: to a Nazi book burning. But we're getting ahead of ourselves.

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Speaker 1: Heigel talk to us about the development of disco.

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Speaker 2: So back in nineteen sixty nine, homosexuality was still classified

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Speaker 2: as a mental illness. The FBI reportedly did surveillance on

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Speaker 2: known homosexuals. Probably James Baldwin is probably the biggest example

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Speaker 2: of that.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, right, I would think so, is that why I

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Speaker 1: left the country for France.

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Speaker 2: I wouldn't blame him if there was any other reason

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Speaker 2: to do it. The Tina Turner model this place the

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Speaker 2: post Office track mail containing gay material. Anyone who appeared

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Speaker 2: to be what would have then referred to as transvestites,

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Speaker 2: which was shockingly the most nuanced term that existed at

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Speaker 2: the time, would be stripped and frisked. Halloween was a

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Speaker 2: major holiday for gay men and trans women back in

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Speaker 2: the nineteen sixties because it was the one day of

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Speaker 2: the year that they could wear gender affirming attire like

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Speaker 2: dresses in public without being arrested.

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Speaker 1: There are stories of cops.

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Speaker 2: Congregating outside of known gay haunts on Halloween wordplay, waiting

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Speaker 2: for twelve oh one so that they could bust people, horrifying.

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Speaker 2: There were laws prohibiting people of the same sex from

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Speaker 2: dancing together in a place that had a liquor license,

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Speaker 2: and as a result, many gay bars, like the famous

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Speaker 2: Stone Wall in didn't even bother with a liquor license

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Speaker 2: and just operated as off a private quote unquote bottle club.

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Speaker 2: Until nineteen sixty six, it was illegal to even sell

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Speaker 2: alcohol to someone who you knew was gay.

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Speaker 1: One of the more unprovable laws on the books, though,

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Speaker 1: I guess yeah, post prohibition law against serving any quote

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Speaker 1: unquote disorderly people.

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Speaker 2: God, this country is so stupid. Oh, I'm just tammed

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Speaker 2: to begging for an anger of one star Boomer review

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Speaker 2: this episode. I really apologize.

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Speaker 1: What legally not being allowed to serve a gay person

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Speaker 1: of beer? I think that's an okay hill to die on.

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Speaker 1: I think you're okay, okay, all right, we'll find out.

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Speaker 2: As a result, many places that were known as gay

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Speaker 2: hangouts were monitored closely by the authorities and rated regularly.

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Speaker 2: Most of the Greenwich Village gay bars in the nineteen

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Speaker 2: sixties were owned by members of the mob who paid

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Speaker 2: off the cops keep from getting raided more often, a

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Speaker 2: process known whimsically as gayola. For example, the famous Stonewall

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Speaker 2: Inn was owned by members of the Genovesei crime family.

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Speaker 2: These owners treated the regulars terribly. They watered down the liquor,

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Speaker 2: they overcharged. Stonewall had no running water behind the bar

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Speaker 2: during this period, so dirty glasses were just switched through

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Speaker 2: tubs of water and immediately reused. Yeah, that's really gross.

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Speaker 3: Yeah.

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Speaker 2: And there were also reports that the owners were blackmailing

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Speaker 2: some of the wealthier customers due to their sexual orientation,

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Speaker 2: which provided vastly more income than the bar profits. Even

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Speaker 2: well connected gay bars were rated about once a month.

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Speaker 2: Gay men apparently made it a habit to carry bale

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Speaker 2: money on them when they went out, just to be safe. God,

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Speaker 2: horrifying this country ellipses trails off, staring at the middle distance.

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Speaker 1: Uh.

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Speaker 2: These practices began to loosen somewhat following the Stonewall riot

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Speaker 2: in June of nineteen sixty nine. And by the way,

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Speaker 2: you and I are both the VH one pilled Boomer

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Speaker 2: hagiography lionizing generation. How late was it until you learned

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Speaker 2: about stone Wall?

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Speaker 3: Oh?

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Speaker 1: Man, it embarrassingly.

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Speaker 2: Completely glossed over in all of the all along the Watchtower,

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Speaker 2: Fortunate Sun soundtracked sixties montage horses. We were fed as kids, right,

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Speaker 2: Like I think that in high school, I mean maybe.

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Speaker 1: In central Pennsylvania.

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Speaker 2: May I think college is my is my mayor. But

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Speaker 2: like what the July sixty nine ground zero in the

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Speaker 2: middle of all this other life changing, generation defining.

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Speaker 1: We just don't we know what he knows about it

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Speaker 1: because it's gay people, you know what. I don't even

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Speaker 1: know if it was. I think it was I learned

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Speaker 1: about in college because I lived within like three blocks

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Speaker 1: of Stonewall and Greenwich Village at the time of school.

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Speaker 1: That might have been. I probably saw plaque or something

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Speaker 1: that was probably it. Yeah, No, it's really embarrassing. I

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Speaker 1: don't remember how late it was that I learned, but

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Speaker 1: it was fairly recently.

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Speaker 2: In seventeen weeks on the Civil War because I lived

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Speaker 2: within like two hours of Gettysburg much on stone Wall anyway,

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Speaker 2: Google stone Wall if you don't know what we're talking about.

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Speaker 2: Too long to get into here, but really another way

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Speaker 2: it yeah, hashtag worth it. Even after the Stonewall Riots,

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Speaker 2: though many clubs had house rules banning same sex dancing.

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Speaker 2: Another great tangent to get into, by the way, is

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Speaker 2: cabaret laws in New York City, like if you.

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Speaker 1: Want to rue my code, real.

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Speaker 2: Insane discourse on bureaucracy, run a muck. It was an

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Speaker 2: incredible way for them to also completely racially profile and

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Speaker 2: disenfranchised black musicians, Deloneous Monk being one of the most famous.

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Speaker 2: The guy was on like the cover of Time magazine

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Speaker 2: and he couldn't play in New York because his cabaret

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Speaker 2: license had been revoked. Anyway, these rules gave way to

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Speaker 2: the rise of underground parties, the most famous of which

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Speaker 2: was hosted by DJ David Mancuso. Mancuso threw invite only

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Speaker 2: raves every Saturday in his Soho apartment, popularly known as

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Speaker 2: the Loft. I assume it was a loft. I'm guessing, yeah,

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Speaker 2: it'd be funny if it was like a one bedroom

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Speaker 2: I guess sro so nobody would have come otherwise, that's true.

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Speaker 2: Shout out to lofts Man. Yeah, you know, such an

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Speaker 2: incubator for everything from free jazz to minimalism throughout this

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Speaker 2: this time period.

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Speaker 1: Do you ever live in a loft? No? I didn't either. No,

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Speaker 1: I live like I'm within sight. I can see it

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Speaker 1: out the window of the mckibbon Lofts and oh bedbugs

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Speaker 1: centraight now is it really? Oh god, yeah, I mean

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Speaker 1: that was you know.

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Speaker 2: I it's been funny with his Indie Sleeves revival because

390
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Speaker 2: you will live through peak indie sleeves because you were

391
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Speaker 2: in college in New York. But I got to it.

392
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Speaker 2: I think is it was dying, But yeah, we're all dying.

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Speaker 1: It's true.

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Speaker 2: LCD sound System, guy Voice. I was there when them

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Speaker 2: when the mckibbon lofts were infested by bedbugs.

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Speaker 1: I had friends who lived there. I gross, Yeah, I

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Speaker 1: don't remember. It seemed clean to me. I'm sure there's

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Speaker 1: a vice.

399
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Speaker 2: Then again, I was twine. I'm sure there's like a

400
00:22:08,920 --> 00:22:11,359
Speaker 2: vice oral history of the mckibbon Lofts. Oh, there is,

401
00:22:11,480 --> 00:22:11,800
Speaker 2: there is.

402
00:22:11,920 --> 00:22:13,560
Speaker 1: Yeah.

403
00:22:15,200 --> 00:22:17,960
Speaker 2: According to his Wikipedia page, David Mancuso insisted on playing

404
00:22:18,040 --> 00:22:21,000
Speaker 2: music that was soulful, rhythmic, and imparted words of hope,

405
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Speaker 2: redemption or pride.

406
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Speaker 1: Nothing white.

407
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Speaker 4: True.

408
00:22:26,119 --> 00:22:28,640
Speaker 2: Admission was two dollars to pay for rent and overhead,

409
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Speaker 2: but attendees were never turned away for lack of funds.

410
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Speaker 2: Organic dishes, breads, and freshly squeezed fruit juice were freely

411
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Speaker 2: available for attendees. Nothing was ever sold on the premises.

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Speaker 2: Otherwise the police could argue that he was operating a

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Speaker 2: professional establishment without a license, and this was a very

414
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Speaker 2: real threat since the loft was raided early in its

415
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Speaker 2: existence and Mancuso was arrested for operating an unlicensed cabaret.

416
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Speaker 1: He successfully disputed.

417
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Speaker 2: The charges since there was no alcohol for sale and

418
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Speaker 2: events were not open to the public. After the raid,

419
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Speaker 2: Mancuso was more cautious about police presence and set up

420
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Speaker 2: a warning system using lights lights. When the lights turned red,

421
00:23:03,880 --> 00:23:07,000
Speaker 2: the party paused. Everyone turned down the music, turned up

422
00:23:07,040 --> 00:23:10,560
Speaker 2: the lights and sat on the floor. We should have

423
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Speaker 2: had that at the lodge.

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Speaker 1: Was that illegal? I mean, I don't know if it's

425
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Speaker 1: a bad idea to talk about this, but the performance

426
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Speaker 1: spot slash practice spot that we had that also doubled

427
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Speaker 1: as a performance venue, Oh.

428
00:23:22,640 --> 00:23:25,800
Speaker 2: Yeah, super legal. We sold booze. The second you exchange

429
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Speaker 2: money for alcohol, it becomes illegal.

430
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Speaker 1: Oh that was ohs I didn't realize that was not

431
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Speaker 1: a legal spot. No, oh, no, Dudel, that's awesome. I

432
00:23:36,320 --> 00:23:39,280
Speaker 1: didn't know that. Wow, proud we played there.

433
00:23:41,320 --> 00:23:43,679
Speaker 2: These underground parties were places where people could gather and

434
00:23:43,680 --> 00:23:47,160
Speaker 2: express themselves freely without fear of homophobic or racial discrimination.

435
00:23:47,720 --> 00:23:50,840
Speaker 2: One of the organizers would describe the demographic breakdown thusly.

436
00:23:51,160 --> 00:23:54,240
Speaker 2: It was probably about sixty percent black and seventy percent gay.

437
00:23:54,680 --> 00:23:56,720
Speaker 2: There was a mix of sexual orientation. There was a

438
00:23:56,760 --> 00:23:59,720
Speaker 2: mix of races, mix of economic groups, a real mix

439
00:23:59,720 --> 00:24:03,080
Speaker 2: where a common denominator was music and the way that

440
00:24:03,080 --> 00:24:04,879
Speaker 2: the music was played was a good old fashioned combo

441
00:24:04,960 --> 00:24:07,520
Speaker 2: of two turntables and a microphone and a mixer to

442
00:24:07,720 --> 00:24:10,960
Speaker 2: ensure the unbroken flow of tunes. These house parties elevated

443
00:24:10,960 --> 00:24:12,920
Speaker 2: the role of the DJ from a mere song selector

444
00:24:12,960 --> 00:24:16,560
Speaker 2: to the vibe director of the evening. Oough, sorry, I'm

445
00:24:16,600 --> 00:24:21,080
Speaker 2: sorry DJing. And is Bossonova even still open?

446
00:24:21,680 --> 00:24:25,320
Speaker 1: What's Bossonova? Bossonova Civic Club on Broadway?

447
00:24:25,640 --> 00:24:26,520
Speaker 3: Oh, I don't know.

448
00:24:27,760 --> 00:24:30,840
Speaker 2: He definitely calls himself a vibe curator or vibe director.

449
00:24:31,560 --> 00:24:33,960
Speaker 2: They controlled the music, the lights, the atmosphere, and even

450
00:24:34,000 --> 00:24:36,760
Speaker 2: the temperature from their booth. The popularity of the loft

451
00:24:36,760 --> 00:24:39,640
Speaker 2: parties gave rise to clubs like Paradise Garage and The Gallery,

452
00:24:39,920 --> 00:24:42,120
Speaker 2: the latter of which was founded by DJ Nikki Siano,

453
00:24:42,200 --> 00:24:45,240
Speaker 2: who was famous for his innovative three turntable system that

454
00:24:45,280 --> 00:24:47,720
Speaker 2: allowed him to loop dance breaks as much as he wanted,

455
00:24:48,200 --> 00:24:51,479
Speaker 2: laying the groundwork for countless genres like hip hop, house

456
00:24:51,720 --> 00:24:54,760
Speaker 2: and yes disco, and he would go on to spin

457
00:24:54,880 --> 00:24:57,960
Speaker 2: at Studio fifty four. So the music played at these

458
00:24:57,960 --> 00:25:00,280
Speaker 2: gay underground parties was largely soul in our and b

459
00:25:00,400 --> 00:25:03,840
Speaker 2: from black clubs. A turning point came when DJ David

460
00:25:03,840 --> 00:25:07,520
Speaker 2: Mancuso started playing Manu Dibango's nineteen seventy two proto disco

461
00:25:07,640 --> 00:25:10,440
Speaker 2: hit soul Makassa, probably known for this these this days

462
00:25:10,440 --> 00:25:15,320
Speaker 2: as being the inspiration for the spoken word section in

463
00:25:15,359 --> 00:25:17,760
Speaker 2: Michael Jackson's Want to Be Starting Something.

464
00:25:17,800 --> 00:25:22,520
Speaker 1: Mama Say, Mama, saw Mama Sakusa. That's close enough. Good.

465
00:25:22,680 --> 00:25:25,480
Speaker 1: I love it. That good job. Thank you, You're an

466
00:25:25,520 --> 00:25:32,840
Speaker 1: ally Ma ma.

467
00:25:35,880 --> 00:25:41,000
Speaker 3: Ma Ma gu Sa.

468
00:25:42,320 --> 00:25:45,400
Speaker 2: Mancus came across the relatively obscure single in a Brooklyn

469
00:25:45,400 --> 00:25:47,320
Speaker 2: record store and like it so much that he passed

470
00:25:47,320 --> 00:25:49,679
Speaker 2: it to a radio DJ who started playing it on

471
00:25:49,720 --> 00:25:52,600
Speaker 2: the air. By nineteen seventy four, went mainstream and broke

472
00:25:52,640 --> 00:25:54,560
Speaker 2: into the top forty, making it both one of the

473
00:25:54,560 --> 00:25:57,320
Speaker 2: first records to break through as a club hit and

474
00:25:57,400 --> 00:26:01,400
Speaker 2: also one of the earliest disco esque songs. The sonic

475
00:26:01,480 --> 00:26:04,960
Speaker 2: stew that is canonical disco has its origins and funk

476
00:26:05,520 --> 00:26:09,119
Speaker 2: soul salsa traditions from the Black and Latino communities. Another

477
00:26:09,160 --> 00:26:12,240
Speaker 2: major ingredient was the Philly soul streaming from Kenny Gamble

478
00:26:12,240 --> 00:26:16,639
Speaker 2: and Leon Huff's hit Factory, particularly groups like Tsop, The

479
00:26:16,680 --> 00:26:20,800
Speaker 2: Sound of Philadelphia, and the OJS. One of disco's most

480
00:26:20,800 --> 00:26:23,840
Speaker 2: distinctive features, the exceedingly easy to dance to four on

481
00:26:23,840 --> 00:26:26,520
Speaker 2: the floor. Drumbeat is often credited to Gamble and Huff

482
00:26:26,600 --> 00:26:29,879
Speaker 2: session player Earl Young, notably his playing on Harold Melvin

483
00:26:29,960 --> 00:26:33,000
Speaker 2: and the Blue Notes nineteen seventy three song The Love

484
00:26:33,040 --> 00:26:35,800
Speaker 2: I Lost, which is widely cited as the first disco

485
00:26:35,920 --> 00:26:40,480
Speaker 2: drumming I sure, but a lot of motown is also

486
00:26:40,520 --> 00:26:41,919
Speaker 2: that done.

487
00:26:41,640 --> 00:26:44,000
Speaker 1: Done, wha yeah.

488
00:26:43,240 --> 00:26:58,080
Speaker 3: Done done.

489
00:26:59,480 --> 00:27:03,840
Speaker 2: Other music cohallmarks of disco include the percussive guitar wah wah,

490
00:27:03,880 --> 00:27:07,359
Speaker 2: I think Isaac Haye's Immortal theme from Shaft another proto

491
00:27:07,400 --> 00:27:12,040
Speaker 2: disco mainstay. Heavy syncopation on the high hat, Latin tinged percussion. Yeah,

492
00:27:12,080 --> 00:27:15,040
Speaker 2: this is a great era for auxiliary percussion gigs. Yeah

493
00:27:15,160 --> 00:27:18,200
Speaker 2: you got the got cow bell, A lot of congas,

494
00:27:18,240 --> 00:27:26,200
Speaker 2: probably some wind chimes, jazzy extended chords, strings, rhythmic chicken

495
00:27:26,240 --> 00:27:30,560
Speaker 2: scratch guitar style from the great lineage of James Brown.

496
00:27:30,600 --> 00:27:36,119
Speaker 2: Guitarists like Catfish Collins and Jimmy Chank Nolan as I

497
00:27:36,200 --> 00:27:39,000
Speaker 2: believe is his full nickname because.

498
00:27:38,720 --> 00:27:40,560
Speaker 1: Of the sound that he would make when he was

499
00:27:40,560 --> 00:27:42,040
Speaker 1: just that's really good.

500
00:27:42,200 --> 00:27:45,840
Speaker 2: Yeah, And of course the iconic you failed. You were

501
00:27:45,920 --> 00:27:48,560
Speaker 2: missing your duties. You did not mention the the iconic

502
00:27:49,160 --> 00:27:51,200
Speaker 2: octave bass parts.

503
00:27:51,119 --> 00:27:53,720
Speaker 3: Boom boom boom boom boom boom boom, boom boom boom

504
00:27:53,720 --> 00:27:55,320
Speaker 3: boom boom boom boom.

505
00:27:54,960 --> 00:27:58,520
Speaker 1: As your former bass player. I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm very

506
00:27:58,560 --> 00:27:59,080
Speaker 1: sorry for that.

507
00:27:59,200 --> 00:28:02,080
Speaker 2: I think, I mean, well, I this is fresh in

508
00:28:02,080 --> 00:28:04,520
Speaker 2: my mind because I played a house party actually in

509
00:28:04,560 --> 00:28:08,800
Speaker 2: December with all disco stuff, and you hear a lot

510
00:28:08,840 --> 00:28:11,199
Speaker 2: on abba, but you also hear it in like boogie

511
00:28:11,280 --> 00:28:16,159
Speaker 2: Wonderland has a pretty heavy octive part and I don't

512
00:28:16,240 --> 00:28:18,680
Speaker 2: think I can I'm just spitballing here. But it might

513
00:28:18,720 --> 00:28:21,280
Speaker 2: come from early synths and sequencers, since that was an

514
00:28:21,280 --> 00:28:25,800
Speaker 2: easy pattern program like a fau arpeggiator, just like Doom Doom, Doom, Doom, Doom, Doom,

515
00:28:25,880 --> 00:28:33,480
Speaker 2: doom doom of MGMT. Now, speaking of McKibben LOFs, I

516
00:28:33,480 --> 00:28:38,200
Speaker 2: can smell that phrase, how do I do?

517
00:28:38,240 --> 00:28:39,800
Speaker 1: In that section? You know a lot more about the

518
00:28:39,840 --> 00:28:41,080
Speaker 1: development of music, and.

519
00:28:41,960 --> 00:28:45,800
Speaker 2: I mean, it's funny that disco has you know, a

520
00:28:45,840 --> 00:28:48,160
Speaker 2: big The thing that I would just add to that

521
00:28:48,240 --> 00:28:51,520
Speaker 2: is more cultural, which is that disco, in the retelling

522
00:28:51,560 --> 00:28:54,680
Speaker 2: of it, has become so white and straight washed that

523
00:28:54,760 --> 00:28:59,520
Speaker 2: it is deeply a crime. You know, like again laying

524
00:28:59,560 --> 00:29:01,960
Speaker 2: the blame squarely at the foot of in my experience,

525
00:29:02,000 --> 00:29:04,040
Speaker 2: your former employer of VH one. But you know, everyone

526
00:29:04,080 --> 00:29:07,520
Speaker 2: thinks of like you know, Casey in the Sunshine Band

527
00:29:07,640 --> 00:29:12,600
Speaker 2: or Abba, and it's like, yeah, those people sold a

528
00:29:12,640 --> 00:29:14,960
Speaker 2: boatload of money and made it onto TV. But this

529
00:29:15,040 --> 00:29:18,320
Speaker 2: is black and gay music as at its core. You know,

530
00:29:18,520 --> 00:29:21,800
Speaker 2: you don't really in the popular consciousness that is just

531
00:29:21,880 --> 00:29:25,280
Speaker 2: it's just become, at least in the way I was

532
00:29:25,320 --> 00:29:26,840
Speaker 2: exposed to it. That's part of the reason why I

533
00:29:26,840 --> 00:29:29,800
Speaker 2: think the eyre was so developed towards it. You know

534
00:29:29,960 --> 00:29:33,200
Speaker 2: that it was like Chicago shock jock meatheads who were

535
00:29:33,520 --> 00:29:37,440
Speaker 2: just innately, on some instinctive level repulsed by it.

536
00:29:37,560 --> 00:29:39,360
Speaker 1: You know, it says a.

537
00:29:39,280 --> 00:29:43,840
Speaker 2: Lot about the bedrock of internalized racism and homophobia that

538
00:29:43,960 --> 00:29:45,360
Speaker 2: is this country is built on.

539
00:29:45,840 --> 00:29:48,160
Speaker 1: Well, I think there's two theories. There's that, as you said,

540
00:29:48,160 --> 00:29:51,719
Speaker 1: the inherent racism homophobia that this country's built on. But

541
00:29:51,800 --> 00:29:55,640
Speaker 1: I think there was also people reacting to the objectively

542
00:29:55,920 --> 00:29:59,640
Speaker 1: bad stuff that was coming out as cheap castions, as

543
00:29:59,720 --> 00:30:05,120
Speaker 1: really bad, you know, watered down versions of disco that

544
00:30:05,160 --> 00:30:10,040
Speaker 1: were made by predominantly white people. Yeah. Yeah, but I executives.

545
00:30:10,240 --> 00:30:13,080
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean sure, but there's there's always the cash grabs.

546
00:30:13,120 --> 00:30:16,400
Speaker 2: I mean there's always, like, right, literally every form of

547
00:30:16,480 --> 00:30:19,200
Speaker 2: music has its has its garbage cash grabs coming in.

548
00:30:19,280 --> 00:30:20,880
Speaker 1: It just seems like, yeah, I do know.

549
00:30:20,960 --> 00:30:24,400
Speaker 2: I it's funny too because I think about, like you

550
00:30:24,440 --> 00:30:26,600
Speaker 2: also think about like this era as sort of birthing

551
00:30:26,640 --> 00:30:29,320
Speaker 2: like hard rock and metal and really like the really

552
00:30:29,400 --> 00:30:32,440
Speaker 2: ugly strains of like macho like aggressive music, like I

553
00:30:32,480 --> 00:30:35,520
Speaker 2: think of Kiss and like Black Flag two, and obviously

554
00:30:35,560 --> 00:30:37,360
Speaker 2: I love that stuff, but I mean, like when you

555
00:30:37,360 --> 00:30:40,000
Speaker 2: really think about like what the polar opposite of disco was,

556
00:30:40,160 --> 00:30:42,480
Speaker 2: it's like Gene Simmons, you know, even though they made

557
00:30:42,480 --> 00:30:44,680
Speaker 2: a disc, they made several disco songs, or it's and

558
00:30:44,720 --> 00:30:47,040
Speaker 2: we're on a disco label, but it's like you know,

559
00:30:47,240 --> 00:30:51,120
Speaker 2: or like Ted NuGen, like it really was concurrent with

560
00:30:51,200 --> 00:30:56,680
Speaker 2: the rise of like lungkhead rock and then also punk rock.

561
00:30:56,760 --> 00:31:00,680
Speaker 2: And I think because so much of mainstream America is

562
00:31:00,760 --> 00:31:07,120
Speaker 2: more comfortable with male posturing and misogyny than gay and

563
00:31:07,480 --> 00:31:12,040
Speaker 2: non white stuff. It was very easy to poison the

564
00:31:12,080 --> 00:31:15,640
Speaker 2: country against disco, and there may have also just been

565
00:31:15,680 --> 00:31:18,239
Speaker 2: a touch of people being like why in gods, like

566
00:31:18,280 --> 00:31:21,360
Speaker 2: what is this weird coming from the coasts? You know,

567
00:31:22,280 --> 00:31:24,480
Speaker 2: because there's also like a you know, you can't really

568
00:31:24,480 --> 00:31:28,880
Speaker 2: discount the San Francisco side of things, or like even

569
00:31:29,000 --> 00:31:31,440
Speaker 2: La but I think San Francisco at the time period

570
00:31:31,440 --> 00:31:34,720
Speaker 2: would have been way more influential as a gay mecha

571
00:31:34,760 --> 00:31:39,120
Speaker 2: in terms of music culture. Yeah, there's such a rich

572
00:31:39,160 --> 00:31:41,120
Speaker 2: stew of reasons why people hate this stuff.

573
00:31:42,120 --> 00:31:45,160
Speaker 1: I mean, also, maybe I'm wrong. You could probably disprove

574
00:31:45,200 --> 00:31:47,280
Speaker 1: me on this, but I feel like this was a

575
00:31:47,480 --> 00:31:50,320
Speaker 1: genre maybe for the last time, or a lot of

576
00:31:50,480 --> 00:31:54,080
Speaker 1: artists who had cut their teeth in the sixties on

577
00:31:54,160 --> 00:31:57,080
Speaker 1: either rock and roll or even older artists like I

578
00:31:57,120 --> 00:32:00,600
Speaker 1: think Sinatra and even ethel Merman, they tried to follow

579
00:32:00,680 --> 00:32:04,160
Speaker 1: the trends and cut a disco song. The Beach Boys did,

580
00:32:04,400 --> 00:32:09,560
Speaker 1: oh shure, Karen Carpenter tried to. Yeah, Paul McCartney has one.

581
00:32:09,600 --> 00:32:11,480
Speaker 1: I mean the Rolling Stones Miss You is basically a

582
00:32:11,520 --> 00:32:13,880
Speaker 1: disco song. And so maybe that was part of it too,

583
00:32:14,000 --> 00:32:16,680
Speaker 1: is that instead of just being a new genre that

584
00:32:17,080 --> 00:32:20,120
Speaker 1: existed alongside rock and roll, it actually became something that

585
00:32:20,320 --> 00:32:24,560
Speaker 1: changed artists who were known for doing other things, and

586
00:32:24,600 --> 00:32:27,480
Speaker 1: maybe that made it seem more oppressive for lack of

587
00:32:27,520 --> 00:32:30,520
Speaker 1: a better term, that's interesting. Everybody had their disco song.

588
00:32:30,680 --> 00:32:33,280
Speaker 2: No, that's interesting, And I'm going to take it one

589
00:32:33,280 --> 00:32:36,880
Speaker 2: step further into one star or iTunes reviews and say

590
00:32:36,920 --> 00:32:41,560
Speaker 2: that it was perhaps the first genre that couldn't successfully

591
00:32:41,600 --> 00:32:46,800
Speaker 2: be stolen or was so so alienating when white people

592
00:32:46,880 --> 00:32:48,720
Speaker 2: tried to steal it the way that they had for

593
00:32:48,760 --> 00:32:52,240
Speaker 2: the previous fifty years that it introduced.

594
00:32:52,240 --> 00:32:54,680
Speaker 1: This it was so uncanny.

595
00:32:54,840 --> 00:32:59,240
Speaker 2: Their efforts were so uncanny and repulsive that it immediately

596
00:32:59,280 --> 00:33:01,400
Speaker 2: embarrassed them in a way that it didn't when they

597
00:33:01,400 --> 00:33:04,680
Speaker 2: were able to successfully steal blues or R and B.

598
00:33:04,840 --> 00:33:06,440
Speaker 2: I mean, beach Boy is a great example.

599
00:33:06,480 --> 00:33:11,080
Speaker 1: In nineteen sixty two sixty three, they ripped off you know,

600
00:33:11,200 --> 00:33:14,600
Speaker 1: Chuck Berry riffs to do surfing USA and fun, fun, fun,

601
00:33:14,680 --> 00:33:17,960
Speaker 1: and then fifteen years later in the late seventies, they

602
00:33:18,120 --> 00:33:21,480
Speaker 1: tried their hand at doing disco stuff and didn't work. Yeah.

603
00:33:21,520 --> 00:33:23,760
Speaker 2: Well, early rock and roll stuff is so fascinating to

604
00:33:23,800 --> 00:33:25,160
Speaker 2: me because, like some of the stuff that we think

605
00:33:25,200 --> 00:33:27,920
Speaker 2: of canonically, you're gonna have a bitch of a time

606
00:33:28,040 --> 00:33:28,440
Speaker 2: editing this.

607
00:33:28,840 --> 00:33:29,640
Speaker 1: Mo'm's letting it go.

608
00:33:30,040 --> 00:33:33,360
Speaker 2: But I'm galaxy braining here, I'm I'm cooking. I'm cooking.

609
00:33:35,040 --> 00:33:35,200
Speaker 1: You know.

610
00:33:35,240 --> 00:33:39,000
Speaker 2: Early roll is really an interesting example because it was

611
00:33:39,000 --> 00:33:42,040
Speaker 2: coming from the rural South where there was a general

612
00:33:42,360 --> 00:33:44,880
Speaker 2: a real commingling of white and black culture. I mean,

613
00:33:45,560 --> 00:33:47,360
Speaker 2: if you read a lot of that early blues guys,

614
00:33:47,600 --> 00:33:51,800
Speaker 2: they were like obsessed with Jimmy Rodgers, the yodeling cowboy

615
00:33:53,080 --> 00:33:56,120
Speaker 2: and vice versa. Obviously, and when you do think of

616
00:33:56,200 --> 00:33:59,560
Speaker 2: like fifties rock and roll authentically, it is not just

617
00:34:00,080 --> 00:34:05,080
Speaker 2: black music. It's also quote unquote hillbilly harmonies and bluegrass influence.

618
00:34:05,160 --> 00:34:06,680
Speaker 2: Like you know, you really do have to think of

619
00:34:06,720 --> 00:34:10,799
Speaker 2: like as the Beatles, like Carl Perkins and Motown and

620
00:34:10,880 --> 00:34:13,280
Speaker 2: Chuck Berry and all this stuff. And I think disco

621
00:34:14,000 --> 00:34:20,120
Speaker 2: being a holy urban post industrial genre an invention that

622
00:34:20,239 --> 00:34:24,440
Speaker 2: equation couldn't be repeated in as quote unquote unauthentic way

623
00:34:24,600 --> 00:34:27,359
Speaker 2: as early rock and roll, so it was. I think

624
00:34:27,680 --> 00:34:31,200
Speaker 2: that's why that everybody's disco phase is so galling and glaring,

625
00:34:31,400 --> 00:34:37,160
Speaker 2: because it was really without precedent in the same way

626
00:34:37,200 --> 00:34:39,680
Speaker 2: that they were able to successfully steal the Blues or

627
00:34:39,800 --> 00:34:42,279
Speaker 2: R and B or or you know, in Sinatra's case,

628
00:34:42,400 --> 00:34:43,640
Speaker 2: Billy Holliday or what have you.

629
00:34:44,640 --> 00:34:55,800
Speaker 1: Well, that's interesting, man, Where were we? This one's going along, folks. Yeah,

630
00:34:55,880 --> 00:34:58,800
Speaker 1: the first American news coverage, or at least mainstream American

631
00:34:58,800 --> 00:35:00,600
Speaker 1: news coverage at the disco scene, and it is widely

632
00:35:00,640 --> 00:35:02,760
Speaker 1: believed to be a story that appeared in a September

633
00:35:02,920 --> 00:35:06,759
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy three issue of Rolling Stone. In the piece,

634
00:35:06,920 --> 00:35:12,239
Speaker 1: disco tech rock journalist Vince Aletti writes, part hey party.

635
00:35:12,840 --> 00:35:16,640
Speaker 1: He spells it out phonetically. You hear the chant concerts

636
00:35:16,960 --> 00:35:20,120
Speaker 1: rising like a tribal rallying cry on a shrill wave

637
00:35:20,200 --> 00:35:23,920
Speaker 1: of whistles and hard beaten tambourines. It's at once a

638
00:35:23,960 --> 00:35:26,680
Speaker 1: call to get down and party, a statement that there's

639
00:35:26,680 --> 00:35:29,560
Speaker 1: a party going on, and an indication that disco techs

640
00:35:29,600 --> 00:35:33,280
Speaker 1: with a chant originated are back and force. Disco Tech's

641
00:35:33,360 --> 00:35:36,240
Speaker 1: never died. They just went back underground, but the hardcore

642
00:35:36,360 --> 00:35:40,080
Speaker 1: dance crowd was blacks latinos gaze. In the last year

643
00:35:40,120 --> 00:35:43,640
Speaker 1: they've returned, not only as a rapidly spreading social phenomenon

644
00:35:43,960 --> 00:35:47,160
Speaker 1: via juice bars, after hours clubs, private lofts open on

645
00:35:47,200 --> 00:35:50,040
Speaker 1: weekends the members only, but as a strong influence on

646
00:35:50,080 --> 00:35:52,600
Speaker 1: the music people listen to and buy. It's a hell

647
00:35:52,600 --> 00:35:55,360
Speaker 1: of a run on sentence there by the summer of

648
00:35:55,400 --> 00:35:58,160
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy four, the same year that Saul Makosa made

649
00:35:58,160 --> 00:36:01,440
Speaker 1: the charts Rock the Boat by Hughes Corporation top Billboard,

650
00:36:01,719 --> 00:36:04,440
Speaker 1: mostly based off of club play, and then it was

651
00:36:04,520 --> 00:36:08,000
Speaker 1: kicked off by another disco four runner, George McCrae's Rock

652
00:36:08,040 --> 00:36:11,480
Speaker 1: Your Baby. Five years almost to the day after the

653
00:36:11,480 --> 00:36:17,000
Speaker 1: Stonemall Riots, disco had gone mainstream. It was popular because,

654
00:36:17,160 --> 00:36:20,600
Speaker 1: as Interview magazine editor Bob Colochello would say, it had

655
00:36:20,600 --> 00:36:23,719
Speaker 1: a strong, syncopated beat that everybody could move to, like

656
00:36:23,760 --> 00:36:26,239
Speaker 1: your college professor said, you could make up your own

657
00:36:26,280 --> 00:36:30,040
Speaker 1: steps and jump up and down like a child. It

658
00:36:30,080 --> 00:36:33,120
Speaker 1: wasn't until nineteen seventy seven, with the world beating success

659
00:36:33,160 --> 00:36:36,920
Speaker 1: of the Begs Saturday Night Fevers soundtrack and the accompanying film,

660
00:36:37,280 --> 00:36:40,759
Speaker 1: that disco's reputations shifted and it became popularly known as

661
00:36:40,800 --> 00:36:45,120
Speaker 1: the music of choice for straight white vaguely predatory males.

662
00:36:45,400 --> 00:36:47,960
Speaker 1: So I think that had a lot of impact of

663
00:36:48,719 --> 00:36:52,239
Speaker 1: what we think of as disco fans. Disco stew from

664
00:36:52,239 --> 00:36:55,279
Speaker 1: The Simpsons, If you will, I love disco sto, though

665
00:36:55,920 --> 00:36:58,399
Speaker 1: I mean no, I need to. But Studio fifty four,

666
00:36:58,440 --> 00:37:01,319
Speaker 1: which opened that same year, long way towards bringing these

667
00:37:01,360 --> 00:37:04,120
Speaker 1: sounds out of the underground clubs and into contact with

668
00:37:04,160 --> 00:37:07,640
Speaker 1: the rich, famous, and influential in a way that was

669
00:37:07,680 --> 00:37:12,760
Speaker 1: slightly less damaging than say, Saturday Night Fever. Long story

670
00:37:12,800 --> 00:37:15,520
Speaker 1: short back to Studio fifty four. Steve Rubell and Ian

671
00:37:15,600 --> 00:37:19,080
Speaker 1: Schrager wanted their shot at the disco big leagues in Manhattan,

672
00:37:19,400 --> 00:37:22,000
Speaker 1: and in early nineteen seventy seven they set their eyes

673
00:37:22,040 --> 00:37:25,440
Speaker 1: on a former television studio at two fifty four West

674
00:37:25,480 --> 00:37:28,080
Speaker 1: fifty fourth Street. I think you know where I'm going

675
00:37:28,120 --> 00:37:35,000
Speaker 1: with this. Wait, I'll put it together. This building had

676
00:37:35,040 --> 00:37:38,320
Speaker 1: a long history of turning fantasy into reality. Built in

677
00:37:38,400 --> 00:37:41,640
Speaker 1: nineteen twenty seven as an opera theater, for the last

678
00:37:41,640 --> 00:37:44,600
Speaker 1: thirty years, it had been a broadcast center for CBS

679
00:37:44,719 --> 00:37:48,680
Speaker 1: radio and TV. Called Studio fifty two. It was the

680
00:37:48,680 --> 00:37:51,640
Speaker 1: home of productions like What's My Line, The sixty four

681
00:37:51,640 --> 00:37:55,720
Speaker 1: thousand Dollars Question, password to tell the truth, beat the Clock,

682
00:37:55,960 --> 00:38:02,000
Speaker 1: the Jack Benny Show, I've got a secret and Captain Kangaroo. Yes,

683
00:38:02,080 --> 00:38:05,440
Speaker 1: people were doing lines and having ejaculation contests, which we'll

684
00:38:05,440 --> 00:38:08,600
Speaker 1: get to later on the hollow ground where Captain Kangaroo

685
00:38:08,640 --> 00:38:10,320
Speaker 1: gallivanted with mister Green Jeans.

686
00:38:10,320 --> 00:38:13,880
Speaker 2: Did you know that the ejaculation contest? So the mister Kangaroo,

687
00:38:13,960 --> 00:38:15,160
Speaker 2: Captain Kangaro, excuse me.

688
00:38:15,160 --> 00:38:21,000
Speaker 1: Captain Ken he served h No, I didn't. That's all

689
00:38:21,040 --> 00:38:24,920
Speaker 1: pretty wild. Yeah. So, City of fifty four already had

690
00:38:24,920 --> 00:38:31,040
Speaker 1: a storied pop cultural history before Disco, but CBS relocated

691
00:38:31,080 --> 00:38:33,960
Speaker 1: as production base to California in the early seventies and

692
00:38:34,080 --> 00:38:37,520
Speaker 1: CBS put the building up for sale. Steve Rebell and

693
00:38:37,560 --> 00:38:41,200
Speaker 1: I Schrager, along with a silent partner, put up approximately

694
00:38:41,239 --> 00:38:43,839
Speaker 1: four hundred thousand dollars. I've also heard as high as

695
00:38:43,840 --> 00:38:46,480
Speaker 1: seven hundred thousand dollars, which would have been in the

696
00:38:46,560 --> 00:38:49,760
Speaker 1: area of three to four million dollars in today's money.

697
00:38:50,200 --> 00:38:54,320
Speaker 1: Still not a lot to buy the building. Their friends

698
00:38:54,440 --> 00:38:58,280
Speaker 1: thought they were crazy, the building seemed far too big,

699
00:38:58,320 --> 00:39:02,040
Speaker 1: and the neighborhood was a disaster area. Fifty fourth Street

700
00:39:02,040 --> 00:39:05,080
Speaker 1: and eighth Avenue was arguably the sleaziest neighborhood in the

701
00:39:05,280 --> 00:39:09,120
Speaker 1: entire city, cramped with porno theaters and riddled with crime.

702
00:39:09,719 --> 00:39:12,200
Speaker 1: They thought that there was no way that elite clientele

703
00:39:12,239 --> 00:39:15,320
Speaker 1: would be caught dead there unless they were literally murdered,

704
00:39:16,000 --> 00:39:20,120
Speaker 1: which in nineteen seventy seven was possible. It's worth mentioning

705
00:39:20,120 --> 00:39:22,799
Speaker 1: that this was full on taxi driver era in New York,

706
00:39:22,880 --> 00:39:25,400
Speaker 1: when the city was teetering on the brink of bankruptcy

707
00:39:25,719 --> 00:39:28,960
Speaker 1: and President Gerald Ford refused to bail out, leading to

708
00:39:29,000 --> 00:39:33,120
Speaker 1: the infamous daily news headline forward to city dropped dead.

709
00:39:34,280 --> 00:39:36,560
Speaker 1: This was a time when getting mugged was as common

710
00:39:36,600 --> 00:39:39,080
Speaker 1: as the trash on the ground, just a part of

711
00:39:39,120 --> 00:39:42,560
Speaker 1: life in New York. Grown men would ask their cabbies

712
00:39:42,600 --> 00:39:44,840
Speaker 1: to wait while they walked the fifteen feet from the

713
00:39:44,920 --> 00:39:48,160
Speaker 1: curb to the door of wherever they were going. An

714
00:39:48,160 --> 00:39:51,399
Speaker 1: extremely popular car accessory around this time was something called

715
00:39:51,400 --> 00:39:54,600
Speaker 1: a Benzie box, which allowed you to easily slide your

716
00:39:54,680 --> 00:39:56,800
Speaker 1: radio out of your car at night when you parked

717
00:39:56,800 --> 00:39:59,640
Speaker 1: on the street, in an effort to prevent smashing grabs

718
00:40:00,520 --> 00:40:04,360
Speaker 1: all in all New York. Was Max Fisher from Rushmore.

719
00:40:04,040 --> 00:40:07,640
Speaker 2: Voice in the sh It is amazing to think of

720
00:40:07,680 --> 00:40:10,480
Speaker 2: all this going on, juxtaposed against like the grindhouse era,

721
00:40:10,640 --> 00:40:15,200
Speaker 2: when it was yeah, the most sleazy, horrific films that

722
00:40:15,440 --> 00:40:17,760
Speaker 2: Quintantino would later wax nostalgic about.

723
00:40:19,239 --> 00:40:21,680
Speaker 1: Just like a couple of blocks away. Oh yeah, like

724
00:40:21,719 --> 00:40:23,160
Speaker 1: you could. You could see it from the door of

725
00:40:23,160 --> 00:40:26,720
Speaker 1: the club. It's insane. Greatest city in the world, Baby

726
00:40:26,800 --> 00:40:34,000
Speaker 1: bing Bong Comas Steve Rebillen and Srigger, they had confidence

727
00:40:34,040 --> 00:40:36,920
Speaker 1: in their vision, but they were also nervous considering this

728
00:40:37,040 --> 00:40:40,360
Speaker 1: was the biggest project they'd ever undertaken. They put up

729
00:40:40,400 --> 00:40:42,880
Speaker 1: an additional five hundred thousand dollars in cash for a

730
00:40:42,920 --> 00:40:46,640
Speaker 1: six week crash construction job, which transformed Studio fifty two

731
00:40:47,320 --> 00:40:51,160
Speaker 1: into Studio fifty four. They wanted it open in springtime

732
00:40:51,200 --> 00:40:53,520
Speaker 1: before the Manhattan elite to camp to the Hamptons for

733
00:40:53,560 --> 00:40:56,160
Speaker 1: the summer, but they didn't wait for a building permit

734
00:40:56,200 --> 00:40:58,560
Speaker 1: to come through, which was something of a theme with

735
00:40:58,640 --> 00:41:02,160
Speaker 1: them when it came to dealing with bureaucratic paperwork. Hold

736
00:41:02,200 --> 00:41:06,239
Speaker 1: that thought for later, as we'll discuss. Steve Rubell was

737
00:41:06,280 --> 00:41:09,120
Speaker 1: more of the people person, handling guests and becoming the

738
00:41:09,120 --> 00:41:12,160
Speaker 1: public face of Studio fifty four. Well Ian Schrager was

739
00:41:12,200 --> 00:41:16,080
Speaker 1: the creative producer, running operations behind the scenes. The ViBe's director,

740
00:41:16,600 --> 00:41:19,239
Speaker 1: will the ViBe's director, if you will? Yes. Schreger would

741
00:41:19,280 --> 00:41:21,360
Speaker 1: later say, when you have a nightclub, you have no

742
00:41:21,480 --> 00:41:24,959
Speaker 1: product that's uniquely yours. Use the same music, the same

743
00:41:24,960 --> 00:41:28,319
Speaker 1: liquor as everyone else. The only chance for distinction is

744
00:41:28,360 --> 00:41:33,400
Speaker 1: the atmosphere, the ambiance, as you say, the vibes. The

745
00:41:33,440 --> 00:41:36,360
Speaker 1: big names for nightclub lighting and architecture had been warned

746
00:41:36,360 --> 00:41:39,600
Speaker 1: off working with Rebel and Schreger by the club's competitors,

747
00:41:40,040 --> 00:41:42,439
Speaker 1: but this ended up working out for the best. Since

748
00:41:42,480 --> 00:41:44,960
Speaker 1: the building had previously been a theater, they decided to

749
00:41:45,040 --> 00:41:48,839
Speaker 1: hire people from a theatrical background who also worked at

750
00:41:48,840 --> 00:41:51,400
Speaker 1: the speed of a theatrical production, which proved to be

751
00:41:51,440 --> 00:41:56,240
Speaker 1: an added bonus because you know, those guys move quickly. Schrager,

752
00:41:56,400 --> 00:41:59,160
Speaker 1: who supervised the design, later said everyone who worked on

753
00:41:59,200 --> 00:42:02,440
Speaker 1: Studio fifty five never worked on a nightclub before, except

754
00:42:02,440 --> 00:42:05,640
Speaker 1: for the sound guy. This guaranteed a fresh approach. The

755
00:42:05,719 --> 00:42:08,360
Speaker 1: lighting was by Jules Fisher and Paul Morantz, who had

756
00:42:08,400 --> 00:42:11,680
Speaker 1: done the Broadway Show Chicago. It was their idea to

757
00:42:11,719 --> 00:42:14,000
Speaker 1: take advantage of the theatrical rigs we had so we

758
00:42:14,040 --> 00:42:17,400
Speaker 1: could have moving and changing scenery. The sound was by

759
00:42:17,480 --> 00:42:20,320
Speaker 1: Richard Long, who did most of the gay discos in town.

760
00:42:20,800 --> 00:42:23,600
Speaker 1: We had huge bass speakers on the floors. You could

761
00:42:23,600 --> 00:42:27,160
Speaker 1: actually feel the music and tweeter arrays hanging from the ceiling.

762
00:42:27,560 --> 00:42:31,440
Speaker 1: The idea was to constantly assault the senses in an

763
00:42:31,480 --> 00:42:35,000
Speaker 1: inspired stroke. They turned the stage the former stage, i

764
00:42:35,040 --> 00:42:38,880
Speaker 1: should say, into the dance floor because they reasoned everybody

765
00:42:38,920 --> 00:42:41,080
Speaker 1: wants to be on the stage. That's the key to

766
00:42:41,160 --> 00:42:44,880
Speaker 1: life in Manhattan or anywhere else. And they really leaned

767
00:42:44,880 --> 00:42:48,200
Speaker 1: into using the infrastructure of the old theater. They adapted

768
00:42:48,239 --> 00:42:53,000
Speaker 1: the existing lighting rigging system to generate special effects like confetti, snow, fog,

769
00:42:53,160 --> 00:42:54,640
Speaker 1: wind and even rain drops.

770
00:42:55,160 --> 00:43:01,200
Speaker 2: And later on it wasn't rained. Oh.

771
00:43:01,239 --> 00:43:03,800
Speaker 1: On the ceiling was a thirty by forty foot cycle

772
00:43:03,920 --> 00:43:06,800
Speaker 1: rama which is like a curve screen which could project

773
00:43:06,800 --> 00:43:12,360
Speaker 1: images of space volcano eruptions, who sunrises and sunsets volcanoes

774
00:43:12,360 --> 00:43:16,680
Speaker 1: if you were lucky. The whole idea was that you

775
00:43:16,680 --> 00:43:19,200
Speaker 1: were part of a show and no other club was

776
00:43:19,200 --> 00:43:21,840
Speaker 1: doing that. They wanted to break down the barrier between

777
00:43:21,960 --> 00:43:25,680
Speaker 1: audience and performer and create the sense that anything could happen.

778
00:43:26,600 --> 00:43:29,879
Speaker 1: And this theatrical assault to the senses made every other

779
00:43:29,960 --> 00:43:34,080
Speaker 1: club seem mundane. But you can't have a disco club

780
00:43:34,200 --> 00:43:38,560
Speaker 1: without a disco ball. So disco balls.

781
00:43:38,280 --> 00:43:40,920
Speaker 2: Actually date back to the early nineteen hundreds, which is

782
00:43:41,120 --> 00:43:44,360
Speaker 2: amazing to me that like people were having their minds

783
00:43:44,400 --> 00:43:47,080
Speaker 2: blown by a train coming at them on a movie

784
00:43:47,120 --> 00:43:50,200
Speaker 2: screen and the disco ball at the same time.

785
00:43:50,719 --> 00:43:53,200
Speaker 1: Well, it was like an early light show. Basically, it

786
00:43:53,239 --> 00:43:55,120
Speaker 1: was like a pre laser light show. Yeah.

787
00:43:55,160 --> 00:44:01,359
Speaker 2: The first patent was prosaically described as a myriad reflector,

788
00:44:02,080 --> 00:44:07,840
Speaker 2: filed in nineteen seventeen by Louis Bernard wost West is

789
00:44:07,920 --> 00:44:10,319
Speaker 2: the American what is he looks German to me, could

790
00:44:10,320 --> 00:44:15,640
Speaker 2: be French. Luis Benage voiced who pledged to fill venues

791
00:44:15,680 --> 00:44:19,480
Speaker 2: with dancing fireflies of one thousand hues. Now he has

792
00:44:19,520 --> 00:44:24,320
Speaker 2: to be French, he would not be German. Writing like that.

793
00:44:24,880 --> 00:44:27,360
Speaker 2: These were staples of dance halls in the twenties and thirties,

794
00:44:27,400 --> 00:44:29,880
Speaker 2: and one can even be seen in a scene from Casablanca.

795
00:44:30,360 --> 00:44:32,239
Speaker 2: And they were not cheap. The average price of a

796
00:44:32,280 --> 00:44:34,680
Speaker 2: forty eight inch ball in the nineteen forties came to

797
00:44:34,800 --> 00:44:39,000
Speaker 2: four grand or twenty thousand dollars in today's dollars.

798
00:44:39,400 --> 00:44:42,200
Speaker 1: That's insane. You can get a new HVAC system for

799
00:44:42,239 --> 00:44:43,840
Speaker 1: that if you buy it off the back of a truck.

800
00:44:44,200 --> 00:44:47,600
Speaker 2: As lighting and special effect technology improved in the nineteen sixties,

801
00:44:47,600 --> 00:44:50,160
Speaker 2: they came to be associated with more doughty, low budget,

802
00:44:50,239 --> 00:44:54,040
Speaker 2: low resource places, which is possibly how a disco ball

803
00:44:54,080 --> 00:44:57,560
Speaker 2: came to be featured at David Mancuso's Loft Parties. Loft

804
00:44:57,640 --> 00:44:59,920
Speaker 2: DJ Niki Siano barred the idea for his own pro

805
00:45:00,160 --> 00:45:02,680
Speaker 2: disco club, The Gallery a few years later, and the

806
00:45:02,719 --> 00:45:07,080
Speaker 2: trend took off. There are some random Internet denizens claiming

807
00:45:07,120 --> 00:45:10,120
Speaker 2: that there wasn't a disco ball at Studio fifty four,

808
00:45:10,440 --> 00:45:12,279
Speaker 2: and while that may not have been the case when

809
00:45:12,280 --> 00:45:15,600
Speaker 2: the club first opened, there are places that claim to

810
00:45:15,600 --> 00:45:21,399
Speaker 2: have the Studio fifty four disco ball collections of rich

811
00:45:21,440 --> 00:45:23,840
Speaker 2: white people who owned guitars, ye who owned famous guitars.

812
00:45:24,000 --> 00:45:26,319
Speaker 2: According to Architecture or Digest, one is wound up in

813
00:45:26,320 --> 00:45:28,920
Speaker 2: the sun room of a private home in an Atlanta suburb.

814
00:45:30,440 --> 00:45:33,400
Speaker 2: Great there's also a disco ball hanging in the lobby

815
00:45:33,400 --> 00:45:36,080
Speaker 2: of the current theater that occupies the building that used

816
00:45:36,080 --> 00:45:39,640
Speaker 2: to house Studio fifty four. Yeah, how many disco balls

817
00:45:39,680 --> 00:45:40,440
Speaker 2: you think they went through.

818
00:45:41,040 --> 00:45:44,080
Speaker 1: I've been looking at pictures of Studio fifty four and

819
00:45:44,120 --> 00:45:47,479
Speaker 1: I haven't actually been able to like see any because

820
00:45:47,520 --> 00:45:50,640
Speaker 1: I presumably would have been very high up. Yeah, yeah,

821
00:45:50,640 --> 00:45:52,920
Speaker 1: I don't know. I guess. I mean, how many disco balls.

822
00:45:53,160 --> 00:45:55,719
Speaker 1: It's not like they wear out? Well, maybe they do.

823
00:45:57,000 --> 00:45:58,839
Speaker 1: Why would they? You shouldn't light at it.

824
00:45:59,000 --> 00:46:02,080
Speaker 2: I couldn't tell you what am I on smoke smoke rising,

825
00:46:02,120 --> 00:46:04,120
Speaker 2: and maybe they dull it. I mean, actually that is

826
00:46:04,120 --> 00:46:06,360
Speaker 2: probably the most likely thing. That they just weren't able

827
00:46:06,440 --> 00:46:09,120
Speaker 2: or willing to drop this thing down and scrub off

828
00:46:09,120 --> 00:46:10,759
Speaker 2: all the nicotine, the tar.

829
00:46:12,560 --> 00:46:19,160
Speaker 1: That's gross. Imagine that. No, I mean that's that's one

830
00:46:19,200 --> 00:46:21,560
Speaker 1: of the least gross things that they were scrubbing off

831
00:46:21,560 --> 00:46:24,560
Speaker 1: of the walls and c oh the walls. Yeah, I

832
00:46:24,600 --> 00:46:27,680
Speaker 1: was like nobody could get something that.

833
00:46:27,920 --> 00:46:34,279
Speaker 2: There were contests. There were contests. As you meditate on that,

834
00:46:34,600 --> 00:46:36,759
Speaker 2: We'll be right back with more too much information.

835
00:46:37,080 --> 00:46:48,480
Speaker 5: After these messages, we even even.

836
00:46:48,280 --> 00:46:52,319
Speaker 1: Gotten to the true insanity. Although now we're at opening night,

837
00:46:52,400 --> 00:46:54,040
Speaker 1: so now we're going to start getting to the true

838
00:46:54,080 --> 00:46:55,640
Speaker 1: insanity of Study fifty four.

839
00:46:56,000 --> 00:46:59,839
Speaker 2: So some workers put in thirty hours straight, which I'm

840
00:46:59,880 --> 00:47:02,640
Speaker 2: sure sure they did without the aid of any artificial

841
00:47:02,719 --> 00:47:06,080
Speaker 2: stimulants to ensure that they were ready for opening night

842
00:47:06,200 --> 00:47:09,560
Speaker 2: on April twenty sixth, nineteen seventy seven. It was quite

843
00:47:09,600 --> 00:47:11,680
Speaker 2: literally down to the wire. Forty five minutes before the

844
00:47:11,680 --> 00:47:14,360
Speaker 2: doors opened. They were still laying down black astro turf.

845
00:47:15,719 --> 00:47:18,799
Speaker 2: What for the dance.

846
00:47:18,480 --> 00:47:24,040
Speaker 1: Floor, for the dantelia, for the for the ow coves,

847
00:47:25,640 --> 00:47:31,920
Speaker 1: possibly colves, sex caves, the grotto.

848
00:47:32,400 --> 00:47:34,080
Speaker 2: Then the lights went out on the bar, so a

849
00:47:34,120 --> 00:47:36,840
Speaker 2: poor runner was sent around to the corner bodega to

850
00:47:36,880 --> 00:47:39,279
Speaker 2: get vote of candles just before people were let in

851
00:47:39,760 --> 00:47:45,000
Speaker 2: ah bodegas and fire hazards. The True New York, True

852
00:47:45,080 --> 00:47:49,360
Speaker 2: New York Experience invites had been sent ushering the great

853
00:47:49,400 --> 00:47:51,640
Speaker 2: and good of New York society to the premiere of

854
00:47:51,680 --> 00:47:55,280
Speaker 2: Studio fifty four, advising them that the dress code was spectacular.

855
00:47:56,239 --> 00:47:56,560
Speaker 1: Sure.

856
00:47:56,960 --> 00:47:59,400
Speaker 2: The invite included their famous fifty four logo, which came

857
00:47:59,400 --> 00:48:02,240
Speaker 2: from the brain of High magazine graphic designer Gil Lesser,

858
00:48:02,800 --> 00:48:05,240
Speaker 2: who had also done the award winning poster for the play.

859
00:48:05,280 --> 00:48:09,279
Speaker 2: Equis famous for featuring full frontal male nudity and a horse.

860
00:48:09,160 --> 00:48:11,400
Speaker 1: Two things. You will see a lot of it before

861
00:48:11,520 --> 00:48:11,960
Speaker 1: the theme.

862
00:48:12,000 --> 00:48:15,400
Speaker 2: They stayed on theme. They sent these to everyone that

863
00:48:15,440 --> 00:48:18,280
Speaker 2: they wanted to be in a room. Chuck, it's your cousin.

864
00:48:18,680 --> 00:48:21,160
Speaker 2: You know that new club you're thinking about, Your cousin

865
00:48:21,200 --> 00:48:26,560
Speaker 2: Gil Lesser holding a naked man and a horse on

866
00:48:26,719 --> 00:48:33,080
Speaker 2: the rooney. They sent these to everyone they wanted to

867
00:48:33,120 --> 00:48:38,239
Speaker 2: be in a room with Chaer, Margot Hemingway, Brooke Shields,

868
00:48:38,360 --> 00:48:44,080
Speaker 2: who would have been carry the two twelve. God, it

869
00:48:44,120 --> 00:48:46,760
Speaker 2: is amazing that that woman didn't end up a bigger disaster.

870
00:48:46,920 --> 00:48:50,200
Speaker 2: I mean, look what we did to Linda Blair, Moore,

871
00:48:50,640 --> 00:48:55,320
Speaker 2: Linda Blair and Brooke Shilds was like the nation's disgusting wet.

872
00:48:55,160 --> 00:48:57,400
Speaker 1: Dream before she could get her learners permit.

873
00:48:59,200 --> 00:49:03,200
Speaker 2: And then other ugly people like mel Brooks, John Liftgow,

874
00:49:03,600 --> 00:49:08,520
Speaker 2: Zero Mostel, Jerry Orbo John and Jerry Or.

875
00:49:08,840 --> 00:49:11,160
Speaker 1: Got an invite to the opening night of the studio fifty.

876
00:49:11,400 --> 00:49:11,840
Speaker 1: George C.

877
00:49:12,120 --> 00:49:18,040
Speaker 2: Scott, can you imagine drunk shaped like a barrel? Belligerent

878
00:49:18,239 --> 00:49:25,680
Speaker 2: George C. Scott, Era, yeah, Jerry Stiller, Dustin Hoffman. I

879
00:49:25,719 --> 00:49:28,759
Speaker 2: can see Lee Strasburg there, I can see Lily Tomlin there,

880
00:49:28,880 --> 00:49:32,799
Speaker 2: Joan Fontaine, Joe Namath had swag though back in the day.

881
00:49:32,840 --> 00:49:34,600
Speaker 2: Can you imagine Joe Namath rolling up in one of

882
00:49:34,640 --> 00:49:35,799
Speaker 2: those fur coats.

883
00:49:35,960 --> 00:49:39,000
Speaker 1: Is see, Hollywood, Joe, there's another Joe football player, Joe

884
00:49:39,040 --> 00:49:41,200
Speaker 1: Montana Mine. Yeah, I don't know. I don't know. I

885
00:49:41,480 --> 00:49:42,280
Speaker 1: forgot well.

886
00:49:44,120 --> 00:49:45,800
Speaker 2: One of the first people to appear outside of the

887
00:49:45,840 --> 00:49:48,680
Speaker 2: doors of Studio fifty four is someone who very few

888
00:49:48,680 --> 00:49:50,520
Speaker 2: people would want to be in a room with these days,

889
00:49:51,080 --> 00:49:54,399
Speaker 2: Donald Trump. He and then wife Ivanka were having dinner

890
00:49:54,440 --> 00:49:57,879
Speaker 2: at the Upper east Side hotspots. Elaine's famously name dropped

891
00:49:57,880 --> 00:50:01,160
Speaker 2: in Billy Joel's Big Shot. When they're friend social like Nicky,

892
00:50:01,239 --> 00:50:05,240
Speaker 2: Haskell suggested they check out this new club. As Haskell

893
00:50:05,280 --> 00:50:08,919
Speaker 2: remembered in Anthony Halden Guest's book The Last Party, which

894
00:50:08,960 --> 00:50:11,960
Speaker 2: you describe as the definitive book on Studio fifty four.

895
00:50:12,000 --> 00:50:16,040
Speaker 2: It's Christopher Guest's brother or half brother something. Anthony Igan guessed.

896
00:50:16,320 --> 00:50:20,400
Speaker 1: Huh yeah, man, he should do a Studio fifty four mockumentary.

897
00:50:21,360 --> 00:50:22,640
Speaker 3: Ah.

898
00:50:22,719 --> 00:50:25,400
Speaker 1: Man, that's so good. Did they hate each other? Why

899
00:50:25,440 --> 00:50:27,040
Speaker 1: haven't they done that? Anyway?

900
00:50:27,040 --> 00:50:28,040
Speaker 3: I don't know.

901
00:50:28,280 --> 00:50:30,280
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a great book. The last part. It's incredible.

902
00:50:30,400 --> 00:50:34,040
Speaker 1: What's the quote quote? We got to Studio fifty four,

903
00:50:34,120 --> 00:50:36,720
Speaker 1: and there was nobody there. We were like the first

904
00:50:37,000 --> 00:50:39,880
Speaker 1: we knocked on the door. Donald hadn't built Trump Tower.

905
00:50:40,120 --> 00:50:43,560
Speaker 1: Nobody knew him in those days. Their knocks went unanswered.

906
00:50:43,920 --> 00:50:45,880
Speaker 2: About fifteen minutes later, we were just getting ready to

907
00:50:45,920 --> 00:50:48,040
Speaker 2: leave and they opened one of the doors. They didn't

908
00:50:48,040 --> 00:50:51,239
Speaker 2: even know we were waiting out there. Once inside, Trump

909
00:50:51,320 --> 00:50:54,680
Speaker 2: and Company wandered through the empty disco, Haskell continues, they

910
00:50:54,680 --> 00:50:57,839
Speaker 2: were still adjusting the lights and fixing the music. DJ

911
00:50:58,000 --> 00:51:00,279
Speaker 2: Richie Kasker dropped the needle in the first record of

912
00:51:00,320 --> 00:51:04,919
Speaker 2: the night, Devil's Gun by CJ and Company, than.

913
00:51:06,640 --> 00:51:21,440
Speaker 4: Insignments, comments Trunk in Silent Stament.

914
00:51:17,360 --> 00:51:24,040
Speaker 2: Stan, but the club remained dead. About a half an

915
00:51:24,040 --> 00:51:25,920
Speaker 2: hour later, there were fifty or sixty people in there.

916
00:51:26,280 --> 00:51:29,640
Speaker 2: We kept saying, gee, I wonder where everybody is. Sadly,

917
00:51:29,719 --> 00:51:32,439
Speaker 2: there are no photos of Trump showing up unfashionably early

918
00:51:32,560 --> 00:51:34,720
Speaker 2: to the opening of Studio fifty four, and his presence

919
00:51:34,760 --> 00:51:38,080
Speaker 2: made little impression at the time. Studio fifty four bus boy,

920
00:51:38,200 --> 00:51:40,200
Speaker 2: Richie no Tar were called. In the twenty seventeen BBC

921
00:51:40,360 --> 00:51:43,400
Speaker 2: radio documentary, no one remembered him being there the first night.

922
00:51:43,719 --> 00:51:45,840
Speaker 2: He was a non entity. He was never on the

923
00:51:45,920 --> 00:51:49,160
Speaker 2: dance floor. Trump is famously a non drinker, supposed to

924
00:51:49,200 --> 00:51:51,760
Speaker 2: the reaction to his older brother, who died of alcohol

925
00:51:51,800 --> 00:51:54,799
Speaker 2: related complications. He has claimed that he's never even had

926
00:51:54,800 --> 00:51:57,520
Speaker 2: a beer, although Vice and numerous other outlets have published

927
00:51:57,680 --> 00:52:00,279
Speaker 2: lengthy expose as featuring interviews with people who claim in

928
00:52:00,320 --> 00:52:03,399
Speaker 2: fact the opposite. Regardless, Trump is known as not much

929
00:52:03,400 --> 00:52:05,080
Speaker 2: of a party animal, which makes it all the more

930
00:52:05,120 --> 00:52:07,680
Speaker 2: surprising that he became something of a regular at studio,

931
00:52:08,560 --> 00:52:10,800
Speaker 2: which is what everybody in the no called it, just

932
00:52:10,880 --> 00:52:13,319
Speaker 2: shortening off. The number was in studio fifty four. Yes,

933
00:52:13,719 --> 00:52:17,760
Speaker 2: just a studio. I'd go there a lot with dates

934
00:52:17,920 --> 00:52:20,120
Speaker 2: and with friends and with lots of people, he told

935
00:52:20,160 --> 00:52:23,240
Speaker 2: The Washington Post. In twenty sixteen, he added to another outlet,

936
00:52:23,640 --> 00:52:27,400
Speaker 2: I would watch supermodels getting screwed, well known supermodels getting

937
00:52:27,400 --> 00:52:29,680
Speaker 2: screwed on a bench in the middle of the room.

938
00:52:30,200 --> 00:52:32,080
Speaker 2: There were seven of them, and each one was getting

939
00:52:32,120 --> 00:52:33,399
Speaker 2: screwed by a different guy.

940
00:52:34,920 --> 00:52:38,359
Speaker 1: His quotes distilled down and to the page. So it's

941
00:52:38,520 --> 00:52:40,440
Speaker 1: really really alarming.

942
00:52:42,640 --> 00:52:46,960
Speaker 2: Sure, man, okay, okay man. According to Trump's friend Nikki Haskell,

943
00:52:47,000 --> 00:52:48,920
Speaker 2: who led him there in the first place, the non drinking,

944
00:52:49,000 --> 00:52:51,759
Speaker 2: non dancing Mogul had business reasons for making the scene.

945
00:52:52,800 --> 00:52:56,400
Speaker 2: He understood it was an opportunity to be grabbed, phrasing.

946
00:52:56,200 --> 00:52:57,479
Speaker 1: Wooh woh wow.

947
00:52:57,719 --> 00:52:59,839
Speaker 2: He was not there for the drug fueled disco del

948
00:53:00,719 --> 00:53:02,400
Speaker 2: He was there to be seen with the famous people,

949
00:53:02,680 --> 00:53:07,560
Speaker 2: to network, to cut the deal whilst everyone else cut

950
00:53:07,640 --> 00:53:10,759
Speaker 2: the coke. You think she ripped that page out of

951
00:53:10,800 --> 00:53:15,760
Speaker 2: the typewriter and was like, good job, Nikki, Johnny Carson

952
00:53:15,840 --> 00:53:17,799
Speaker 2: golf sewing hack.

953
00:53:19,640 --> 00:53:22,319
Speaker 1: But getting back to opening night, Though the first few

954
00:53:22,360 --> 00:53:25,200
Speaker 1: hours were a little slow, the crowds quickly descended on

955
00:53:25,280 --> 00:53:28,560
Speaker 1: the club in droves. The exterior of Studio fifty four

956
00:53:28,680 --> 00:53:30,840
Speaker 1: was lit up with cleague lights like a movie premiere,

957
00:53:31,320 --> 00:53:33,200
Speaker 1: but apparently no one had thought about the kind of

958
00:53:33,280 --> 00:53:38,480
Speaker 1: public attention this withdraw. Without adequate security and bouncers outside,

959
00:53:38,600 --> 00:53:41,879
Speaker 1: Rebel and Schrieger had to take interior security guards out

960
00:53:41,960 --> 00:53:45,200
Speaker 1: to work the front door. By eleven PM, the crowd

961
00:53:45,280 --> 00:53:48,319
Speaker 1: had gone from a trickle to a torrent of thousands,

962
00:53:48,440 --> 00:53:51,200
Speaker 1: and traffic on fifty fourth Street came to a standstill.

963
00:53:51,680 --> 00:53:54,480
Speaker 1: Frank Sinatra was stranded in his limousine, unable to get

964
00:53:54,600 --> 00:53:58,120
Speaker 1: near but Cher Margo Hemingway and a young Brookshields made

965
00:53:58,160 --> 00:54:03,160
Speaker 1: it inside, while Charlie's Angels star Kate Jackson and Henry

966
00:54:03,239 --> 00:54:06,400
Speaker 1: the Fawns Winkler did not. They were caught in the crowd.

967
00:54:07,360 --> 00:54:10,400
Speaker 1: Another who was stranded outside was a physician who started

968
00:54:10,440 --> 00:54:15,040
Speaker 1: distributing pills from his jumbo size bottle of Quayludes. As

969
00:54:15,120 --> 00:54:18,640
Speaker 1: one club goer told Anthony Hayden guest, the doctor started

970
00:54:18,680 --> 00:54:22,239
Speaker 1: handing them out. About thirty people standing around us took them,

971
00:54:22,520 --> 00:54:26,120
Speaker 1: and then everybody started having this mad sexual orgy. All

972
00:54:26,200 --> 00:54:30,280
Speaker 1: the man had their dicks out, everybody was feeling everybody else.

973
00:54:30,760 --> 00:54:33,720
Speaker 1: The crowd was moving in waves. All of a sudden

974
00:54:33,760 --> 00:54:36,080
Speaker 1: you would find yourself next to somebody you didn't know.

975
00:54:37,440 --> 00:54:40,719
Speaker 1: So that was going on outside that worked out well.

976
00:54:40,920 --> 00:54:43,239
Speaker 1: I mean, I guess April and May and New York

977
00:54:43,320 --> 00:54:46,759
Speaker 1: is pretty warm. Yeah, but it's still in literally in

978
00:54:46,800 --> 00:54:49,160
Speaker 1: the middle of the street, the middle of fifty fourth Street.

979
00:54:49,320 --> 00:54:53,280
Speaker 1: That's true, yea. I know it was nineteen seventy seven,

980
00:54:53,480 --> 00:54:55,680
Speaker 1: and I know it was when that whole area was

981
00:54:55,960 --> 00:54:59,040
Speaker 1: a porn mecca. But that's a lot even for then

982
00:55:00,440 --> 00:55:04,440
Speaker 1: God better days. But those who did find their way

983
00:55:04,520 --> 00:55:07,440
Speaker 1: inside were treated to an unforgettable sight as they passed

984
00:55:07,440 --> 00:55:10,919
Speaker 1: through the smoked glass doors. As dorman Mark Bennekey would

985
00:55:10,960 --> 00:55:13,680
Speaker 1: recall in the Studio fifty four episode of VH one's

986
00:55:13,719 --> 00:55:16,640
Speaker 1: Behind the Music, Beyond the Velvet Rope is what I

987
00:55:16,760 --> 00:55:19,719
Speaker 1: used to call the Corridor of Joy. It had orn

988
00:55:19,760 --> 00:55:22,960
Speaker 1: eate chandeliers and everybody there was screaming with joy that

989
00:55:23,040 --> 00:55:25,920
Speaker 1: they got in. You could hear the pulsating music as

990
00:55:25,960 --> 00:55:29,560
Speaker 1: you walk through. The long entranceway was mirrored on both sides,

991
00:55:29,600 --> 00:55:32,319
Speaker 1: with a big chandelier in it hit by lasers which

992
00:55:32,360 --> 00:55:35,439
Speaker 1: went onto the mirrors and bounced everywhere. The disco beat,

993
00:55:35,480 --> 00:55:38,600
Speaker 1: but from beyond the hallway lured you further. Once inside

994
00:55:38,640 --> 00:55:41,479
Speaker 1: the main room, you were invited to an enormous refreshment center.

995
00:55:42,040 --> 00:55:45,080
Speaker 1: Poles lined with lights, almost like an amusement ride, came

996
00:55:45,200 --> 00:55:47,640
Speaker 1: down just about eye level on the dance floor, and

997
00:55:47,719 --> 00:55:51,319
Speaker 1: they were topped off with twirling police sirens. When you'd leave,

998
00:55:51,440 --> 00:55:54,359
Speaker 1: they'd have little bowls of candy like tutsi rolls as

999
00:55:54,400 --> 00:55:56,560
Speaker 1: you went out into the harsh morning light of the street.

1000
00:55:57,400 --> 00:56:00,479
Speaker 1: Studio opened at ten PM and served liquor into four

1001
00:56:00,640 --> 00:56:04,160
Speaker 1: but never closed before six am. So yeah, usually it

1002
00:56:04,280 --> 00:56:09,160
Speaker 1: was dawn when people were done. Opening night featured a

1003
00:56:09,239 --> 00:56:13,279
Speaker 1: fashion show, circus acts reportedly, and a performance by the

1004
00:56:13,320 --> 00:56:16,800
Speaker 1: Alvin Ailey Dance Troupe, and the club scored a major

1005
00:56:16,880 --> 00:56:18,839
Speaker 1: coup with The New York Post the next day when

1006
00:56:18,880 --> 00:56:21,560
Speaker 1: they put a picture of Share on their front page,

1007
00:56:22,239 --> 00:56:25,000
Speaker 1: and Trager recalled, I remember Steve calling me up that

1008
00:56:25,160 --> 00:56:27,120
Speaker 1: morning and we couldn't believe it. We were on the

1009
00:56:27,200 --> 00:56:30,480
Speaker 1: front page, the whole page. No nightclub up to then

1010
00:56:30,560 --> 00:56:32,880
Speaker 1: had done that. So they're off to a good start.

1011
00:56:33,880 --> 00:56:36,719
Speaker 1: This was April twenty sixth, nineteen seventy seven, but the

1012
00:56:36,840 --> 00:56:40,600
Speaker 1: next few days weren't quite as busy, and then club

1013
00:56:40,680 --> 00:56:43,240
Speaker 1: owner Steve Rubelle got a call from the famous fashion

1014
00:56:43,320 --> 00:56:46,840
Speaker 1: designer Halston. He wanted to throw a birthday party for

1015
00:56:46,920 --> 00:56:50,080
Speaker 1: Bianca Jagger's wife. At the time, it was to be

1016
00:56:50,160 --> 00:56:53,600
Speaker 1: a small affair. I've seen somewhere between thirty and one

1017
00:56:53,680 --> 00:56:56,400
Speaker 1: hundred and fifty people, which it's a big spread, but

1018
00:56:56,560 --> 00:56:59,720
Speaker 1: still it's not a lot. It's a huge building. According

1019
00:56:59,719 --> 00:57:02,719
Speaker 1: to Jigends, Steve Rebell, who will learn had a bit

1020
00:57:02,800 --> 00:57:06,359
Speaker 1: of an ego, initially told the world famous designer were

1021
00:57:06,400 --> 00:57:11,480
Speaker 1: closed on Mondays closed. He replied, we'll open it. This

1022
00:57:11,560 --> 00:57:13,400
Speaker 1: would prove to be a very good idea, because the

1023
00:57:13,480 --> 00:57:16,280
Speaker 1: party yielded one of the most indelible images of Studio

1024
00:57:16,360 --> 00:57:19,720
Speaker 1: fifty four, which launched the club's reputation in a big way.

1025
00:57:20,520 --> 00:57:24,560
Speaker 1: I'm talking about, of course, Bianca Jagger on a horse.

1026
00:57:25,160 --> 00:57:26,840
Speaker 1: We all have that image in our mind. You know

1027
00:57:26,920 --> 00:57:29,960
Speaker 1: that shot. I'm talking about that, of course. Yeah. As

1028
00:57:30,000 --> 00:57:31,880
Speaker 1: soon as Rebel got off the phone with Holliston, the

1029
00:57:31,960 --> 00:57:35,400
Speaker 1: production team flipped into action, enlisting everyone they knew to

1030
00:57:35,440 --> 00:57:38,560
Speaker 1: blow up white balloons and call up the Claremont stables

1031
00:57:38,640 --> 00:57:41,320
Speaker 1: on the upper i think upper west Side and arrange

1032
00:57:41,360 --> 00:57:44,800
Speaker 1: for a horse to be delivered. The big day arrived

1033
00:57:44,840 --> 00:57:47,640
Speaker 1: on May second, barely a week after Studio fifty four

1034
00:57:47,680 --> 00:57:51,680
Speaker 1: had opened. Everyone from Barishnakoff the Jacque Line Bassett was there.

1035
00:57:52,440 --> 00:57:56,720
Speaker 1: One of the bartenders troublingly donned a diaper and popped

1036
00:57:56,720 --> 00:57:59,520
Speaker 1: out of a cake for Bianca. But the highlight of

1037
00:57:59,560 --> 00:58:02,360
Speaker 1: the evening occurred around midnight, when the DJ hit play

1038
00:58:02,440 --> 00:58:05,760
Speaker 1: on the Stone Sympathy for the Devil, and the aforementioned

1039
00:58:05,840 --> 00:58:08,680
Speaker 1: white steed was let out from behind a stage curtain

1040
00:58:09,200 --> 00:58:12,880
Speaker 1: by a nude couple slathered in shivering paint and sparkles.

1041
00:58:12,960 --> 00:58:16,240
Speaker 1: They basically had like tuxedos painted on their naked bodies.

1042
00:58:16,560 --> 00:58:19,240
Speaker 1: If you would be on the Jagger and.

1043
00:58:19,360 --> 00:58:22,360
Speaker 2: Someone played Sympathy for the Devil is your walk on music?

1044
00:58:23,800 --> 00:58:25,720
Speaker 2: Would you take that the wrong way?

1045
00:58:26,760 --> 00:58:30,360
Speaker 1: I think of what other Stone song would work better? Bitch,

1046
00:58:32,440 --> 00:58:35,400
Speaker 1: It's it's like I said, It's like I knew that

1047
00:58:35,520 --> 00:58:37,720
Speaker 1: was coming when I set you up for it. Incredible,

1048
00:58:38,320 --> 00:58:45,560
Speaker 1: tremendous under my thumb, always get what you want. Yeah,

1049
00:58:46,560 --> 00:58:50,360
Speaker 1: jumping jackflash, good old purpose rock, up tempo song. I

1050
00:58:50,400 --> 00:58:51,080
Speaker 1: would have gone with that.

1051
00:58:51,760 --> 00:58:51,960
Speaker 3: Yeah.

1052
00:58:53,240 --> 00:58:57,640
Speaker 1: The horse was let out the off the Jagger climbed

1053
00:58:57,680 --> 00:59:00,920
Speaker 1: the board, and then the horse was trotted across the

1054
00:59:01,000 --> 00:59:04,440
Speaker 1: dance floor while photographers went crazy. I'm changing my text

1055
00:59:04,480 --> 00:59:14,800
Speaker 1: alert for you to the horse was let out. The

1056
00:59:14,880 --> 00:59:17,560
Speaker 1: photo of Bianca Jagger on the horse went viral before

1057
00:59:17,640 --> 00:59:22,000
Speaker 1: going viral was a thing. However, people of Mandela affected

1058
00:59:22,040 --> 00:59:24,520
Speaker 1: two points about this moment, which you're not strictly true.

1059
00:59:25,360 --> 00:59:27,640
Speaker 1: One of them is that Bianca was naked on the horse,

1060
00:59:27,960 --> 00:59:30,400
Speaker 1: which is probably a rumor that got started because the

1061
00:59:30,440 --> 00:59:32,720
Speaker 1: horse was in fact led out by a nude couple.

1062
00:59:33,760 --> 00:59:35,960
Speaker 1: And also there's a rumor that she actually rode the

1063
00:59:36,080 --> 00:59:39,640
Speaker 1: horse into the club from the street. Now, Bianca Jagger,

1064
00:59:39,640 --> 00:59:41,320
Speaker 1: who's done a lot of work for animal rights over

1065
00:59:41,360 --> 00:59:43,720
Speaker 1: the years, attempted to set the record straight in a

1066
00:59:43,800 --> 00:59:47,920
Speaker 1: twenty fifteen letter to the Financial Times, who for some

1067
00:59:48,120 --> 00:59:52,280
Speaker 1: reason were covering us as an environmentalist and an animal

1068
00:59:52,360 --> 00:59:55,120
Speaker 1: rights defender. I find the insinuation that I would ride

1069
00:59:55,120 --> 00:59:59,440
Speaker 1: a horse into a nightclub offensive, she said. But regardless,

1070
00:59:59,680 --> 01:00:02,440
Speaker 1: this was one of the most effective publicity stunts in history,

1071
01:00:02,880 --> 01:00:06,080
Speaker 1: and photos of Bianca Jagger on horseback instantly appeared in

1072
01:00:06,160 --> 01:00:10,120
Speaker 1: newspapers all around the globe. Dorman Mark Benneche recalled in

1073
01:00:10,120 --> 01:00:13,800
Speaker 1: a nineteen ninety eight E documentary, it just snowballed from there.

1074
01:00:14,240 --> 01:00:17,040
Speaker 1: Studio opened on a Tuesday. The next couple nights weren't

1075
01:00:17,040 --> 01:00:19,600
Speaker 1: as busy, but then that picture started the ball rolling.

1076
01:00:20,120 --> 01:00:23,920
Speaker 1: It was that soon. So now we got to talk

1077
01:00:23,960 --> 01:00:26,760
Speaker 1: about what it took to actually get into Studio fifty four,

1078
01:00:26,920 --> 01:00:30,919
Speaker 1: which was famously not easy to get into. It cost

1079
01:00:31,040 --> 01:00:34,200
Speaker 1: twelve dollars on weeknights and fifteen dollars on weekends, which

1080
01:00:34,240 --> 01:00:37,200
Speaker 1: is about fifty dollars in today's money. But as we

1081
01:00:37,280 --> 01:00:38,760
Speaker 1: all know, it took a hell of a lot more

1082
01:00:38,840 --> 01:00:41,600
Speaker 1: than just cash to get past the velvet ropes. Vel

1083
01:00:41,760 --> 01:00:44,080
Speaker 1: Ropes were actually put up originally because eighth Avenue and

1084
01:00:44,120 --> 01:00:46,920
Speaker 1: fifty fourth Street was, as we mentioned earlier, a hub

1085
01:00:47,040 --> 01:00:50,040
Speaker 1: for sex workers and they wanted to keep the prostitutes

1086
01:00:50,080 --> 01:00:53,120
Speaker 1: out rude, so that's why the velvet growth. Actually one

1087
01:00:53,160 --> 01:00:55,680
Speaker 1: of the first places to have velvet ropes was I

1088
01:00:55,720 --> 01:00:58,840
Speaker 1: think it was the Waldorf Astoria, which was owned by

1089
01:00:59,040 --> 01:01:01,480
Speaker 1: John Jacob Astro, who died on the Titanic. I always

1090
01:01:01,480 --> 01:01:03,160
Speaker 1: have a Titanic fan. I was gonna say if it

1091
01:01:03,240 --> 01:01:04,400
Speaker 1: was like that or the Beatles.

1092
01:01:04,720 --> 01:01:04,919
Speaker 2: Yeah.

1093
01:01:05,760 --> 01:01:08,160
Speaker 1: Aside from the disco and the drugs, the most famous

1094
01:01:08,200 --> 01:01:11,520
Speaker 1: aspect of Studio fifty four was the ultra strict door policy.

1095
01:01:12,840 --> 01:01:15,160
Speaker 1: I find this hard to believe, but according to numerous

1096
01:01:15,200 --> 01:01:17,680
Speaker 1: sources I found this was one of the first places

1097
01:01:17,720 --> 01:01:20,120
Speaker 1: that had a policy that basically said you can come

1098
01:01:20,200 --> 01:01:23,840
Speaker 1: in and you can't. Well. I mean, I think we

1099
01:01:24,000 --> 01:01:27,280
Speaker 1: have to give it to the racists of the world.

1100
01:01:27,920 --> 01:01:30,160
Speaker 1: But there have been clubs that you needed address code,

1101
01:01:30,160 --> 01:01:31,680
Speaker 1: there have been clubs that you need to be a member,

1102
01:01:31,720 --> 01:01:34,520
Speaker 1: there have been to pay a certain amount, that's all something.

1103
01:01:34,680 --> 01:01:38,880
Speaker 1: But Studio fifty four was based purely on vibes, and

1104
01:01:39,040 --> 01:01:43,560
Speaker 1: that was how they let you in. Good for them, Yeah,

1105
01:01:44,080 --> 01:01:46,360
Speaker 1: Steve Bell and I Sraeger were well aware that the

1106
01:01:46,440 --> 01:01:48,920
Speaker 1: more you tell someone they can't have something, the more

1107
01:01:49,000 --> 01:01:51,240
Speaker 1: they want it, and that became the name of the

1108
01:01:51,320 --> 01:01:54,800
Speaker 1: game was Studio fifty four. Rubelle he viewed this as

1109
01:01:54,960 --> 01:01:57,840
Speaker 1: his nightly party, and the people he let in were

1110
01:01:57,920 --> 01:02:01,160
Speaker 1: his guests to the party, and as with any party,

1111
01:02:01,280 --> 01:02:04,840
Speaker 1: not everyone gets to be a guest. Rebel's partner co

1112
01:02:04,960 --> 01:02:07,760
Speaker 1: owner Ian Schrigger, would explain, there was a kind of

1113
01:02:07,880 --> 01:02:10,920
Speaker 1: institutional resentment towards us, and it was really because of

1114
01:02:10,960 --> 01:02:13,840
Speaker 1: the door policy, the fact that people who were normally

1115
01:02:13,920 --> 01:02:17,080
Speaker 1: big shots or rich meant nothing at studio. They thought

1116
01:02:17,120 --> 01:02:20,720
Speaker 1: what we were doing was undemocratic, Unamerican and elitist, but

1117
01:02:20,880 --> 01:02:23,520
Speaker 1: in reality it wasn't elitist at all. We were just

1118
01:02:23,560 --> 01:02:26,120
Speaker 1: trying to exercise the same discretion you do and you

1119
01:02:26,240 --> 01:02:28,920
Speaker 1: have a private dinner party at your home, create a

1120
01:02:28,960 --> 01:02:32,320
Speaker 1: good mix of people and from the jump, Studio fifty

1121
01:02:32,360 --> 01:02:34,600
Speaker 1: four was popular enough to be selective about who they

1122
01:02:34,680 --> 01:02:37,840
Speaker 1: let inside, and co owner Steve Rebell ruled the velvet

1123
01:02:37,960 --> 01:02:41,040
Speaker 1: ropes with an iron fist. He could often be found

1124
01:02:41,080 --> 01:02:43,680
Speaker 1: outside of the club on a step stool, selecting members

1125
01:02:43,720 --> 01:02:47,160
Speaker 1: of the crowd for admittance personally, with a subjectivity that

1126
01:02:47,240 --> 01:02:51,360
Speaker 1: could be described as heartless, certainly rude and insulting.

1127
01:02:52,000 --> 01:02:55,000
Speaker 2: Yeah, a tire was very cruelly judged. There's a footage

1128
01:02:55,040 --> 01:02:57,680
Speaker 2: of Rubel on his stool screaming at someone, don't you

1129
01:02:57,880 --> 01:03:01,280
Speaker 2: ever come in here with a hat? He had a

1130
01:03:01,320 --> 01:03:05,640
Speaker 2: hatred of hats, and also polyester. Polyester melts under the lights.

1131
01:03:05,680 --> 01:03:08,760
Speaker 2: He'd tell people go home and get a cotton shirt,

1132
01:03:09,600 --> 01:03:13,120
Speaker 2: and perhaps most terrifyingly, he would remember there's a lot

1133
01:03:13,160 --> 01:03:15,080
Speaker 2: of footage out there of him screaming, didn't I tell

1134
01:03:15,120 --> 01:03:16,320
Speaker 2: you not to wear an outfit like that?

1135
01:03:16,480 --> 01:03:20,480
Speaker 1: Last time? You can't come in. He was judgy, but

1136
01:03:20,600 --> 01:03:21,640
Speaker 1: also sort of hilarious.

1137
01:03:21,760 --> 01:03:23,520
Speaker 2: When he would see a crowd of straight white guys

1138
01:03:23,560 --> 01:03:26,440
Speaker 2: dressed like John Travolta in Saturday Night Fever, he'd announce

1139
01:03:26,640 --> 01:03:30,080
Speaker 2: barbecue house party to his bouncers and bar their entry.

1140
01:03:30,880 --> 01:03:33,320
Speaker 2: One night, the doorman barred a guy who did look

1141
01:03:33,400 --> 01:03:35,960
Speaker 2: like a Saturday Night Fever extra with gold chains, the

1142
01:03:36,040 --> 01:03:39,000
Speaker 2: open neck shirt and huge hair. The man stood there

1143
01:03:39,040 --> 01:03:41,720
Speaker 2: for half an hour, and they finally realized that it

1144
01:03:41,800 --> 01:03:45,240
Speaker 2: was Barry Gibb of the Beugs aka one of the

1145
01:03:45,320 --> 01:03:47,600
Speaker 2: only people who could get away with looking like that

1146
01:03:47,680 --> 01:03:49,520
Speaker 2: at Studio fifty four in nineteen seventy seven.

1147
01:03:50,240 --> 01:03:52,680
Speaker 1: Rubel was also famous for splitting up couples.

1148
01:03:53,960 --> 01:03:55,760
Speaker 2: There are tons of stories of him just letting the

1149
01:03:55,800 --> 01:03:57,800
Speaker 2: guy or just the girl in, at which point the

1150
01:03:57,880 --> 01:04:03,480
Speaker 2: lucky one would shrug sorry their partner and head inside. Overtly,

1151
01:04:03,520 --> 01:04:07,680
Speaker 2: straight men entering alone were invariably denied entry to prevent

1152
01:04:08,120 --> 01:04:12,960
Speaker 2: predatory behavior, which is nice. Rubelle certainly had a Napoleon complex.

1153
01:04:13,480 --> 01:04:17,600
Speaker 2: His behavior offered veered into the sadistic. He would tell

1154
01:04:17,680 --> 01:04:19,320
Speaker 2: women that he'd let them into the club if they

1155
01:04:19,320 --> 01:04:22,360
Speaker 2: would take off all their clothes, which is admittedly a

1156
01:04:22,480 --> 01:04:25,880
Speaker 2: weird move for a gay man. Some complied, and in

1157
01:04:26,000 --> 01:04:29,200
Speaker 2: winter this resulted in at least one woman going to

1158
01:04:29,240 --> 01:04:33,840
Speaker 2: the hospital for frost bit Nipples tweeted us using the hashtag.

1159
01:04:35,040 --> 01:04:37,000
Speaker 2: He had a particular hatred for what he called bridge

1160
01:04:37,000 --> 01:04:39,920
Speaker 2: and tunnel people, or Brooklyn and New Jersey residents, who

1161
01:04:39,960 --> 01:04:42,200
Speaker 2: traveled into Manhattan on weekends for a big night out,

1162
01:04:42,800 --> 01:04:44,640
Speaker 2: and in his eyes, these hay seeds from the outer

1163
01:04:44,720 --> 01:04:49,040
Speaker 2: boroughs were unsophisticated tacky and deserving of unrelenting scorn. Once

1164
01:04:49,160 --> 01:04:51,160
Speaker 2: one of the bartenders arrived with friends from out of town,

1165
01:04:51,760 --> 01:04:54,960
Speaker 2: Steve greeted the bartender warmly before seeing his entourage. Then

1166
01:04:55,000 --> 01:04:58,360
Speaker 2: his face fell and he started screaming, no way, no way.

1167
01:04:59,400 --> 01:05:02,160
Speaker 2: He eventually lent, but not before dragging the bartender aside

1168
01:05:02,160 --> 01:05:03,160
Speaker 2: and hissing, don't you.

1169
01:05:03,360 --> 01:05:04,680
Speaker 1: Ever do this to me again.

1170
01:05:06,520 --> 01:05:09,080
Speaker 2: There's footage of him saying to some guy out front, Hey,

1171
01:05:09,320 --> 01:05:10,560
Speaker 2: it doesn't matter that you're nice.

1172
01:05:10,760 --> 01:05:13,120
Speaker 1: My cousin's nice. I love her, but that doesn't matter.

1173
01:05:13,360 --> 01:05:16,400
Speaker 1: She's not coming in here. And admirably he held himself

1174
01:05:16,440 --> 01:05:18,680
Speaker 1: to the same standard. He would regularly admit that if

1175
01:05:18,680 --> 01:05:20,680
Speaker 1: he didn't own the place, there's no way that he

1176
01:05:20,920 --> 01:05:22,040
Speaker 1: would have been let inside.

1177
01:05:23,280 --> 01:05:25,600
Speaker 2: With all of this, the vibe outside the club was

1178
01:05:25,640 --> 01:05:28,760
Speaker 2: a strange mix of glamour and desperation, which Anthony Hayden,

1179
01:05:28,800 --> 01:05:31,919
Speaker 2: guest described as looking like the damned outside of Hell.

1180
01:05:33,400 --> 01:05:36,200
Speaker 2: Rubel judged the crowd based on his ever changing definition

1181
01:05:36,320 --> 01:05:39,480
Speaker 2: of the right stuff. He viewed himself as a casting

1182
01:05:39,520 --> 01:05:42,360
Speaker 2: director who was casting a show, and the scene outside

1183
01:05:42,680 --> 01:05:46,280
Speaker 2: was the audition. Rubel determined that diversity was key to

1184
01:05:46,320 --> 01:05:50,280
Speaker 2: creating a vibrant, combustible atmosphere. As a result, seems totally

1185
01:05:50,360 --> 01:05:52,680
Speaker 2: integrated in a way that was rare for the late seventies.

1186
01:05:53,040 --> 01:05:55,040
Speaker 2: He thought that if any one group was too out

1187
01:05:55,080 --> 01:05:58,120
Speaker 2: of proportion to many men, too many women, too many couples,

1188
01:05:58,160 --> 01:05:59,960
Speaker 2: too many straits, too many gays, too black, to young,

1189
01:06:00,200 --> 01:06:02,800
Speaker 2: too old, etc. It would put damper on the evening.

1190
01:06:03,200 --> 01:06:07,960
Speaker 2: He used to say, it's like mixing a salad hold

1191
01:06:08,000 --> 01:06:12,840
Speaker 2: for applause. If it gets too straight, then there's not

1192
01:06:12,960 --> 01:06:15,240
Speaker 2: enough energy in the room. If it gets too gay,

1193
01:06:15,720 --> 01:06:19,880
Speaker 2: then there's no glamour. We want it to be bisexual,

1194
01:06:20,400 --> 01:06:25,040
Speaker 2: very very very bisexual. That was a salad tossing joke

1195
01:06:25,080 --> 01:06:26,280
Speaker 2: that we were making there earlier.

1196
01:06:28,000 --> 01:06:29,400
Speaker 1: Thanks Ted, That is the joke.

1197
01:06:30,560 --> 01:06:34,160
Speaker 2: They were essentially inverting the established power structures. Rebel would

1198
01:06:34,200 --> 01:06:36,560
Speaker 2: banish the suit wearing swingers, but then let their limo

1199
01:06:36,680 --> 01:06:41,160
Speaker 2: drivers in great stuff. One Halloween, two women, perhaps recalling

1200
01:06:41,200 --> 01:06:43,920
Speaker 2: the famous Bianca Jagger photo, took out a five hundred

1201
01:06:43,920 --> 01:06:46,720
Speaker 2: dollars loan to rent a horse, which they rode nude

1202
01:06:46,720 --> 01:06:50,320
Speaker 2: to the velvet ropes as twin Lady Godivas. The horse

1203
01:06:50,520 --> 01:06:53,360
Speaker 2: was then granted entry and the women were not.

1204
01:06:54,840 --> 01:06:55,600
Speaker 1: That's incredible.

1205
01:06:56,560 --> 01:06:58,720
Speaker 2: On any given night, a kid who worked at McDonald's

1206
01:06:58,720 --> 01:07:01,280
Speaker 2: would share couch with a super buddle. The writer Paul

1207
01:07:01,320 --> 01:07:03,320
Speaker 2: Goldberger has a great quote about this from a preface

1208
01:07:03,360 --> 01:07:05,840
Speaker 2: to a Studio fifty four coffee table book. The club

1209
01:07:05,960 --> 01:07:07,880
Speaker 2: was viewed as a place of exclusion, which made it

1210
01:07:08,040 --> 01:07:11,560
Speaker 2: an unnatural symbol for an age of inclusion. But Studio

1211
01:07:11,600 --> 01:07:13,960
Speaker 2: fifty four's velvet rope in the end was far less

1212
01:07:13,960 --> 01:07:16,240
Speaker 2: important than the connection the club made between the intense,

1213
01:07:16,360 --> 01:07:19,320
Speaker 2: explosive dance culture of downtown New York and the older

1214
01:07:19,360 --> 01:07:21,760
Speaker 2: culture of uptown New York. And by doing this, it

1215
01:07:21,840 --> 01:07:24,520
Speaker 2: broke more barriers than it created. It was where the

1216
01:07:24,560 --> 01:07:27,000
Speaker 2: notion of the outsider and the notion of the insider

1217
01:07:27,120 --> 01:07:29,440
Speaker 2: blended so completely that you could no longer tell the

1218
01:07:29,480 --> 01:07:30,480
Speaker 2: difference between them.

1219
01:07:30,720 --> 01:07:32,000
Speaker 1: I think that's cool. Yeah.

1220
01:07:32,240 --> 01:07:35,080
Speaker 2: Dressing out landishly was an easy way to guarantee entry.

1221
01:07:35,440 --> 01:07:37,400
Speaker 2: Once a woman came out of a limo with green

1222
01:07:37,440 --> 01:07:40,680
Speaker 2: and purple hair, wearing a rubber suit, dragging two plastic

1223
01:07:40,760 --> 01:07:45,400
Speaker 2: dogs behind her, and she got in club staple Grace Jones,

1224
01:07:46,200 --> 01:07:49,680
Speaker 2: who was a once in a lifetime icon, once in

1225
01:07:49,760 --> 01:07:53,480
Speaker 2: generation I should say, UH had to fend off desperate

1226
01:07:53,520 --> 01:07:56,160
Speaker 2: plebs who would literally cling to her outfit and scream

1227
01:07:56,320 --> 01:07:58,800
Speaker 2: tell them I'm with you. On more than one occasion,

1228
01:07:59,320 --> 01:08:02,640
Speaker 2: she would enter basically naked, which she could do because

1229
01:08:02,680 --> 01:08:08,240
Speaker 2: she was as statuesque individual. Have you seen the Conan

1230
01:08:08,320 --> 01:08:13,400
Speaker 2: movie She's in? No, that was the sequel, Great Great Stuff, Rubella.

1231
01:08:13,560 --> 01:08:15,440
Speaker 2: I'm sure you've seen him in the Bond movie right

1232
01:08:15,480 --> 01:08:15,960
Speaker 2: with Walkin.

1233
01:08:16,280 --> 01:08:20,320
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, uh pull up to the bump up Baby.

1234
01:08:21,600 --> 01:08:24,840
Speaker 2: Rebel's chief crowd control lieutenant was Dorman Mark Bennicky, so

1235
01:08:25,080 --> 01:08:27,200
Speaker 2: chosen because he was the best looking member of the

1236
01:08:27,240 --> 01:08:30,559
Speaker 2: security staff. Though he was only nineteen, The club's owners

1237
01:08:30,600 --> 01:08:33,519
Speaker 2: made him unbribeable by paying him more than anyone else.

1238
01:08:34,240 --> 01:08:36,800
Speaker 2: Even so, that didn't stop some desperate hopeful from shoving

1239
01:08:36,840 --> 01:08:40,200
Speaker 2: their hands into his coat pocket to deposit cash or drugs. And,

1240
01:08:40,479 --> 01:08:43,000
Speaker 2: needless to say, being a nineteen year old in a

1241
01:08:43,040 --> 01:08:46,280
Speaker 2: position of almost unlimited social cachet made him a little

1242
01:08:46,320 --> 01:08:50,559
Speaker 2: bit of a punk, just like Rubel. Naturally, people tried

1243
01:08:50,560 --> 01:08:53,320
Speaker 2: good old fashioned bribery, but that didn't work, he'd later say.

1244
01:08:53,760 --> 01:08:55,280
Speaker 2: Then I'd say to them they should go and buy

1245
01:08:55,280 --> 01:08:57,880
Speaker 2: the exact same jacket I was wearing. Forgive me, but

1246
01:08:57,960 --> 01:08:59,880
Speaker 2: I was only a teen at the time, and then

1247
01:09:00,120 --> 01:09:02,960
Speaker 2: go to Bloomingdale's and buy it and they still wouldn't

1248
01:09:03,000 --> 01:09:05,880
Speaker 2: get in. He was in charge of adhering to the

1249
01:09:05,920 --> 01:09:08,160
Speaker 2: guest list at the front door. Next to the names

1250
01:09:08,200 --> 01:09:12,679
Speaker 2: were notes like pay comp or NFU for no cub.

1251
01:09:13,800 --> 01:09:15,840
Speaker 2: What does that mean that they wouldn't they would be

1252
01:09:16,040 --> 01:09:16,920
Speaker 2: they were not.

1253
01:09:17,000 --> 01:09:20,639
Speaker 1: Allowed to know. I've meant like basically like ultra VIP,

1254
01:09:21,160 --> 01:09:24,439
Speaker 1: like do anything they say? Okay, okay, okay.

1255
01:09:24,920 --> 01:09:27,719
Speaker 2: Those blacklisted have their names under the no goods column,

1256
01:09:28,520 --> 01:09:30,559
Speaker 2: as we'll discover when we talk about their tax fraud.

1257
01:09:30,840 --> 01:09:34,120
Speaker 2: Studio fifty four's record books were not difficult to decipher.

1258
01:09:35,240 --> 01:09:37,160
Speaker 2: Part of Mark Benecke's role at the doorman also meant

1259
01:09:37,160 --> 01:09:39,240
Speaker 2: that he was in charge of managing the entourages of

1260
01:09:39,240 --> 01:09:41,800
Speaker 2: those on the guest list. As with everything in relation

1261
01:09:41,880 --> 01:09:44,200
Speaker 2: to fame, there was a hierarchy. A movie star could

1262
01:09:44,200 --> 01:09:47,080
Speaker 2: bring unlimited guests, a prince of princess could invite five

1263
01:09:47,160 --> 01:09:51,599
Speaker 2: or six guests. Counts and Countesses four, most other VIPs three,

1264
01:09:52,040 --> 01:09:54,960
Speaker 2: and so on. Other rules were more or less unwritten.

1265
01:09:55,200 --> 01:09:58,240
Speaker 2: For example, Mick and Keith of the Rolling Stones were comped,

1266
01:09:58,800 --> 01:10:07,840
Speaker 2: but the other Rolling Stone intend to pay. Oh, that's funny.

1267
01:10:10,439 --> 01:10:11,800
Speaker 2: Do you think that was just the rule for rock

1268
01:10:11,880 --> 01:10:14,479
Speaker 2: bands in general? Like guitarists and front man get in,

1269
01:10:14,600 --> 01:10:19,160
Speaker 2: but based on the drummer have to pay. Paul mc

1270
01:10:19,600 --> 01:10:20,120
Speaker 2: keith Moon.

1271
01:10:20,040 --> 01:10:20,479
Speaker 1: Didn't have to.

1272
01:10:20,920 --> 01:10:24,599
Speaker 2: Paul mccartty God, John McVie didn't have to. Paul McCartney

1273
01:10:24,640 --> 01:10:25,679
Speaker 2: had Studio fifty four.

1274
01:10:26,680 --> 01:10:29,920
Speaker 1: Yeah. Of all the names that I have found who

1275
01:10:29,960 --> 01:10:32,280
Speaker 1: attended City fifty four, Paul McCartney was one I have

1276
01:10:32,400 --> 01:10:36,400
Speaker 1: not seen. Yeah, that doesn't surprise me. Hey with his

1277
01:10:36,520 --> 01:10:40,080
Speaker 1: thumbs up, Just that's like a tug boat T shirt,

1278
01:10:43,640 --> 01:10:44,840
Speaker 1: Rupert the bear T shirt.

1279
01:10:45,160 --> 01:10:47,120
Speaker 2: Among those who were excluded at one time or another

1280
01:10:47,200 --> 01:10:51,000
Speaker 2: were Frank Sinatra, ROBERTA. Flack, and several Young Kennedy's.

1281
01:10:52,040 --> 01:10:53,080
Speaker 1: That's fine Boston.

1282
01:10:53,680 --> 01:10:56,360
Speaker 2: The president of Cypress was once rejected because the doorman

1283
01:10:56,439 --> 01:10:58,479
Speaker 2: thought he was the president of New York City Cypress

1284
01:10:58,560 --> 01:11:05,400
Speaker 2: Hills Cemetery. Did she get but you put a nineteen

1285
01:11:05,439 --> 01:11:08,519
Speaker 2: year old and chudge the door. When the son of

1286
01:11:08,640 --> 01:11:12,240
Speaker 2: King Khalid of Saudi Arabia was rejected, the Saudi Embassy

1287
01:11:12,320 --> 01:11:15,000
Speaker 2: to the United States wrote Rubella letter asking that he

1288
01:11:15,120 --> 01:11:18,840
Speaker 2: not be rejected again. No word on the outcome, but

1289
01:11:19,439 --> 01:11:22,600
Speaker 2: it would indeed be more hilarious if he was summarily

1290
01:11:22,680 --> 01:11:28,000
Speaker 2: ejected again, and for some reason. Cher was also once rejected.

1291
01:11:28,560 --> 01:11:31,760
Speaker 2: She reportedly said to the doorman, I'm Cher, to which

1292
01:11:31,840 --> 01:11:37,040
Speaker 2: he said, I know, I have a.

1293
01:11:37,080 --> 01:11:38,960
Speaker 1: Hard time running that one down. I have a hard

1294
01:11:39,000 --> 01:11:40,000
Speaker 1: time believing that one.

1295
01:11:40,360 --> 01:11:41,680
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, she's like the most one of the

1296
01:11:41,720 --> 01:11:44,479
Speaker 2: most striking women alive and a dressed by Bob Mackie.

1297
01:11:44,640 --> 01:11:48,840
Speaker 1: Like, I don't that's insane. Yeah, there must be. I've

1298
01:11:48,920 --> 01:11:52,439
Speaker 1: seen that appear on numerous sites and numerous outlets, so

1299
01:11:53,080 --> 01:11:54,519
Speaker 1: I don't know. There must be some truth to it.

1300
01:11:54,640 --> 01:11:58,559
Speaker 1: Maybe she was just delayed. I don't know. It goes

1301
01:11:58,640 --> 01:12:01,719
Speaker 1: without saying that some want to be took this rejection poorly.

1302
01:12:02,600 --> 01:12:06,240
Speaker 1: To prepare for any malcontents, Studio fifty four employees were

1303
01:12:06,320 --> 01:12:10,320
Speaker 1: tasked with removing bottles, cans, and any convenient projectiles from

1304
01:12:10,360 --> 01:12:15,360
Speaker 1: nearby trash pins. Doorman Mark Benecke often required an escort

1305
01:12:15,479 --> 01:12:17,120
Speaker 1: back to his apartment at the end of the night,

1306
01:12:17,880 --> 01:12:20,599
Speaker 1: t toimes it got really hairy outside. He told Anthony

1307
01:12:20,640 --> 01:12:24,160
Speaker 1: Hayden guest once a regular customer had too many people

1308
01:12:24,320 --> 01:12:26,679
Speaker 1: or some problem, I walked him back to his limo,

1309
01:12:27,240 --> 01:12:29,400
Speaker 1: and all of a sudden, the guy starts choking me.

1310
01:12:30,000 --> 01:12:32,760
Speaker 1: Another time, a car mounted the sidewalk and threatened to

1311
01:12:32,800 --> 01:12:35,880
Speaker 1: run down anyone unlucky enough to be guarding the velvet ropes.

1312
01:12:36,400 --> 01:12:40,160
Speaker 1: Security chief Chuck Garlick recalled the Hayden guest. A car

1313
01:12:40,439 --> 01:12:44,479
Speaker 1: was by. Someone yelled out, hey, asshole. I looked and

1314
01:12:44,560 --> 01:12:47,320
Speaker 1: there was a rifle pointed at me, and I kind

1315
01:12:47,320 --> 01:12:51,360
Speaker 1: of let that slide because he didn't shoot. The bar

1316
01:12:51,600 --> 01:12:55,519
Speaker 1: was low in nineteen seventy seven New York, but then

1317
01:12:55,760 --> 01:12:58,679
Speaker 1: another morning he wasn't so lucky and someone did pull

1318
01:12:58,760 --> 01:13:01,759
Speaker 1: the trigger. We walked through the entrance where the garbage

1319
01:13:01,840 --> 01:13:04,439
Speaker 1: goes out. It was closer meaning the end of the night,

1320
01:13:04,479 --> 01:13:07,080
Speaker 1: and we were dead. The next thing we knew, these

1321
01:13:07,160 --> 01:13:09,639
Speaker 1: guys were out of a car across the street. They'd

1322
01:13:09,680 --> 01:13:12,400
Speaker 1: been waiting, and they just started shooting above our heads.

1323
01:13:12,760 --> 01:13:15,679
Speaker 1: Chips of brick flew down. We dived onto the ground.

1324
01:13:16,280 --> 01:13:18,919
Speaker 1: I personally try to get very friendly with the underside

1325
01:13:18,960 --> 01:13:21,920
Speaker 1: of a car. But some people were not deterred. At

1326
01:13:21,920 --> 01:13:25,120
Speaker 1: the front door. If Steve Rebell turned them down, they

1327
01:13:25,200 --> 01:13:28,960
Speaker 1: tried gate crashing. Some climbed into the building next door.

1328
01:13:29,200 --> 01:13:32,000
Speaker 1: Some eleven stories and tried to find a way in

1329
01:13:32,160 --> 01:13:36,639
Speaker 1: from the roof. Mark Benecke claimed that one entrepreneurial soul

1330
01:13:36,800 --> 01:13:39,799
Speaker 1: sold maps that allegedly showed how to get into Studio

1331
01:13:39,880 --> 01:13:44,080
Speaker 1: fifty four through subway tunnels. I can't believe that's true.

1332
01:13:45,000 --> 01:13:48,679
Speaker 1: In one legendary story told by many people, including Sheet

1333
01:13:48,760 --> 01:13:53,240
Speaker 1: guitarist Nile Rogers, clubgoers noticed a terrible smell coming from

1334
01:13:53,320 --> 01:13:56,519
Speaker 1: the vent for days. They assumed it was a dead mouse,

1335
01:13:57,080 --> 01:13:59,880
Speaker 1: but upon investigation, it was revealed to be a tux

1336
01:14:00,000 --> 01:14:03,360
Speaker 1: pseudo clad reveler who tried to break into Studio fifty

1337
01:14:03,400 --> 01:14:07,880
Speaker 1: four through the ventilation system. Apparently he got stuck and

1338
01:14:08,040 --> 01:14:12,160
Speaker 1: froze to death, or so the story goes. Stever, Bill's

1339
01:14:12,200 --> 01:14:14,560
Speaker 1: assistant had never heard this story, so maybe it was

1340
01:14:14,600 --> 01:14:17,200
Speaker 1: a myth, but Studio fifty four Cohn or Ian Schraeger

1341
01:14:17,280 --> 01:14:20,760
Speaker 1: confirmed it years later. So your mileage may fary at.

1342
01:14:20,720 --> 01:14:23,960
Speaker 2: Least one fatality attributed to Studio fifty four. No, that

1343
01:14:24,200 --> 01:14:27,639
Speaker 2: that's good. That tracks Yeah, that's a good track record.

1344
01:14:28,680 --> 01:14:31,520
Speaker 1: Regardless of Studio fifty four took pride in their reputation

1345
01:14:31,760 --> 01:14:35,120
Speaker 1: as discerning hosts when they launched a brand of Studio

1346
01:14:35,160 --> 01:14:39,360
Speaker 1: fifty four jeenes. They opted for the slogan now everyone

1347
01:14:39,479 --> 01:14:44,719
Speaker 1: can get into Studio fifty four. I like that naturally.

1348
01:14:44,800 --> 01:14:46,720
Speaker 1: A huge part of the draw of Studio fifty four

1349
01:14:46,800 --> 01:14:50,160
Speaker 1: were the celebrities. The regular presence of famous people Studio

1350
01:14:50,240 --> 01:14:54,759
Speaker 1: fifty four was deemed absolutely critical. This was the beginning

1351
01:14:54,800 --> 01:14:57,800
Speaker 1: of the age of the celebrity is defined by people

1352
01:14:57,840 --> 01:15:01,280
Speaker 1: who are famous for being famous, and as such they

1353
01:15:01,280 --> 01:15:03,280
Speaker 1: would be put on the front page of papers for

1354
01:15:04,040 --> 01:15:08,040
Speaker 1: no particular reason. Remember, People magazine had been founded three

1355
01:15:08,120 --> 01:15:11,760
Speaker 1: years before, and its competitor, Us Weekly began publication the

1356
01:15:11,920 --> 01:15:16,160
Speaker 1: very week Studio fifty four opened. Ian Schrager later said,

1357
01:15:16,560 --> 01:15:19,320
Speaker 1: there was this paradigm shift away from reading about crime

1358
01:15:19,439 --> 01:15:23,479
Speaker 1: and sports heroes. People became fascinated with celebrities. We were

1359
01:15:23,560 --> 01:15:25,320
Speaker 1: there at the right time and we wrote it for

1360
01:15:25,400 --> 01:15:28,680
Speaker 1: all it was worth. And celebrities liked Studio fifty four

1361
01:15:28,800 --> 01:15:31,720
Speaker 1: because all photos taken inside by photographers had to be

1362
01:15:31,800 --> 01:15:35,519
Speaker 1: approved by Steve Rubell personally before being sent to outlets

1363
01:15:35,560 --> 01:15:39,920
Speaker 1: for publications, so they felt reasonably protected. Except there was

1364
01:15:39,960 --> 01:15:43,439
Speaker 1: a time when Canadian First Lady Margaret Trudeau, Justin's mom,

1365
01:15:44,080 --> 01:15:48,479
Speaker 1: was photographed without underwear, and that was circulated, So that's weird.

1366
01:15:49,160 --> 01:15:51,120
Speaker 1: I don't know how that got out. We should tweet

1367
01:15:51,160 --> 01:15:51,799
Speaker 1: that at him.

1368
01:15:54,000 --> 01:15:54,360
Speaker 3: Loser.

1369
01:15:57,320 --> 01:15:59,960
Speaker 1: To ensure a suitably star studed evening on their premise,

1370
01:16:00,320 --> 01:16:02,639
Speaker 1: Steve Bell and Ann Schraeger drew on the guest book

1371
01:16:02,640 --> 01:16:06,640
Speaker 1: of legendary party promoter Carmen Delecio, and then later they

1372
01:16:06,680 --> 01:16:10,439
Speaker 1: also employed a publicist named Joanna Horowitz to essentially act

1373
01:16:10,479 --> 01:16:14,400
Speaker 1: as celebrity wrangler, getting famous people to Studio fifty four

1374
01:16:14,680 --> 01:16:17,320
Speaker 1: nightly and making sure that photos of them wound up

1375
01:16:17,360 --> 01:16:21,280
Speaker 1: in the news. Her payment structure illustrated the hierarchy of

1376
01:16:21,320 --> 01:16:24,479
Speaker 1: the New York gossip rags. Horowitz would be paid five

1377
01:16:24,600 --> 01:16:26,840
Speaker 1: hundred dollars for landing a photo of a celebrity at

1378
01:16:26,880 --> 01:16:29,639
Speaker 1: studio and the cover of the Daily News, one thousand

1379
01:16:29,720 --> 01:16:32,160
Speaker 1: dollars for a cover of the New York Post, and

1380
01:16:32,280 --> 01:16:34,240
Speaker 1: just one hundred and fifty dollars for a photo in

1381
01:16:34,280 --> 01:16:38,240
Speaker 1: the New York Post page six, section ooh. She also

1382
01:16:38,320 --> 01:16:40,599
Speaker 1: had a sliding scale when it came to which stars

1383
01:16:40,680 --> 01:16:43,519
Speaker 1: she secured for studio, She told New York Magazine in

1384
01:16:43,560 --> 01:16:46,519
Speaker 1: two thousand and seven, everybody was a different price once

1385
01:16:46,560 --> 01:16:48,519
Speaker 1: in a while. Ian and I would argue, because I

1386
01:16:48,560 --> 01:16:51,839
Speaker 1: thought Alice Cooper sixty dollars was worth more than Sylvester

1387
01:16:51,960 --> 01:16:55,960
Speaker 1: stallone eighty dollars, but Ian thought no going over the rates.

1388
01:16:56,000 --> 01:16:59,160
Speaker 1: Even more, the presence of Suzanne Summers and her TV

1389
01:16:59,280 --> 01:17:02,519
Speaker 1: producer husband and Alan Hamill earned Horowitz one hundred dollars,

1390
01:17:03,160 --> 01:17:06,639
Speaker 1: rock singer Peter Frampton earned her fifty dollars, and TV

1391
01:17:06,760 --> 01:17:10,479
Speaker 1: host Dick Clark entering the club only earned her thirty dollars.

1392
01:17:11,800 --> 01:17:15,639
Speaker 1: Brutal all of it. As a point of fact, Horowitz

1393
01:17:15,640 --> 01:17:18,120
Speaker 1: would later go on to work as Kevin Spacey's full

1394
01:17:18,160 --> 01:17:21,479
Speaker 1: time manager for twenty eight years until he fired her

1395
01:17:21,640 --> 01:17:24,960
Speaker 1: in twenty seventeen, around the time he was making the

1396
01:17:25,040 --> 01:17:27,479
Speaker 1: aforementioned film All the Money in the World about the

1397
01:17:27,520 --> 01:17:31,439
Speaker 1: John Paul Getty Ransom ear slicing thing before he was

1398
01:17:31,520 --> 01:17:33,519
Speaker 1: cut in the wake of a sex abuse scandal and

1399
01:17:33,640 --> 01:17:43,080
Speaker 1: replaced by Christopher Plummer. Also her he fired her, well said,

1400
01:17:46,439 --> 01:17:48,920
Speaker 1: and now let's get to the cavalcade of stars. The

1401
01:17:49,040 --> 01:17:51,719
Speaker 1: storied social scene of Studio fifty four is the stuff

1402
01:17:51,800 --> 01:17:56,479
Speaker 1: of legend. You'd have Elizabeth Taylor, Andy Warhol, Betty Ford,

1403
01:17:56,720 --> 01:17:59,120
Speaker 1: and designer Holston all sitting next to each other on

1404
01:17:59,200 --> 01:18:01,400
Speaker 1: a couch when she was cooler.

1405
01:18:03,120 --> 01:18:06,360
Speaker 2: Not this is pre Betty Ford. Betty Ford, Oh so okay,

1406
01:18:07,160 --> 01:18:09,840
Speaker 2: so when she partied, I think so cool.

1407
01:18:11,560 --> 01:18:13,559
Speaker 1: Just A quick roll call of the regulars who were

1408
01:18:13,600 --> 01:18:20,040
Speaker 1: off on photograph at Studio fifty four include Breath, Calvin Klein, Truman,

1409
01:18:20,080 --> 01:18:24,080
Speaker 1: Capodi e Liza Minelli, Robert Maplethorpe, Elizabeth Taylor, Andy Warhol,

1410
01:18:24,200 --> 01:18:28,240
Speaker 1: Frank Sinatra, Diana Ross, Stephen Tyler, Michael Jackson, Dolly Parton,

1411
01:18:28,280 --> 01:18:32,639
Speaker 1: Sylvester Stallone, Donna Summers, Grace Jones, Robert DeNiro, Farah Fawcett,

1412
01:18:32,880 --> 01:18:42,040
Speaker 1: Woody Allen, John Belushi, Bernstein, uh Divine, Faye Dunaway, The

1413
01:18:42,120 --> 01:18:47,639
Speaker 1: Coffee Heiress, Doris Duke, tom Ford, Diane von Fursberg, Martha Graham,

1414
01:18:47,880 --> 01:18:52,559
Speaker 1: Richard Gear, Boris Nikoff, Christopher reve, Elton, John, Debbie Harry

1415
01:18:52,600 --> 01:18:56,800
Speaker 1: and Jelica Houston, Tommy Hilfiger, Margot Hemingway, Rod Stewart, Rick James,

1416
01:18:56,920 --> 01:19:00,719
Speaker 1: Caitlin Jenner, Tom Jones, Carl Lagerfeld, Bette Midler, Jack Nicholson,

1417
01:19:00,760 --> 01:19:05,639
Speaker 1: Al Pacino, Mohammed Ali, Paul Newman, Clive Davis, Michael Caine.

1418
01:19:05,680 --> 01:19:07,400
Speaker 1: They must have had a field day with his name

1419
01:19:07,840 --> 01:19:12,040
Speaker 1: because it sounds like Mike Cocaine. Yeah, Yeah, Suzanne Summers,

1420
01:19:12,080 --> 01:19:16,200
Speaker 1: George Hamilton, Fleetwood, Mac David Geffen, Sidney Poitier, Gregory Peck,

1421
01:19:16,920 --> 01:19:20,960
Speaker 1: Bruce Springsteen, Richard Pryor, Gil Radner, Lou Reed, Heraldo Rivera,

1422
01:19:21,240 --> 01:19:25,320
Speaker 1: John Travolta, Tina Turner, Robbie Williams, Paul Simon, Dan Vreelnz,

1423
01:19:25,400 --> 01:19:29,480
Speaker 1: fran Lebowitz, John McEnroe, Bianca Jagger, Magic, Johnson.

1424
01:19:29,320 --> 01:19:36,240
Speaker 2: McEnroe, Little Tennis one with a maniacal rage problem.

1425
01:19:36,600 --> 01:19:38,000
Speaker 1: It was like he seemed kind of tweaked. I mean

1426
01:19:38,040 --> 01:19:40,000
Speaker 1: that that rage probably came from something.

1427
01:19:40,479 --> 01:19:42,120
Speaker 2: God I would have loved to be I would have

1428
01:19:42,200 --> 01:19:44,759
Speaker 2: loved to be there with fran Lebowitz, just like Surly

1429
01:19:44,920 --> 01:19:46,479
Speaker 2: and rip it on everyone.

1430
01:19:49,240 --> 01:19:53,200
Speaker 1: Tennessee. Williams, You've Saint Laurent, John Collins, George Plimpton, omarsha

1431
01:19:53,280 --> 01:19:57,280
Speaker 1: reef Alice Cooper, John voightd Eartha kit El, Brenner, pele O,

1432
01:19:57,479 --> 01:20:02,960
Speaker 1: J Simpson, Rupert Murdoch. Who's worse? Jimmy Carter's mother, Anna

1433
01:20:04,720 --> 01:20:09,160
Speaker 1: got her in there, Chevy Chase, Jack Lemon, Shelley Duvall, Hello,

1434
01:20:09,360 --> 01:20:15,400
Speaker 1: I'm Shelley Carry Grant Barbis streisand Coretta Scott King, Jackie oh,

1435
01:20:16,280 --> 01:20:23,759
Speaker 1: Arnold Schwartzenegger, Ryan O'Neill, Jievon, She, Glorious Swanson, Walter, Joe Namath,

1436
01:20:24,840 --> 01:20:31,360
Speaker 1: Salvador Dali, the aforementioned, Margaret Trudeau, Chare, David Bowie, Freddie

1437
01:20:31,400 --> 01:20:35,679
Speaker 1: Mercury and the rest. Actually one more, especially for Heigel.

1438
01:20:35,960 --> 01:20:38,439
Speaker 1: Actress Sylvia Miles, who got her role in the Toby

1439
01:20:38,520 --> 01:20:42,240
Speaker 1: Hooper slasher The Funhouse after bumping into Toby at Studio

1440
01:20:42,320 --> 01:20:42,800
Speaker 1: fifty four.

1441
01:20:43,400 --> 01:20:46,840
Speaker 2: Wow, Toby Hooper, that's really funny, Like he would have

1442
01:20:46,920 --> 01:20:48,920
Speaker 2: made Texas chainsaw massacre at that point.

1443
01:20:49,520 --> 01:20:52,760
Speaker 1: Yeah, and everybody, everybody.

1444
01:20:53,000 --> 01:20:56,640
Speaker 2: But it's just so funny that like this disgusting grindhouse

1445
01:20:56,760 --> 01:20:58,160
Speaker 2: movie would have gotten him in.

1446
01:20:59,000 --> 01:21:02,400
Speaker 1: I mean it's not anyway, that's amazing. Good for Toby.

1447
01:21:04,240 --> 01:21:07,400
Speaker 1: Other regulars are perhaps more surprising. Mark Bennochy the Dorman,

1448
01:21:07,479 --> 01:21:11,600
Speaker 1: recalls classical pianist Vladimir Horowitz turning up regularly with his

1449
01:21:11,720 --> 01:21:15,639
Speaker 1: wife Wanda. He always wore earplugs. He hated the music

1450
01:21:15,800 --> 01:21:19,880
Speaker 1: but loved watching the people. A Vanity Fair retrospective from

1451
01:21:19,960 --> 01:21:23,400
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety six offered this evocative description of the scene

1452
01:21:24,040 --> 01:21:26,439
Speaker 1: on any night at Studio fifty four. One could find

1453
01:21:26,520 --> 01:21:29,920
Speaker 1: Diana Ross, fran Lebowitz and Farah Fawson on the dance floor,

1454
01:21:30,400 --> 01:21:33,519
Speaker 1: John Mceroe, Ilie Nastey, don't know who that is? And

1455
01:21:33,680 --> 01:21:37,479
Speaker 1: Cheryl Tig's at the bar, Lynn Wyatt, Syle Schomberger and

1456
01:21:37,640 --> 01:21:40,000
Speaker 1: Kenny J. Lane on the bakette. Don't who any of

1457
01:21:40,000 --> 01:21:43,280
Speaker 1: those people are. Barry Dillar, Calvin Klein and David Geffen

1458
01:21:43,320 --> 01:21:46,760
Speaker 1: against the back wall, Rod Stewart, Peter Frampton and Ryan

1459
01:21:46,800 --> 01:21:49,599
Speaker 1: O'Neil up in the balcony, Peter Beard in the ladies room,

1460
01:21:49,800 --> 01:21:52,120
Speaker 1: Debbie Harry in the men's room, and a teenage Michael

1461
01:21:52,200 --> 01:21:54,919
Speaker 1: Jackson and the DJ booth playing with the lights and sounds.

1462
01:21:55,560 --> 01:21:59,600
Speaker 1: The journalist Beauregard Houston Montgomery incredible name, later said of

1463
01:21:59,640 --> 01:22:02,800
Speaker 1: the scene, and it was so exciting. I sometimes had

1464
01:22:02,840 --> 01:22:08,920
Speaker 1: to take a tranquilizer. Same dude, you saw so many celebrities.

1465
01:22:09,160 --> 01:22:11,519
Speaker 1: The code was he didn't speak to them, but very

1466
01:22:11,600 --> 01:22:14,719
Speaker 1: often they spoke to you. I don't think any stalkers

1467
01:22:14,760 --> 01:22:19,240
Speaker 1: got into fifty four. Steve Rubell was the stalker. That

1468
01:22:19,360 --> 01:22:21,280
Speaker 1: was the unwritten rule Studio fifty four was that you

1469
01:22:21,360 --> 01:22:23,720
Speaker 1: never asked anybody to dance. You could get up and

1470
01:22:23,880 --> 01:22:26,040
Speaker 1: dance and you might end up dancing next to Cathain

1471
01:22:26,120 --> 01:22:28,840
Speaker 1: Deneuve or Truman Capodi, but you had to play it cool.

1472
01:22:29,760 --> 01:22:32,200
Speaker 1: Andy Warhol would say that the club was a dictatorship

1473
01:22:32,280 --> 01:22:35,479
Speaker 1: at the door, but a democracy inside. Part of the

1474
01:22:35,520 --> 01:22:37,599
Speaker 1: magic of Studio fifty four was that it made normal

1475
01:22:37,640 --> 01:22:41,160
Speaker 1: people feel like stars, and stars feel like normal people.

1476
01:22:41,880 --> 01:22:46,400
Speaker 2: Normal people, though may have been something of an exaggeration. Yeah,

1477
01:22:47,560 --> 01:22:52,080
Speaker 2: a sort of eccentrics who guaranteed the aforementioned feliniesque vibes

1478
01:22:52,479 --> 01:22:56,160
Speaker 2: also made the scene, including people wearing nothing but leather

1479
01:22:56,280 --> 01:23:00,639
Speaker 2: straps or a wedding veil. Others would recall a couple

1480
01:23:00,680 --> 01:23:03,000
Speaker 2: who would often come in. The woman would be naked

1481
01:23:03,600 --> 01:23:06,320
Speaker 2: and the guy was dressed like Abraham Lincoln, and their

1482
01:23:06,479 --> 01:23:08,680
Speaker 2: bit was that he would follow her around with a

1483
01:23:08,720 --> 01:23:11,600
Speaker 2: flashlight pointing at various parts of her body, probably not

1484
01:23:11,680 --> 01:23:17,640
Speaker 2: the back of her head, though right. One regular was

1485
01:23:17,640 --> 01:23:21,120
Speaker 2: an individual known only as roller Rena, who was affectionately

1486
01:23:21,160 --> 01:23:24,240
Speaker 2: known as the fairy godmother of Studio fifty four. Rollerina

1487
01:23:24,360 --> 01:23:26,080
Speaker 2: was a man in a wedding dress and roller skates

1488
01:23:26,120 --> 01:23:28,479
Speaker 2: who would roll down Broadway and straight into the club.

1489
01:23:29,080 --> 01:23:31,839
Speaker 1: By day, he was a Wall Street stockbroker.

1490
01:23:31,760 --> 01:23:33,880
Speaker 2: And a friend who knew him wouldlater say he used

1491
01:23:33,880 --> 01:23:36,040
Speaker 2: to hide his costumes in different nooks and crannies in

1492
01:23:36,040 --> 01:23:38,280
Speaker 2: the cities because there was no way that he could change,

1493
01:23:38,479 --> 01:23:40,960
Speaker 2: especially in those days from his job on Wall Street.

1494
01:23:41,520 --> 01:23:44,280
Speaker 2: He was like Superman, hiding and putting on his costume

1495
01:23:44,320 --> 01:23:48,080
Speaker 2: in a phone booth. And then, of course, there's Disco Sally.

1496
01:23:48,760 --> 01:23:51,519
Speaker 2: A contemporary New York magazine article paints a vivid portrait

1497
01:23:51,920 --> 01:23:54,639
Speaker 2: a tiny seventy seven year old lawyer named Sally Lipman

1498
01:23:54,760 --> 01:23:56,519
Speaker 2: was mourning the death of her husband when she happened

1499
01:23:56,640 --> 01:24:00,320
Speaker 2: upon the disco scene and it changed her life. Dressed

1500
01:24:00,360 --> 01:24:03,639
Speaker 2: in tight pants and high top sneakers, she became Disco Sally,

1501
01:24:04,120 --> 01:24:06,240
Speaker 2: a star at Studio fifty four who drawn audience of

1502
01:24:06,280 --> 01:24:08,719
Speaker 2: adoring fans as she got down on the dance floor.

1503
01:24:09,760 --> 01:24:12,639
Speaker 2: Many would call her dancing, usually with little to no clothes,

1504
01:24:13,040 --> 01:24:16,439
Speaker 2: with leather trucker dudes, getting bodily passed around the crowd

1505
01:24:17,479 --> 01:24:21,639
Speaker 2: to her men's delight, and she was there almost every night.

1506
01:24:22,120 --> 01:24:24,519
Speaker 2: Club manager Mark Fleischman would describe her in his memoir

1507
01:24:24,600 --> 01:24:27,040
Speaker 2: Inside Studio fifty four as a sprightly thing in her

1508
01:24:27,160 --> 01:24:29,519
Speaker 2: late seventies who danced like a thirty year old and

1509
01:24:29,640 --> 01:24:31,840
Speaker 2: was accompanied by a handsome young man named John on

1510
01:24:31,960 --> 01:24:34,719
Speaker 2: her arm. She was a retired Jewish lawyer who became

1511
01:24:34,760 --> 01:24:37,120
Speaker 2: a judge and suddenly went crazy due to the combination

1512
01:24:37,200 --> 01:24:40,320
Speaker 2: of cocaine and the Studio fifty four effect. But back

1513
01:24:40,320 --> 01:24:42,920
Speaker 2: in the day, she would dance NonStop from midnight to

1514
01:24:43,000 --> 01:24:45,680
Speaker 2: five am, many nights a week, taking only bathroom and

1515
01:24:45,760 --> 01:24:48,679
Speaker 2: cocaine breaks. She was there so often that she became

1516
01:24:48,760 --> 01:24:50,680
Speaker 2: close to the staff and often invited them back to

1517
01:24:50,720 --> 01:24:53,960
Speaker 2: her apartment for dinner. As Studio fifty four manager Scott

1518
01:24:54,000 --> 01:24:57,000
Speaker 2: Bitterman said, Sally represented the best of the club for me.

1519
01:24:57,360 --> 01:24:59,800
Speaker 2: She was neither rich nor famous. She was a woman

1520
01:24:59,800 --> 01:25:02,000
Speaker 2: who love to dance and have fun with her friends

1521
01:25:02,080 --> 01:25:02,679
Speaker 2: in the evening.

1522
01:25:02,880 --> 01:25:03,599
Speaker 1: Oh oh.

1523
01:25:04,840 --> 01:25:06,640
Speaker 2: The other stars of the scene were the DJs at

1524
01:25:06,680 --> 01:25:10,560
Speaker 2: Studio fifty four was one of the inner sanctums of

1525
01:25:10,600 --> 01:25:13,800
Speaker 2: the Sorry Old Man Yell's at club. The DJ booth

1526
01:25:13,920 --> 01:25:15,720
Speaker 2: was one of the inner sanctums of the club, high

1527
01:25:15,800 --> 01:25:17,439
Speaker 2: up above the dance floor and lit so it could

1528
01:25:17,439 --> 01:25:20,479
Speaker 2: be seen from all vantage points. VIPs would be invited

1529
01:25:20,600 --> 01:25:23,720
Speaker 2: up to intro and sometimes even select records. They even

1530
01:25:23,760 --> 01:25:26,080
Speaker 2: released a record called A Knight at Studio fifty four,

1531
01:25:26,120 --> 01:25:28,800
Speaker 2: which was a medley of disco songs mixed live at

1532
01:25:28,840 --> 01:25:32,880
Speaker 2: the club. Needless to say, it instantly went gold. The

1533
01:25:33,000 --> 01:25:35,320
Speaker 2: DJs were very, very important at that time because they

1534
01:25:35,320 --> 01:25:37,720
Speaker 2: were crucial and breaking songs by trying them out at

1535
01:25:37,760 --> 01:25:41,280
Speaker 2: these nightly raves. As a hilarious Dan Rather hosted sixty

1536
01:25:41,320 --> 01:25:44,160
Speaker 2: minute segment from nineteen seventy eight, tests songs could make

1537
01:25:44,280 --> 01:25:47,360
Speaker 2: hundreds of thousands of dollars thanks to club popularity without

1538
01:25:47,479 --> 01:25:51,760
Speaker 2: requiring airplay. Case in point I Will Survive, which was

1539
01:25:51,760 --> 01:25:54,360
Speaker 2: actually a B side for Gloria Gaynor before Studio fifty

1540
01:25:54,400 --> 01:26:00,479
Speaker 2: four DJ Richie Caxker CAx sore case in point Survive,

1541
01:26:01,200 --> 01:26:04,040
Speaker 2: Steady case in point I Will Survive which was a

1542
01:26:04,120 --> 01:26:06,800
Speaker 2: B side for Gloria Gaynor before Studio fifty four. DJ

1543
01:26:06,960 --> 01:26:09,680
Speaker 2: Richie Kaxer began playing it at the club after it

1544
01:26:09,760 --> 01:26:11,519
Speaker 2: was a hit on the dance floor. He used his

1545
01:26:11,600 --> 01:26:14,800
Speaker 2: cloup to get it played on the radio. This helped

1546
01:26:14,840 --> 01:26:18,120
Speaker 2: turn disco into a four billion dollar a year industry.

1547
01:26:19,280 --> 01:26:21,599
Speaker 2: Side note, did any of you know that Gloria Gaynor

1548
01:26:21,680 --> 01:26:24,240
Speaker 2: recorded I will Survive after she broke her back during

1549
01:26:24,280 --> 01:26:26,880
Speaker 2: a mid concert fall and had to relearn how to walk.

1550
01:26:27,520 --> 01:26:29,960
Speaker 2: It was not an anthem about recovering from heartbreak. She

1551
01:26:30,200 --> 01:26:34,080
Speaker 2: was literally in physical agony. Do you know that I didn't? Actually,

1552
01:26:35,160 --> 01:26:37,920
Speaker 2: she recorded the vocals in a back brace, which she

1553
01:26:38,240 --> 01:26:41,719
Speaker 2: credits for helping her sing with such conviction. Truly a legend.

1554
01:26:42,479 --> 01:26:44,639
Speaker 2: I will Survive as far from the only disco standard

1555
01:26:44,640 --> 01:26:46,720
Speaker 2: that took off thanks to the folks of Studio fifty four.

1556
01:26:48,040 --> 01:26:49,360
Speaker 1: Ah, this is one of my favorites.

1557
01:26:50,200 --> 01:26:53,680
Speaker 2: In fact, their draconian door policy inspired Nile Rodgers and

1558
01:26:53,720 --> 01:26:56,360
Speaker 2: Bernard Edwards to compose a smash for their band Chic.

1559
01:26:56,840 --> 01:26:59,800
Speaker 2: It began on New Year's Eve nineteen seventy seven. Nya

1560
01:27:00,040 --> 01:27:02,400
Speaker 2: and Bernie found themselves unable to get past the front

1561
01:27:02,439 --> 01:27:04,720
Speaker 2: door at studio, despite the fact that their songs were

1562
01:27:04,800 --> 01:27:08,599
Speaker 2: probably being played at that very moment inside. Rogers told

1563
01:27:08,720 --> 01:27:10,760
Speaker 2: Sound on Sound. In two thousand and five, we were

1564
01:27:10,800 --> 01:27:13,160
Speaker 2: invited to meet with Grace Jones at Studio fifty four.

1565
01:27:14,240 --> 01:27:16,479
Speaker 2: She wanted to interview us about recording her next album.

1566
01:27:17,000 --> 01:27:19,920
Speaker 2: At the time, our music was fairly popular. Dance Dance

1567
01:27:20,000 --> 01:27:22,240
Speaker 2: Dance was a big hit, but Grace didn't leave our

1568
01:27:22,320 --> 01:27:24,320
Speaker 2: name at the door, and the doorman wouldn't let us in.

1569
01:27:25,000 --> 01:27:28,280
Speaker 2: They just waited around until the early morning hours. We

1570
01:27:28,360 --> 01:27:30,240
Speaker 2: stood there as long as we could take it, until

1571
01:27:30,280 --> 01:27:32,760
Speaker 2: our feet were finally just way too cold. We were

1572
01:27:32,800 --> 01:27:37,160
Speaker 2: totally dejected. We felt horrible. However, if it's any late

1573
01:27:37,200 --> 01:27:41,760
Speaker 2: breaking consolation to them. Henry Winkler The Fawns was also

1574
01:27:41,840 --> 01:27:42,640
Speaker 2: turned away that night.

1575
01:27:44,400 --> 01:27:46,720
Speaker 1: He didn't get into the opening night either. God Faun

1576
01:27:46,800 --> 01:27:47,679
Speaker 1: no love at the funds.

1577
01:27:47,760 --> 01:27:50,439
Speaker 2: It would be great if if he ended up hanging

1578
01:27:50,479 --> 01:27:55,080
Speaker 2: out was with now Rogers and Bernard Edwards and wound

1579
01:27:55,200 --> 01:27:59,799
Speaker 2: up co co write, or even.

1580
01:27:59,640 --> 01:28:01,799
Speaker 1: Better way, he made it inside and ended up producing

1581
01:28:01,920 --> 01:28:03,240
Speaker 1: Grace Chnce's next novel.

1582
01:28:04,040 --> 01:28:07,840
Speaker 2: Yes actually Bernard Edwards and now Rogers then headed back

1583
01:28:07,840 --> 01:28:09,880
Speaker 2: to Nile's apartment, which was just a few blocks away.

1584
01:28:10,360 --> 01:28:12,519
Speaker 2: He picked up the story in an interview with Anthony

1585
01:28:12,560 --> 01:28:15,080
Speaker 2: Hayden guest, saying, we grabbed a couple of bottles of

1586
01:28:15,160 --> 01:28:17,479
Speaker 2: champagne from the corner liquor store and then went back

1587
01:28:17,520 --> 01:28:20,120
Speaker 2: to my place, plugged in our instruments and started jamming.

1588
01:28:20,600 --> 01:28:25,120
Speaker 2: We were just yelling obscenities. Studio fifty four, Come go off.

1589
01:28:25,720 --> 01:28:30,400
Speaker 2: Those scumbags come and we were laughing. We were entertaining

1590
01:28:30,439 --> 01:28:33,160
Speaker 2: the hell oft ourselves. We had a blast, and finally

1591
01:28:33,160 --> 01:28:36,040
Speaker 2: it hit Bernard. He said, hey, Nile, what you're playing

1592
01:28:36,120 --> 01:28:39,000
Speaker 2: sounds really good, And within half an hour they composed

1593
01:28:39,040 --> 01:28:45,160
Speaker 2: a song called Off. After some lyrical tweaking, they arrived

1594
01:28:45,160 --> 01:28:48,200
Speaker 2: at the slightly more top friendly title. First we changed

1595
01:28:48,240 --> 01:28:51,599
Speaker 2: it from GoF to freak off, and that was pretty hideous.

1596
01:28:52,120 --> 01:28:54,759
Speaker 2: Then all of a sudden, it just hit me. One second,

1597
01:28:54,800 --> 01:28:58,560
Speaker 2: the light bulb went off, and I sang ah Freako.

1598
01:29:00,400 --> 01:29:00,599
Speaker 1: Nice.

1599
01:29:00,720 --> 01:29:03,680
Speaker 2: Released as le Freak in September of nineteen seventy eight,

1600
01:29:03,800 --> 01:29:06,760
Speaker 2: the song would become Chic's first number one and biggest hit.

1601
01:29:16,760 --> 01:29:21,040
Speaker 2: Perhaps understandably now, Rogers now considers Mark Benecke the Studio

1602
01:29:21,080 --> 01:29:22,840
Speaker 2: fifty four door man who would not let them in

1603
01:29:23,960 --> 01:29:24,400
Speaker 2: a friend.

1604
01:29:24,560 --> 01:29:26,920
Speaker 1: I love that. I love that story. Yeah that's great.

1605
01:29:27,280 --> 01:29:31,120
Speaker 1: I just yeah, man, they should have stuck with off of.

1606
01:29:34,200 --> 01:29:36,400
Speaker 1: We're gonna take a quick break, but we'll be right

1607
01:29:36,479 --> 01:29:50,400
Speaker 1: back with more too much information in just a moment. Well.

1608
01:29:50,439 --> 01:29:52,839
Speaker 1: In addition to the DJs and the doorman, the Studio

1609
01:29:52,920 --> 01:29:55,920
Speaker 1: fifty fourth staff was notable for its fleet of shirtless

1610
01:29:55,960 --> 01:29:59,720
Speaker 1: and short, short clad bus boys and bartenders. This was

1611
01:29:59,760 --> 01:30:03,840
Speaker 1: not but strictly by design, at least at first. Hilariously,

1612
01:30:04,000 --> 01:30:06,280
Speaker 1: the first bartender who took off his shirt was this

1613
01:30:07,080 --> 01:30:11,200
Speaker 1: self described scrawny guy from Queen's named Scottie Taylor, and

1614
01:30:11,400 --> 01:30:13,320
Speaker 1: he was just hot and sweaty and figured no one

1615
01:30:13,360 --> 01:30:16,320
Speaker 1: would care or even notice since the customers were mostly

1616
01:30:16,439 --> 01:30:19,519
Speaker 1: half naked, and he took off his shirt. Club owner

1617
01:30:19,560 --> 01:30:22,639
Speaker 1: stever Bell did notice. He came over and said, Scotty,

1618
01:30:22,720 --> 01:30:25,639
Speaker 1: that's great. I love that. Put your shirt back on. Then,

1619
01:30:25,720 --> 01:30:28,679
Speaker 1: looking at Scotty's more handsome and muscular cowork as you said,

1620
01:30:28,720 --> 01:30:32,679
Speaker 1: you other guys take your shirts off, like to pause

1621
01:30:32,760 --> 01:30:35,280
Speaker 1: and briefly observe how messed up this was since the

1622
01:30:35,400 --> 01:30:37,680
Speaker 1: eighteen to twenty one year old bus boys were the

1623
01:30:37,760 --> 01:30:41,080
Speaker 1: most vulnerable on staff and they were basically being used

1624
01:30:41,080 --> 01:30:45,160
Speaker 1: as playthings for the likes of Freddie Mercury and allegedly

1625
01:30:45,320 --> 01:30:49,519
Speaker 1: a famous fashion designer known for his boxer shorts. Watching

1626
01:30:49,560 --> 01:30:52,000
Speaker 1: a documentary on Studio fifty four taught me with the

1627
01:30:52,040 --> 01:30:55,160
Speaker 1: phrase around the world meant in certain circles did daft

1628
01:30:55,200 --> 01:30:59,400
Speaker 1: punk some them. This was in the brief window between

1629
01:30:59,520 --> 01:31:02,519
Speaker 1: the ad of birth control and the AIDS epidemic, when

1630
01:31:02,600 --> 01:31:06,360
Speaker 1: sex was more or less seen as without consequences, STDs

1631
01:31:06,400 --> 01:31:09,040
Speaker 1: were easily treatable. There was basically nothing you couldn't cure

1632
01:31:09,080 --> 01:31:12,040
Speaker 1: without a shot a pickup line. At Studio fifty four,

1633
01:31:12,080 --> 01:31:16,559
Speaker 1: it was basically, according to several hi, you look real,

1634
01:31:16,680 --> 01:31:23,280
Speaker 1: real nice, I'm sure said in a different way. No, yeah,

1635
01:31:25,960 --> 01:31:35,920
Speaker 1: David Lynch, Yeah, that's different what Nile Rogers, who presumably

1636
01:31:36,080 --> 01:31:38,320
Speaker 1: was back in Studio fifty four as Good Graces after

1637
01:31:38,400 --> 01:31:41,080
Speaker 1: Penning the Freak, said in a nineteen ninety eight ITV

1638
01:31:41,280 --> 01:31:44,120
Speaker 1: documentary sex in the bathroom was one of the most

1639
01:31:44,200 --> 01:31:46,960
Speaker 1: common things in those days. I felt like I didn't

1640
01:31:46,960 --> 01:31:48,880
Speaker 1: have a good time if I didn't have sex in

1641
01:31:48,960 --> 01:31:52,719
Speaker 1: a semi public place. I feel like that's not true.

1642
01:31:52,800 --> 01:31:57,960
Speaker 1: But okay, niall, there's so many other ways to have

1643
01:31:58,040 --> 01:32:00,320
Speaker 1: a good time, or at least maybe wasn't as common

1644
01:32:00,360 --> 01:32:03,000
Speaker 1: as he's making it seem. But okay, I you know what,

1645
01:32:03,320 --> 01:32:06,960
Speaker 1: I wasn't there. It was a great quote about the

1646
01:32:06,960 --> 01:32:10,200
Speaker 1: Studio fifty four bathrooms from Judith Linked in a twenty

1647
01:32:10,240 --> 01:32:13,880
Speaker 1: twenty New York Times oral history. Before there was LGBTQ,

1648
01:32:14,479 --> 01:32:17,280
Speaker 1: there were bathrooms at Studio fifty four. You had no

1649
01:32:17,400 --> 01:32:22,120
Speaker 1: idea what anybody was. People also had sex in the

1650
01:32:22,200 --> 01:32:25,960
Speaker 1: upstairs balconies, where you could get busy watching thousands dance

1651
01:32:26,040 --> 01:32:30,600
Speaker 1: down below. This area was upholstered in rubber because it

1652
01:32:30,720 --> 01:32:34,519
Speaker 1: was deemed easy to hose down in the morning. That

1653
01:32:34,640 --> 01:32:39,599
Speaker 1: was the stated objective by the architects. Grace Jones wrote

1654
01:32:39,600 --> 01:32:42,679
Speaker 1: in her memoir. Up high in the seats above the stalls,

1655
01:32:42,880 --> 01:32:45,519
Speaker 1: you could disappear into the shadows and get up to whatever.

1656
01:32:46,240 --> 01:32:48,479
Speaker 1: Up above the balcony there was the rubber room, with

1657
01:32:48,600 --> 01:32:51,280
Speaker 1: thick rubber walls. They could be easily wiped down after

1658
01:32:51,360 --> 01:32:54,719
Speaker 1: all the pottery activity that went on. There was even

1659
01:32:54,800 --> 01:32:57,800
Speaker 1: something above the rubber room, beyond secretive up where the

1660
01:32:57,880 --> 01:33:00,479
Speaker 1: gods of the club could engage in their chos and vice.

1661
01:33:00,920 --> 01:33:04,160
Speaker 1: High up above the relentless dancers, it was a place

1662
01:33:04,240 --> 01:33:08,360
Speaker 1: of secrets and secretions, the in crowd, the in crowd,

1663
01:33:10,720 --> 01:33:17,639
Speaker 1: the in crowd, and inhalations sucking and snorting. Man, don't

1664
01:33:17,680 --> 01:33:21,840
Speaker 1: ever say that to me again. Grace Jones said it

1665
01:33:21,920 --> 01:33:24,479
Speaker 1: to you. That's true. Would it have been easier to

1666
01:33:24,520 --> 01:33:28,360
Speaker 1: take coming from her as it would have? Actually an audiobook? Yeah, yeah,

1667
01:33:28,560 --> 01:33:31,400
Speaker 1: I'm sorry sorry to hear that from me. I'm really

1668
01:33:31,439 --> 01:33:33,560
Speaker 1: sorry from what you're about to hear from me. On

1669
01:33:33,720 --> 01:33:36,559
Speaker 1: a related note, in what I can't believe you left

1670
01:33:36,600 --> 01:33:39,640
Speaker 1: me with this, I thought you would have just taken them.

1671
01:33:39,640 --> 01:33:43,400
Speaker 1: Are the one to share the story. In what must

1672
01:33:43,479 --> 01:33:45,680
Speaker 1: surely be one of the grossest stories we have ever

1673
01:33:45,760 --> 01:33:48,720
Speaker 1: told on the show, club owner Steve Rebel once held

1674
01:33:48,760 --> 01:33:53,040
Speaker 1: an ejaculation contest with his bar boys. The one who

1675
01:33:53,240 --> 01:33:57,879
Speaker 1: ejaculated the furthest was invited to Barbados with him Furthest

1676
01:33:57,960 --> 01:34:00,920
Speaker 1: or most. I think it is like a long jump

1677
01:34:02,439 --> 01:34:09,320
Speaker 1: vertical or horizontal horizontal. Hm, I imagine I'm assuming one

1678
01:34:09,360 --> 01:34:11,560
Speaker 1: of the well presumably don't. I don't know if he

1679
01:34:11,680 --> 01:34:13,760
Speaker 1: was involved in this contest, but one of the bar

1680
01:34:13,880 --> 01:34:15,600
Speaker 1: boys was Alec Baldwin.

1681
01:34:18,280 --> 01:34:26,000
Speaker 2: Told in a different shooting incident, Oh man, he walked

1682
01:34:26,000 --> 01:34:28,599
Speaker 2: into that one and a few other things at Studio

1683
01:34:28,680 --> 01:34:29,200
Speaker 2: fifty four.

1684
01:34:29,840 --> 01:34:35,080
Speaker 1: Oh oh, your boys on it. I'm cooking. He spent

1685
01:34:35,160 --> 01:34:37,400
Speaker 1: two months work working as a He spent two months.

1686
01:34:40,240 --> 01:34:43,080
Speaker 1: He spent two months working as a busboys Studio fifty

1687
01:34:43,120 --> 01:34:45,640
Speaker 1: four in the fall of nineteen seventy nine, and he

1688
01:34:45,760 --> 01:34:48,200
Speaker 1: recalled the scene in the balcony. When speaking to Interview

1689
01:34:48,280 --> 01:34:51,240
Speaker 1: magazine in twenty twelve, gay man would go up to

1690
01:34:51,280 --> 01:34:55,040
Speaker 1: the balcony and fondle one another. It's just like Jack

1691
01:34:55,120 --> 01:35:00,160
Speaker 1: Donnie Voice. Usually couples, very distinguished, wealthy, well dressed, well

1692
01:35:00,240 --> 01:35:02,080
Speaker 1: healed gay men would go up to the balcony and

1693
01:35:02,200 --> 01:35:05,000
Speaker 1: quote discuss things. They'd ask your boy here to go

1694
01:35:05,120 --> 01:35:08,360
Speaker 1: downstairs and quote unquote fetch them a pack of cigarettes.

1695
01:35:08,840 --> 01:35:11,639
Speaker 1: Cigarettes at Studio fifty four were probably like eight dollars,

1696
01:35:12,080 --> 01:35:14,680
Speaker 1: and they'd say, well, keep the change. I was a

1697
01:35:14,800 --> 01:35:17,960
Speaker 1: very popular cigarette snatcher in the balcony. I was the

1698
01:35:18,040 --> 01:35:21,479
Speaker 1: Rick Blaine of well healed homosexual balcony dwellers at Studio

1699
01:35:21,600 --> 01:35:25,120
Speaker 1: fifty four. A very efficient way to tell that story, Alec,

1700
01:35:25,200 --> 01:35:28,000
Speaker 1: but thank you goodness.

1701
01:35:30,040 --> 01:35:31,400
Speaker 3: So that's so.

1702
01:35:31,560 --> 01:35:33,439
Speaker 1: That's the balcony, and the balcony was more or less

1703
01:35:33,479 --> 01:35:36,960
Speaker 1: open to anyone, but the ultra exclusive enclave for decades

1704
01:35:37,040 --> 01:35:40,719
Speaker 1: and depravity of Studio fifty four was the infamous basement,

1705
01:35:41,439 --> 01:35:45,760
Speaker 1: accessible only by a hidden stairway, also known as the Playroom.

1706
01:35:46,240 --> 01:35:48,960
Speaker 1: This cavernous area was very much a basement in the

1707
01:35:49,040 --> 01:35:53,040
Speaker 1: truest sense. It was grungey, graffitied and unglamorous, decorated with

1708
01:35:53,120 --> 01:35:59,000
Speaker 1: old party decorations, pillars of rolled carpet damage, banquettes, and troublingly,

1709
01:35:59,240 --> 01:36:05,800
Speaker 1: a children's playground swing set and kittiepool filled with beach balls. Yeah,

1710
01:36:06,360 --> 01:36:10,000
Speaker 1: mattresses were thrown onto concrete floors and secluded corners where

1711
01:36:10,040 --> 01:36:12,880
Speaker 1: extra special guests could have a moment alone with the

1712
01:36:12,960 --> 01:36:16,000
Speaker 1: bus boy of their choice. God, it's like the Fritzel's

1713
01:36:16,040 --> 01:36:20,559
Speaker 1: Basement or something. Rebel once arranged for a well known

1714
01:36:20,720 --> 01:36:24,200
Speaker 1: countess to have a basement rendezvous with a bartender. She fancied.

1715
01:36:24,880 --> 01:36:28,360
Speaker 1: The barman handcuffed the countess at her request, and then

1716
01:36:28,400 --> 01:36:32,439
Speaker 1: promptly forgot about her. Hours went by before Rebel realized

1717
01:36:32,479 --> 01:36:37,439
Speaker 1: she was missing and rescued her from the basement. As

1718
01:36:37,520 --> 01:36:39,920
Speaker 1: gross as it was, celebrities knew that they weren't going

1719
01:36:39,960 --> 01:36:42,879
Speaker 1: to be bothered or more importantly, photographed in the basement,

1720
01:36:43,080 --> 01:36:47,280
Speaker 1: and few photos of it exist. Security men brandishing walkie

1721
01:36:47,320 --> 01:36:52,000
Speaker 1: talkies secretly patrolled the area, removing any uninvited gawkers. Grace

1722
01:36:52,120 --> 01:36:55,439
Speaker 1: Jones wrote in her twenty sixteen memoir, celebrities headed for

1723
01:36:55,520 --> 01:36:59,479
Speaker 1: the basement, getting high, down low. Not even those who

1724
01:36:59,520 --> 01:37:02,000
Speaker 1: got inside the club could all make it into the basement,

1725
01:37:02,479 --> 01:37:05,240
Speaker 1: you'd stumble into half hidden rooms filled with a few

1726
01:37:05,320 --> 01:37:08,080
Speaker 1: people who seemed to be sweating because of something they

1727
01:37:08,120 --> 01:37:12,479
Speaker 1: had just done or were about to do. Needless to say,

1728
01:37:12,640 --> 01:37:16,320
Speaker 1: many drugs were consumed even more blatantly than they were upstairs.

1729
01:37:17,240 --> 01:37:21,600
Speaker 1: I've read reports of basement VIPs entertaining themselves with strawberries

1730
01:37:21,680 --> 01:37:26,000
Speaker 1: dipped in cocaine, which seems to make no sense whatsoever,

1731
01:37:26,760 --> 01:37:29,320
Speaker 1: because I don't think you get high that way, and

1732
01:37:29,439 --> 01:37:33,920
Speaker 1: it tastes bad. But yeah, there is two things, two

1733
01:37:33,960 --> 01:37:36,959
Speaker 1: things that are important to both of us. But apparently

1734
01:37:37,080 --> 01:37:40,799
Speaker 1: the story is legit. The Soviet ballet dancer Rudolph Duryev

1735
01:37:41,000 --> 01:37:43,519
Speaker 1: came across this scene and helped themself to one of

1736
01:37:43,520 --> 01:37:47,200
Speaker 1: these strawberries dipped in cocaine, apparently thinking the white powder

1737
01:37:47,320 --> 01:37:52,760
Speaker 1: was powdered sugar. He then spat it out and called security,

1738
01:37:53,040 --> 01:37:57,280
Speaker 1: believing that they were trying to poison him. The seventies

1739
01:37:57,479 --> 01:37:58,439
Speaker 1: could sometimes be the.

1740
01:37:58,479 --> 01:38:02,640
Speaker 2: Dumbest decade, perfect segue to getting into one of the

1741
01:38:02,640 --> 01:38:03,360
Speaker 2: most famous.

1742
01:38:03,120 --> 01:38:07,040
Speaker 1: Deal were getting us to drugs, folks, cocaine.

1743
01:38:08,760 --> 01:38:11,439
Speaker 2: We've gone this far talking in detail about Studio fifty

1744
01:38:11,439 --> 01:38:13,960
Speaker 2: four without talking about the famous moon with the spoon,

1745
01:38:14,520 --> 01:38:20,160
Speaker 2: huge light display depicting a crescent moon snorting coke, waxing, gibbis,

1746
01:38:20,600 --> 01:38:21,400
Speaker 2: waning gibbis.

1747
01:38:23,800 --> 01:38:24,880
Speaker 1: I don't know what any of that means.

1748
01:38:25,600 --> 01:38:27,760
Speaker 2: This was essentially the god of Studio fifty four, and

1749
01:38:27,800 --> 01:38:30,679
Speaker 2: it would ceremoniously be lowered over the dance floor several

1750
01:38:30,760 --> 01:38:33,160
Speaker 2: times an evening, at which point people would literally get

1751
01:38:33,200 --> 01:38:36,400
Speaker 2: on their knees and bow. It's difficult in twenty twenty

1752
01:38:36,439 --> 01:38:39,559
Speaker 2: four to understand the casual nature with which cocaine was consumed.

1753
01:38:39,560 --> 01:38:41,400
Speaker 2: At the time, it was taken as a fact that

1754
01:38:41,479 --> 01:38:44,439
Speaker 2: it was not addictive, with one Studio fifty four regular

1755
01:38:44,520 --> 01:38:46,640
Speaker 2: proclaiming it was written in the newspaper.

1756
01:38:49,800 --> 01:38:50,800
Speaker 1: That's not far off, though.

1757
01:38:51,120 --> 01:38:55,519
Speaker 2: Cocaine implements quote unquote tools we're advertising magazines. These range

1758
01:38:55,520 --> 01:38:58,000
Speaker 2: from small silver spoons that hung around your neck, twenty

1759
01:38:58,040 --> 01:39:02,960
Speaker 2: two care gold razor blades, the gasper snow injector, advertised

1760
01:39:02,960 --> 01:39:05,160
Speaker 2: with the slogan do it orally.

1761
01:39:06,479 --> 01:39:06,919
Speaker 1: Nasally?

1762
01:39:07,120 --> 01:39:07,760
Speaker 3: Is that what they mean?

1763
01:39:08,040 --> 01:39:10,439
Speaker 1: What does a snow injector? I'm gonna look at this up.

1764
01:39:10,640 --> 01:39:15,360
Speaker 1: I think it gets more up your nose faster. Wait,

1765
01:39:15,439 --> 01:39:17,400
Speaker 1: I'm gonna hang on a sec and.

1766
01:39:17,520 --> 01:39:21,040
Speaker 2: Even merrors where the ad copy read tonight's forecast snow.

1767
01:39:21,720 --> 01:39:24,040
Speaker 2: There is a high front bringing snow to much of

1768
01:39:24,120 --> 01:39:28,040
Speaker 2: the nation tonight. Light to heavy accumulation is expected. We

1769
01:39:28,280 --> 01:39:31,000
Speaker 2: urge our viewers to prepare for this high front with

1770
01:39:31,160 --> 01:39:35,920
Speaker 2: quality mirrors from easy line. Precut grooves, beveled edges, and

1771
01:39:36,000 --> 01:39:38,479
Speaker 2: a corkbacking are just a few reasons why these merrors

1772
01:39:38,520 --> 01:39:42,439
Speaker 2: are so popular. Hurry to your neighborhood headshop before the

1773
01:39:42,520 --> 01:39:47,320
Speaker 2: supply runs out. I just sent you the the snow

1774
01:39:47,400 --> 01:39:50,719
Speaker 2: injected Oh okay, that's what a buld model and pocket

1775
01:39:51,160 --> 01:39:54,719
Speaker 2: oh turkey bas. The natives of South America used hollow

1776
01:39:54,800 --> 01:39:57,280
Speaker 2: reeds to blow the powder down each other's soroat. Of course,

1777
01:39:58,000 --> 01:40:00,360
Speaker 2: of course they somehow managed to drag that in.

1778
01:40:02,360 --> 01:40:03,599
Speaker 3: Oh boy.

1779
01:40:04,600 --> 01:40:07,040
Speaker 1: This method put the snow more directly into the lungs

1780
01:40:07,080 --> 01:40:10,479
Speaker 1: that did not damage delicate nasal and sinus membranes, so

1781
01:40:10,640 --> 01:40:16,479
Speaker 1: you could just blow cocaine right down your throat. Good lord.

1782
01:40:17,520 --> 01:40:19,400
Speaker 1: All of this to say, offering someone a line or

1783
01:40:19,479 --> 01:40:21,280
Speaker 1: bump was on par with offering them a cup of

1784
01:40:21,479 --> 01:40:25,920
Speaker 1: coffee or red bull or a toot of their vape.

1785
01:40:28,520 --> 01:40:30,559
Speaker 2: I'm sure it was expensive, but for people who were

1786
01:40:30,600 --> 01:40:34,160
Speaker 2: in New York's main industries finance, fashion, entertainment, and so forth.

1787
01:40:34,920 --> 01:40:37,519
Speaker 2: It was considered normal. For Christmas, the Studio fifty four

1788
01:40:37,520 --> 01:40:40,120
Speaker 2: owners put together gift baggies of cocaine that were handed

1789
01:40:40,160 --> 01:40:42,519
Speaker 2: out by Santa. There was a photo of a very

1790
01:40:42,560 --> 01:40:45,880
Speaker 2: excited Robin Williams grabbing one. It was even a guy

1791
01:40:46,000 --> 01:40:50,120
Speaker 2: on staff, Lenny fifty four, whose sole job appeared to

1792
01:40:50,280 --> 01:40:52,600
Speaker 2: just be doing drugs along with the VIPs. It's like

1793
01:40:52,600 --> 01:40:54,519
Speaker 2: the Mighty Mighty Bosstones had a guy on stage for

1794
01:40:54,600 --> 01:40:57,040
Speaker 2: like twenty years whose whole thing was just chilli dancing.

1795
01:40:57,400 --> 01:40:59,840
Speaker 2: They had a guy who's on the payroll's job was

1796
01:40:59,880 --> 01:41:05,599
Speaker 2: just to do cocaine cocaine, Lenny Bostone. Lenny Bostone, please

1797
01:41:05,880 --> 01:41:10,719
Speaker 2: call me Lenny. My father was mister fifty four. Cocaine

1798
01:41:10,800 --> 01:41:13,000
Speaker 2: was quite literally part of the currency at Studio fifty four,

1799
01:41:13,000 --> 01:41:16,640
Speaker 2: as patrons would tip bartenders and vials of coke, and

1800
01:41:16,920 --> 01:41:18,880
Speaker 2: just like cash, they would throw all of the vials

1801
01:41:18,920 --> 01:41:21,040
Speaker 2: into a bucket and divvy them up among staff at

1802
01:41:21,040 --> 01:41:24,680
Speaker 2: the end of the night. Cocaine tended to breed generosity

1803
01:41:25,479 --> 01:41:28,400
Speaker 2: or egregious waste. It was not uncommon for someone to

1804
01:41:28,520 --> 01:41:30,680
Speaker 2: use a one hundred dollars bills to snort cocaine and

1805
01:41:30,760 --> 01:41:32,599
Speaker 2: then just throw it on the ground like a candy wrapper.

1806
01:41:33,320 --> 01:41:35,519
Speaker 2: And then someone else would grab the one hundred dollars

1807
01:41:35,520 --> 01:41:37,759
Speaker 2: bill on the floor, use it to do lines themselves,

1808
01:41:37,960 --> 01:41:41,000
Speaker 2: and throw it away again. While coke may have been

1809
01:41:41,040 --> 01:41:42,599
Speaker 2: the drug of choice, it was far from the only

1810
01:41:42,640 --> 01:41:45,720
Speaker 2: illicit substance being consumed at Studio fifty four. There are

1811
01:41:45,840 --> 01:41:50,080
Speaker 2: legendary and therefore possibly mythical stories of revelers putting amyl

1812
01:41:50,200 --> 01:41:53,040
Speaker 2: nitrate poppers in the ac ducts and telling the DJ

1813
01:41:53,200 --> 01:41:56,479
Speaker 2: to play fast songs. An occupational hazard for the cloak

1814
01:41:56,560 --> 01:41:59,240
Speaker 2: room staff was accidental contact ties due to the poppers

1815
01:41:59,280 --> 01:42:02,439
Speaker 2: that would occasionally explode after being left in people's coats.

1816
01:42:04,360 --> 01:42:07,080
Speaker 2: Sometimes the stars would actually hang out in the coat

1817
01:42:07,160 --> 01:42:09,880
Speaker 2: room to relax a little bit, the chill tent, if

1818
01:42:09,920 --> 01:42:13,360
Speaker 2: you will, and then the co check woman would also

1819
01:42:13,439 --> 01:42:15,920
Speaker 2: would then go out and hang in the club themselves

1820
01:42:16,479 --> 01:42:18,760
Speaker 2: and then come back reporting on all the gossip that

1821
01:42:18,800 --> 01:42:23,479
Speaker 2: they'd picked up. And then, of course were Kayludes, the

1822
01:42:24,560 --> 01:42:29,760
Speaker 2: horrifically and pretty much always abused downers, pain killer and

1823
01:42:29,800 --> 01:42:32,240
Speaker 2: sleep aid known as disco biscuits before they were outlawed

1824
01:42:32,280 --> 01:42:35,679
Speaker 2: by the FDA in nineteen eighty two. You may, perhaps

1825
01:42:35,720 --> 01:42:38,920
Speaker 2: horrifically remember Bill Cosby referring to them as thigh openers.

1826
01:42:39,000 --> 01:42:39,280
Speaker 4: Or was that?

1827
01:42:39,920 --> 01:42:44,280
Speaker 1: Oh was that Hugh Heffner. I think it was Hugh Heffner. Actually,

1828
01:42:44,640 --> 01:42:46,920
Speaker 1: oh god, I've never heard that.

1829
01:42:47,479 --> 01:42:47,679
Speaker 3: Yeah.

1830
01:42:48,880 --> 01:42:51,040
Speaker 2: Coailudes were a favorite of co owner Steve Rubell, who

1831
01:42:51,120 --> 01:42:55,040
Speaker 2: often overindulged on the dance floor. Club goer Nicky Haskell

1832
01:42:55,080 --> 01:42:58,280
Speaker 2: offers this vivid description. He'd beat the bar drinking his

1833
01:42:58,360 --> 01:43:01,280
Speaker 2: Coca Cola with about ten straws. You could always see

1834
01:43:01,320 --> 01:43:03,599
Speaker 2: when he had a couple of queludes because he'd slightly

1835
01:43:03,640 --> 01:43:04,320
Speaker 2: foam at the mouth.

1836
01:43:05,120 --> 01:43:10,200
Speaker 1: It was a look. But enough about the drugs. Let's

1837
01:43:10,240 --> 01:43:16,160
Speaker 1: talk about the themed parties. The most Jordan saidence effort

1838
01:43:17,680 --> 01:43:19,400
Speaker 1: Stewie's sexy party theme.

1839
01:43:19,479 --> 01:43:38,200
Speaker 2: Here, Rubert and Schreger would throw themed parties, tackling them

1840
01:43:38,280 --> 01:43:40,000
Speaker 2: with it over the top intensity that could only have

1841
01:43:40,080 --> 01:43:43,200
Speaker 2: been fueled by cocaine. They came from a competitive background

1842
01:43:43,240 --> 01:43:47,280
Speaker 2: out in Brooklyn, where as one of their friends observed,

1843
01:43:47,479 --> 01:43:50,160
Speaker 2: the prevailing mentality was my bar mits was going to

1844
01:43:50,160 --> 01:43:51,639
Speaker 2: be better than your bar mitzvah.

1845
01:43:52,560 --> 01:43:55,120
Speaker 1: Once a month they had Cocaine and then You Go Yeah.

1846
01:43:55,200 --> 01:43:57,839
Speaker 2: Exactly once a month, they would draw on the Broadway

1847
01:43:57,880 --> 01:44:00,240
Speaker 2: expertise of their staff and transform the venue into a

1848
01:44:00,320 --> 01:44:03,679
Speaker 2: fantastic stage set for one night only. They would frequently

1849
01:44:03,760 --> 01:44:06,439
Speaker 2: drop between forty and fifty grand for these productions, but

1850
01:44:06,560 --> 01:44:10,240
Speaker 2: as far as Eden Scheger and Steve Rubelle were concerned,

1851
01:44:10,320 --> 01:44:13,040
Speaker 2: this was a valuable marketing tool for the club. These

1852
01:44:13,120 --> 01:44:15,880
Speaker 2: parties helped create the reputation that anything could happen at studio,

1853
01:44:16,160 --> 01:44:19,400
Speaker 2: blurred the line between patrons and performers. If the dance

1854
01:44:19,439 --> 01:44:22,439
Speaker 2: floor was literally the stage, then the building itself became

1855
01:44:22,479 --> 01:44:24,439
Speaker 2: a sound stage on which the club owners created their

1856
01:44:24,479 --> 01:44:28,920
Speaker 2: wildest fantasies. Once they transformed space into Louis the Fourteenth Castle,

1857
01:44:29,000 --> 01:44:32,479
Speaker 2: with twenty violin players and white tails lining the entry hallway.

1858
01:44:33,160 --> 01:44:35,479
Speaker 2: For their first anniversary in April nineteen seventy eight, they

1859
01:44:35,520 --> 01:44:39,519
Speaker 2: threw a circus themed celebration with drafts and a marching

1860
01:44:39,640 --> 01:44:42,639
Speaker 2: band that played Happy Birthday. There was another circus theme

1861
01:44:42,680 --> 01:44:45,639
Speaker 2: party later on for the fashion designer Valentino that featured

1862
01:44:45,640 --> 01:44:49,599
Speaker 2: a circus ring with sand and mermaids on trapezes, hastily

1863
01:44:49,720 --> 01:44:52,920
Speaker 2: arranged in just three days. Costumes were borrowed from the

1864
01:44:52,920 --> 01:44:56,200
Speaker 2: filmmaker Fellini the third mention of Fellini in this episode

1865
01:44:56,479 --> 01:45:00,000
Speaker 2: for his nineteen seventy movie The Clowns. The animals would

1866
01:45:00,040 --> 01:45:02,960
Speaker 2: frequently get them into trouble, though Rubel and Schreger received

1867
01:45:03,000 --> 01:45:05,920
Speaker 2: a citation from the New York Department of Health Bureau

1868
01:45:05,960 --> 01:45:09,640
Speaker 2: of Animal Affairs, reading, in part, gentlemen, it has come

1869
01:45:09,720 --> 01:45:11,600
Speaker 2: to the attention of this department that a leopard and

1870
01:45:11,680 --> 01:45:14,400
Speaker 2: panther were president. You're at a party in your establishment

1871
01:45:14,800 --> 01:45:19,080
Speaker 2: on or about December thirteenth, nineteen seventy seven. You are

1872
01:45:19,160 --> 01:45:21,720
Speaker 2: hereby advised that this incident was in violation of two

1873
01:45:21,800 --> 01:45:24,360
Speaker 2: different sections of the New York City Health Code. You

1874
01:45:24,479 --> 01:45:27,320
Speaker 2: are hereby ordered not to have animals in attendance on

1875
01:45:27,439 --> 01:45:32,120
Speaker 2: your premises. Love so much about that they only got

1876
01:45:32,160 --> 01:45:34,840
Speaker 2: an approximate time and date for the leopard and panther

1877
01:45:35,600 --> 01:45:37,680
Speaker 2: a party from Michael and Tina Chow, founders of the

1878
01:45:37,720 --> 01:45:40,880
Speaker 2: upscale Chinese eatery. Mister Chows transformed the dance floor into

1879
01:45:40,920 --> 01:45:44,120
Speaker 2: a Hong Kong street scene with no disturbing racial overtones.

1880
01:45:44,280 --> 01:45:49,439
Speaker 2: I am sure for Valentine for Valentine's Day. For Valentine's Day,

1881
01:45:49,760 --> 01:45:52,879
Speaker 2: Studio fifty four morphed into a garden with fully soldid

1882
01:45:52,960 --> 01:45:56,559
Speaker 2: flower beds, picket fencing, a group of harpists and bus

1883
01:45:56,640 --> 01:45:59,560
Speaker 2: boys dressed as Cupid. The entrance hallway was lined with

1884
01:45:59,560 --> 01:46:02,599
Speaker 2: one hundreds of televisions playing a supercut of famous cinematic

1885
01:46:02,720 --> 01:46:06,160
Speaker 2: kisses and love scenes. You know VHS or Betamax at

1886
01:46:06,160 --> 01:46:10,080
Speaker 2: the time, Oh, I don't know. On Oscar night, they

1887
01:46:10,200 --> 01:46:12,400
Speaker 2: ordered a literal truck full of popcorn and filled the

1888
01:46:12,479 --> 01:46:14,839
Speaker 2: dance floor with TVs so people could watch the ceremony

1889
01:46:14,880 --> 01:46:17,439
Speaker 2: while they danced. They decked out the place with palm

1890
01:46:17,479 --> 01:46:20,280
Speaker 2: trees to resemble the Coconut Grove, a silver screen era

1891
01:46:20,479 --> 01:46:24,760
Speaker 2: Hollywood hotspot. Naturally, Halloween was the biggest night of the year.

1892
01:46:25,320 --> 01:46:27,560
Speaker 2: Mark Fleishman, one of the managers and later owner of

1893
01:46:27,600 --> 01:46:30,800
Speaker 2: Studio fifty four, would say, one year we spent fifty

1894
01:46:30,880 --> 01:46:33,880
Speaker 2: grand transforming the main entrance hall into a haunted mansion

1895
01:46:33,920 --> 01:46:36,640
Speaker 2: that included live monsters jumping out of our guests as

1896
01:46:36,680 --> 01:46:39,280
Speaker 2: they made their way across rickety bridges through a graveyard

1897
01:46:39,360 --> 01:46:42,840
Speaker 2: while howling and other very strange loud noises played in

1898
01:46:42,920 --> 01:46:48,040
Speaker 2: the background that was probably be Unca Jagger. The party

1899
01:46:48,080 --> 01:46:51,240
Speaker 2: Alana Hamilton gave a Mercedes Air Mick Flick featured a

1900
01:46:51,280 --> 01:46:54,559
Speaker 2: Mercedes wrapped in gold le may a brigade of Hell's

1901
01:46:54,600 --> 01:46:57,920
Speaker 2: Angels on Harley's roared onto the dance floor. For Carmen

1902
01:46:58,000 --> 01:47:02,320
Speaker 2: de Lecio's birthday party, our Loggerfeld held a candlelit eighteenth

1903
01:47:02,400 --> 01:47:05,839
Speaker 2: century party with the staff in court dress and powdered wigs.

1904
01:47:07,280 --> 01:47:08,760
Speaker 2: I would have thought he would have gone for more

1905
01:47:08,800 --> 01:47:15,320
Speaker 2: of a third Reich Vibe baby with Hugo Boss present

1906
01:47:15,880 --> 01:47:19,840
Speaker 2: Ah google that one, folks. Bionca Jagger's birthday in nineteen

1907
01:47:19,840 --> 01:47:23,599
Speaker 2: seventy eight was disturbingly a baby party with ice cream

1908
01:47:23,640 --> 01:47:27,240
Speaker 2: cone vases, bowls of cracker jacks, bus boys in diapers,

1909
01:47:27,560 --> 01:47:33,840
Speaker 2: and probably Brooke shields. Oh, Beyoncreick cut as much of

1910
01:47:33,920 --> 01:47:36,760
Speaker 2: that as you want, all of the all the Brooke

1911
01:47:36,880 --> 01:47:39,479
Speaker 2: shield stuff. You think Epstein gotta cut his teeth here.

1912
01:47:39,960 --> 01:47:41,760
Speaker 2: Oh you know what it might have been like.

1913
01:47:41,880 --> 01:47:45,439
Speaker 1: He might have only been too young four or five? Yeah. Uh.

1914
01:47:45,600 --> 01:47:48,519
Speaker 2: Bionca repaid the favor for Steve Reubell's birthday by popping

1915
01:47:48,560 --> 01:47:51,120
Speaker 2: out of a cake before nearly suffocating in a blizzard

1916
01:47:51,160 --> 01:47:54,360
Speaker 2: of plastic snow. Stevie Wonder threw a party for his

1917
01:47:54,479 --> 01:47:58,360
Speaker 2: personal assistant, which he performed at presumably somewhat lacking in

1918
01:47:58,400 --> 01:47:59,000
Speaker 2: the visual.

1919
01:47:58,840 --> 01:48:01,919
Speaker 1: Department, but just nice thing to do for your personal assistant.

1920
01:48:03,520 --> 01:48:08,080
Speaker 2: Describing one party Mile former model Describing one party, former

1921
01:48:08,160 --> 01:48:10,800
Speaker 2: model Kevin Haley told Vanity Fair in nineteen ninety six,

1922
01:48:11,320 --> 01:48:13,280
Speaker 2: as you came up the ramp in the foyer, you

1923
01:48:13,360 --> 01:48:17,000
Speaker 2: looked out through little windows into little booths with little

1924
01:48:17,080 --> 01:48:18,240
Speaker 2: people doing things.

1925
01:48:18,880 --> 01:48:23,000
Speaker 1: Editor Yeah, editorial, Yeah. The one that sticks out of

1926
01:48:23,040 --> 01:48:26,040
Speaker 1: my head had a little people family eating a formal dinner,

1927
01:48:26,560 --> 01:48:30,320
Speaker 1: apparently a scene inspired by Hieronymous Bosh. Sure man, do

1928
01:48:30,479 --> 01:48:31,320
Speaker 1: with that what you will.

1929
01:48:31,960 --> 01:48:34,679
Speaker 2: These are a couple of lightning round instances. But Jordan

1930
01:48:34,880 --> 01:48:36,479
Speaker 2: take us on a tour of some of the just

1931
01:48:36,560 --> 01:48:39,240
Speaker 2: some of the more insane parties. Yeah, that serve as

1932
01:48:39,280 --> 01:48:44,040
Speaker 2: a reminder that cocaine is indeed drive well.

1933
01:48:44,120 --> 01:48:47,040
Speaker 1: Many in Studio fifty four consider Elizabeth Taylor's birthday in

1934
01:48:47,120 --> 01:48:49,760
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy eight as the most amazing party of all.

1935
01:48:50,400 --> 01:48:52,600
Speaker 1: The Lady of Honor was treated to a performance by

1936
01:48:52,640 --> 01:48:55,960
Speaker 1: the Rockets, which she watched from a float of Gardenya's

1937
01:48:56,040 --> 01:49:00,000
Speaker 1: while standing between then husband Senator John Warner of Virginia

1938
01:49:00,800 --> 01:49:03,680
Speaker 1: and designer Halston, and this party apparently went a long

1939
01:49:03,720 --> 01:49:06,920
Speaker 1: way in bolstering the Rocket's reputation because Radio City at

1940
01:49:06,960 --> 01:49:09,400
Speaker 1: this time in the late seventies was in danger being

1941
01:49:09,479 --> 01:49:11,519
Speaker 1: closed down. So this brought a lot of attention to

1942
01:49:11,560 --> 01:49:16,120
Speaker 1: the Rockets and saved them from presumably maybe shutting down,

1943
01:49:16,160 --> 01:49:19,280
Speaker 1: which I think is interesting. Liz was later presented that

1944
01:49:19,400 --> 01:49:22,280
Speaker 1: same night with a life sized portrait of herself made

1945
01:49:22,320 --> 01:49:25,920
Speaker 1: of cake. Her biographer offered this description in the book

1946
01:49:26,160 --> 01:49:30,160
Speaker 1: The Lady The Lover The Legend of Elizabeth Taylor. A

1947
01:49:30,320 --> 01:49:34,799
Speaker 1: dozen well endowed hunks, naked but for sequin posing pouches,

1948
01:49:35,280 --> 01:49:38,240
Speaker 1: and some with joints dangling from the corners of their mouths,

1949
01:49:38,600 --> 01:49:41,679
Speaker 1: scattered guardina pedals and the couple's path as they entered

1950
01:49:42,080 --> 01:49:45,080
Speaker 1: The dancing and fun continued near the early hours, the

1951
01:49:45,160 --> 01:49:48,280
Speaker 1: atmosphere heavy with the stench of poppers, and Elizabeth b

1952
01:49:48,439 --> 01:49:51,759
Speaker 1: bopping with a bevy of gay porn stars until John Warner,

1953
01:49:51,840 --> 01:49:54,559
Speaker 1: her husband, put his foot down and said they were leaving.

1954
01:49:55,600 --> 01:49:59,120
Speaker 1: Andy Warhol meanwhile wrote a less than flattering recap of

1955
01:49:59,200 --> 01:50:02,880
Speaker 1: the party in his which was later published. Liz looked

1956
01:50:02,960 --> 01:50:07,920
Speaker 1: like a belly button, he wrote, the man had a

1957
01:50:07,960 --> 01:50:12,599
Speaker 1: way with words, like a fast little juby doll. Diana

1958
01:50:12,640 --> 01:50:15,639
Speaker 1: Freeland was there and people were being brought over to Liz.

1959
01:50:16,080 --> 01:50:20,280
Speaker 1: She was the Queen. I met a quarterback, Bob, presumably

1960
01:50:20,360 --> 01:50:24,160
Speaker 1: Bob Coloccio the Interview. The editor of Interview magazine was

1961
01:50:24,240 --> 01:50:27,360
Speaker 1: watching Bianca Jagger take poppers and he said to Diana Vreeland,

1962
01:50:28,160 --> 01:50:31,240
Speaker 1: it really becomes more like pagan Rome every day, and

1963
01:50:31,439 --> 01:50:35,120
Speaker 1: she said, I should hope. So isn't that what we're after?

1964
01:50:37,280 --> 01:50:39,479
Speaker 1: So that was Elizabeth Taylor's party. The folks at Studio

1965
01:50:39,520 --> 01:50:42,519
Speaker 1: fifty four also threw a party in honor of Dolly Parton,

1966
01:50:43,120 --> 01:50:46,360
Speaker 1: but sadly and sort of predictably, she was not that

1967
01:50:46,600 --> 01:50:50,040
Speaker 1: into it. When she visited the city for concert dates

1968
01:50:50,080 --> 01:50:55,320
Speaker 1: in May nineteen seventy eight, Steve Rebll somewhat condescendingly decided

1969
01:50:55,360 --> 01:50:58,080
Speaker 1: that they would transform the dance floor of Studio fifty

1970
01:50:58,120 --> 01:51:02,120
Speaker 1: four into a farm. What a prick, I get. Yeah,

1971
01:51:02,200 --> 01:51:04,160
Speaker 1: I know, she didn't grow up on a farm, you

1972
01:51:04,360 --> 01:51:05,280
Speaker 1: fing chud.

1973
01:51:05,920 --> 01:51:09,120
Speaker 2: Also, it was one of the more successful nationale singer

1974
01:51:09,200 --> 01:51:12,360
Speaker 2: songwriters for literally over a decade at this point.

1975
01:51:13,439 --> 01:51:18,639
Speaker 1: Ugh welcome Michael Musta remembered in an e documentary about

1976
01:51:18,720 --> 01:51:21,960
Speaker 1: Studio fifty four. Steve went all out for that. They

1977
01:51:22,000 --> 01:51:25,320
Speaker 1: had haystacks and horses and donkeys and mules running through

1978
01:51:25,320 --> 01:51:28,200
Speaker 1: the club. Most of the animals were procured from a

1979
01:51:28,320 --> 01:51:32,680
Speaker 1: farm in Bucks County, Pennsylvania. Isn't that where you're from? No, oh, Cumberland,

1980
01:51:32,720 --> 01:51:33,120
Speaker 1: never mind.

1981
01:51:33,360 --> 01:51:35,680
Speaker 2: Yeah, Bucks County is I think closer to Philly. That

1982
01:51:35,760 --> 01:51:38,280
Speaker 2: might actually be where freaking Taylor Swift is from.

1983
01:51:38,880 --> 01:51:41,719
Speaker 1: Yeah. We had big wine barrels be filled with corn.

1984
01:51:42,120 --> 01:51:44,360
Speaker 1: We had a farm wagon we brought in and piled

1985
01:51:44,400 --> 01:51:47,320
Speaker 1: with hay. We had chickens and a pen. This is

1986
01:51:47,320 --> 01:51:51,920
Speaker 1: from club associate Rennie Reynolds, who was one of the organizers. Unfortunately,

1987
01:51:52,160 --> 01:51:55,400
Speaker 1: the guest of honor, Dolly, was less than amused. Dolly

1988
01:51:55,479 --> 01:51:57,640
Speaker 1: came and was completely freaked out by the number of

1989
01:51:57,720 --> 01:52:00,960
Speaker 1: people there. Club associate Rennie Reynolds can she had not

1990
01:52:01,080 --> 01:52:04,040
Speaker 1: had a Studio fifty four experience. She was real nervous

1991
01:52:04,040 --> 01:52:06,120
Speaker 1: about this whole deal and went up to the balcony

1992
01:52:06,240 --> 01:52:07,479
Speaker 1: and sat up there for a while.

1993
01:52:07,760 --> 01:52:07,960
Speaker 3: Eew.

1994
01:52:08,680 --> 01:52:11,600
Speaker 1: She was not a comfortable lady there, all thought of

1995
01:52:11,640 --> 01:52:17,000
Speaker 1: Studio fifty four making Dolly sad that's yeah, hateful. My

1996
01:52:17,120 --> 01:52:20,040
Speaker 1: personal favorite Studio fifty four party was the one held

1997
01:52:20,080 --> 01:52:23,080
Speaker 1: for the premiere of Greece in July nineteen seventy eight.

1998
01:52:24,080 --> 01:52:28,679
Speaker 1: The organizers turned the venue into rydel High producer Alan

1999
01:52:28,760 --> 01:52:31,240
Speaker 1: Carr recalled in nineteen ninety eight, he walked in and

2000
01:52:31,320 --> 01:52:34,160
Speaker 1: the hallway was nothing but lockers, high school lockers on

2001
01:52:34,280 --> 01:52:36,680
Speaker 1: both sides, and then you went into the main part

2002
01:52:36,760 --> 01:52:39,280
Speaker 1: of the club and they had all these old convertible

2003
01:52:39,400 --> 01:52:43,120
Speaker 1: cars of the fifties. These were obtained by the aforementioned

2004
01:52:43,160 --> 01:52:45,960
Speaker 1: Renny Reynolds, the kind of official party gopher guy who

2005
01:52:46,080 --> 01:52:49,760
Speaker 1: got livestock for Dolly's party. But these vintage autos were

2006
01:52:49,800 --> 01:52:52,920
Speaker 1: a lot harder to come by than farm animals. He said.

2007
01:52:53,040 --> 01:52:56,360
Speaker 1: I called various places and it was impossible. Nobody wanted

2008
01:52:56,400 --> 01:52:58,840
Speaker 1: to rent a car to Studio fifty four. So I

2009
01:52:58,880 --> 01:53:01,759
Speaker 1: found this little autom museum down somewhere in New Jersey,

2010
01:53:02,040 --> 01:53:05,160
Speaker 1: and they agreed to bring these cars up and six big,

2011
01:53:05,320 --> 01:53:08,559
Speaker 1: thin classics were parked on the dance floor. But minutes

2012
01:53:08,560 --> 01:53:10,720
Speaker 1: before showtime and when the doors were supposed to open,

2013
01:53:10,840 --> 01:53:13,120
Speaker 1: the fire marshal threatened to shut it down, citing a

2014
01:53:13,200 --> 01:53:17,400
Speaker 1: major hazard. Apparently the cars hadn't been drained of gasoline,

2015
01:53:18,120 --> 01:53:20,240
Speaker 1: so each vehicle had to be taken out onto the

2016
01:53:20,280 --> 01:53:23,080
Speaker 1: street where its tank was empty. They siphoned out and emptied,

2017
01:53:23,760 --> 01:53:27,879
Speaker 1: and then pushed back inside by hand. Everything went relatively

2018
01:53:27,920 --> 01:53:30,920
Speaker 1: smoothly after that, except for one minor incident. There was

2019
01:53:30,920 --> 01:53:33,679
Speaker 1: a nineteen fifty Chevy convertible that got a bit trashed

2020
01:53:33,760 --> 01:53:36,479
Speaker 1: because people climbed in and burned the seats. Randy said,

2021
01:53:37,160 --> 01:53:39,160
Speaker 1: so we ended up having to pay for new seats,

2022
01:53:39,840 --> 01:53:42,200
Speaker 1: but the party was wild. They returned them to the

2023
01:53:42,240 --> 01:53:46,800
Speaker 1: autom Museum and the guys like, did you guys my cars?

2024
01:53:49,080 --> 01:53:50,400
Speaker 1: Truman Capoti still in here?

2025
01:53:52,120 --> 01:53:55,960
Speaker 2: Someone pops out of the trunk like kenjiong in the hangover,

2026
01:53:56,240 --> 01:54:02,559
Speaker 2: like launched out of it naked. It's Alec Baldwin.

2027
01:54:05,600 --> 01:54:08,080
Speaker 1: The last major party that was held at Studio fifty

2028
01:54:08,120 --> 01:54:11,360
Speaker 1: four before Steve Rebell and Ian Schrager arrested for tax evasion,

2029
01:54:11,600 --> 01:54:14,160
Speaker 1: which we'll discuss shortly, took place on New Year's Eve

2030
01:54:14,240 --> 01:54:18,160
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy eight. Our dear sweet Rennie Reynolds, the man

2031
01:54:18,240 --> 01:54:22,000
Speaker 1: responsible for the fifties cars and Dolly's livestock, was tasked

2032
01:54:22,080 --> 01:54:25,320
Speaker 1: with turning the club into an igloo, he told The

2033
01:54:25,360 --> 01:54:28,240
Speaker 1: New York Times in twenty twenty. We created walls of

2034
01:54:28,360 --> 01:54:31,599
Speaker 1: ice for the entire main room. The ice company came

2035
01:54:31,680 --> 01:54:34,400
Speaker 1: with blocks of ice and bags of crushed ice, and

2036
01:54:34,480 --> 01:54:36,240
Speaker 1: they told me that if you used the crushed ice

2037
01:54:36,320 --> 01:54:39,920
Speaker 1: between the blocks, it acted like mortar. We backlit the

2038
01:54:40,000 --> 01:54:43,280
Speaker 1: ice with black light that read as glowing blue. We

2039
01:54:43,360 --> 01:54:45,640
Speaker 1: had a couple of feet of artificial snow for depth.

2040
01:54:46,040 --> 01:54:48,760
Speaker 1: When I first walked in, the walls looked kind of frosted,

2041
01:54:49,280 --> 01:54:52,320
Speaker 1: but then they became more beautiful as the outer layers melted.

2042
01:54:53,080 --> 01:54:56,960
Speaker 1: There was also diamond dust. I used diamond dust a

2043
01:54:57,080 --> 01:54:59,960
Speaker 1: bunch of times. On any given morning, you could walk

2044
01:55:00,000 --> 01:55:02,120
Speaker 1: walk along West fifty third Street at the back of

2045
01:55:02,200 --> 01:55:06,640
Speaker 1: the club and you could see it sparkling. I wasn't sure.

2046
01:55:06,680 --> 01:55:08,600
Speaker 1: I googled to make sure that wasn't like some kind

2047
01:55:08,640 --> 01:55:13,000
Speaker 1: of industry set design term for just like random glitter,

2048
01:55:13,120 --> 01:55:18,880
Speaker 1: no literal diamond dust dust shaved from diamonds. Studio fifty

2049
01:55:18,920 --> 01:55:21,640
Speaker 1: four was known for dropping items down onto the dance floor,

2050
01:55:21,920 --> 01:55:25,000
Speaker 1: everything from white balloons to ping pong balls and confetti

2051
01:55:25,120 --> 01:55:29,000
Speaker 1: and feathers, and on New Year's Eve, four tons of

2052
01:55:29,200 --> 01:55:33,960
Speaker 1: glitter was dropped, leaving a four inch pile. Ian shrey Or,

2053
01:55:34,000 --> 01:55:36,440
Speaker 1: one of the club's co owners, later said, you felt

2054
01:55:36,520 --> 01:55:39,200
Speaker 1: like you were standing on star dust. People got the

2055
01:55:39,240 --> 01:55:42,000
Speaker 1: glitter and their hair and their socks. You would see

2056
01:55:42,040 --> 01:55:44,760
Speaker 1: it in people's home six months later, and you knew

2057
01:55:44,800 --> 01:55:49,240
Speaker 1: they'd been at Studio fifty four On New Year's Okay, man.

2058
01:55:52,160 --> 01:55:55,840
Speaker 2: Yeah, just the eternal reply to everything about Studio fifty four.

2059
01:55:57,120 --> 01:56:00,760
Speaker 2: Now chord suddenly turns into a minor c he gravelly

2060
01:56:00,840 --> 01:56:03,120
Speaker 2: voiced behind the music, guy says, but it wasn't all

2061
01:56:03,320 --> 01:56:10,800
Speaker 2: diamond dust. The downfall of Studio fifty four actually has

2062
01:56:10,840 --> 01:56:13,640
Speaker 2: its seeds in the opening of the venue in spring

2063
01:56:13,680 --> 01:56:16,360
Speaker 2: of nineteen seventy seven. In the rush of everything they

2064
01:56:16,440 --> 01:56:18,320
Speaker 2: had to do to get the club open in six weeks,

2065
01:56:18,400 --> 01:56:21,000
Speaker 2: they declined to get a liquor license since the wait

2066
01:56:21,080 --> 01:56:24,800
Speaker 2: time was too long. Instead, they just applied for one

2067
01:56:24,880 --> 01:56:27,800
Speaker 2: day catering permits, which are intended for weddings or parties.

2068
01:56:28,640 --> 01:56:32,440
Speaker 2: Steve Rubelle and Scheger's company was technically called Broadway Catering Corp.

2069
01:56:33,120 --> 01:56:34,920
Speaker 2: And as a result, they had to renew the permit

2070
01:56:35,000 --> 01:56:39,560
Speaker 2: every twenty four hours. There is people differ over whether

2071
01:56:39,640 --> 01:56:42,000
Speaker 2: this was actually illegal, but the State of New York

2072
01:56:42,080 --> 01:56:45,040
Speaker 2: obviously didn't appreciate it isn't a liquor license in New

2073
01:56:45,120 --> 01:56:46,800
Speaker 2: York something like fifty thousand dollars.

2074
01:56:47,360 --> 01:56:47,800
Speaker 1: It's a lot.

2075
01:56:48,000 --> 01:56:51,440
Speaker 2: Yeah, and Studio fifty four was obviously a little too

2076
01:56:51,600 --> 01:56:55,760
Speaker 2: visible to bend the rules so flagrantly and publicly. They

2077
01:56:55,800 --> 01:56:58,680
Speaker 2: also didn't even have a certificate of occupancy or public

2078
01:56:58,720 --> 01:57:02,280
Speaker 2: assembly license, so they were just tempting fate for three years,

2079
01:57:02,440 --> 01:57:03,280
Speaker 2: almost three years.

2080
01:57:03,480 --> 01:57:05,240
Speaker 1: Not even three years. They didn't even make it a

2081
01:57:05,360 --> 01:57:06,800
Speaker 1: month or what. They screwed this up?

2082
01:57:06,840 --> 01:57:09,840
Speaker 2: Oh, I thought it was the total lifetime. It took

2083
01:57:09,880 --> 01:57:12,240
Speaker 2: them less than a month for the good City of

2084
01:57:12,320 --> 01:57:17,040
Speaker 2: New York Bing Bong to catch up with them. Stephen

2085
01:57:17,160 --> 01:57:19,880
Speaker 2: Ian simply forgot to apply for their twenty four hour

2086
01:57:19,960 --> 01:57:23,000
Speaker 2: catering license, much like gay bars in the nineteen sixties.

2087
01:57:23,040 --> 01:57:25,800
Speaker 2: The authorities had been watching them closely, fully expecting them

2088
01:57:25,840 --> 01:57:27,560
Speaker 2: to have a slip up of this nature, and the

2089
01:57:27,600 --> 01:57:29,680
Speaker 2: New York State Liquor Authority was ready to bust them

2090
01:57:29,680 --> 01:57:32,320
Speaker 2: the night that it had occurred. It wasn't just a fine.

2091
01:57:32,560 --> 01:57:35,600
Speaker 2: The club was invaded by thirty uniformed policemen. They was

2092
01:57:35,640 --> 01:57:37,520
Speaker 2: so over the top that bartenders assumed that they were

2093
01:57:37,560 --> 01:57:40,560
Speaker 2: just patrons in village people like costumes until they shut

2094
01:57:40,600 --> 01:57:43,320
Speaker 2: off the music, turned on the lights, and kicked everyone out.

2095
01:57:43,640 --> 01:57:46,360
Speaker 2: Rebell and Schreger got arrested, and, as Schreger said, from

2096
01:57:46,400 --> 01:57:49,680
Speaker 2: that moment on, we became a juice bar. They kept

2097
01:57:49,720 --> 01:57:52,440
Speaker 2: the place open for six months, selling juice while encouraging

2098
01:57:52,440 --> 01:57:55,000
Speaker 2: people to secretly bring their own bottles and mix themselves.

2099
01:57:56,480 --> 01:57:59,400
Speaker 1: Alcohol was actually not on the list of the.

2100
01:57:59,480 --> 01:58:04,960
Speaker 2: Highest and substances at Studio fifty four. The studio continued

2101
01:58:05,000 --> 01:58:07,920
Speaker 2: serving non alcoholic drinks exclusively until Justice for the New

2102
01:58:08,000 --> 01:58:11,520
Speaker 2: York Supreme Court ordered the New York State Liquor Authority

2103
01:58:11,560 --> 01:58:14,400
Speaker 2: to grant Studio fifty four a liquor licensed that October.

2104
01:58:15,600 --> 01:58:20,440
Speaker 2: The liquor board, God, there's so many acronyms. The NYSLA

2105
01:58:20,640 --> 01:58:25,280
Speaker 2: chairman's it's the New York State Liquors Or. State Liquor

2106
01:58:26,400 --> 01:58:29,760
Speaker 2: Authority complied with the Supreme Court ruling, but objected to it,

2107
01:58:29,880 --> 01:58:32,640
Speaker 2: claiming that the judge had been influenced by Studio fifty

2108
01:58:32,680 --> 01:58:35,919
Speaker 2: four's upscale clientele. But this was all only a preamble

2109
01:58:36,000 --> 01:58:39,200
Speaker 2: to an incident. On December fourteenth, nineteen seventy eight, when

2110
01:58:39,200 --> 01:58:42,080
Speaker 2: the club was raided by dozens of IRS agents with

2111
01:58:42,200 --> 01:58:45,160
Speaker 2: a warrant to investigate claims of fraud and income tax

2112
01:58:45,200 --> 01:58:48,880
Speaker 2: evasion in case the catering license anecdote didn't make this clear.

2113
01:58:49,200 --> 01:58:52,280
Speaker 2: Rubel and Schreeger were bad at being criminals, and even

2114
01:58:52,360 --> 01:58:55,880
Speaker 2: worse blatantly obvious about it. They openly bragged about the

2115
01:58:55,920 --> 01:58:59,000
Speaker 2: club's income, with Rubel saying during a TV interview, what

2116
01:58:59,160 --> 01:59:03,880
Speaker 2: the I R s doesn't know won't hurt them. What

2117
01:59:04,040 --> 01:59:08,760
Speaker 2: a fucking idiot. It is really amazing. How like that's

2118
01:59:08,920 --> 01:59:12,880
Speaker 2: like just man, the Dunning Kruger effect. Just dumb people

2119
01:59:13,720 --> 01:59:18,839
Speaker 2: just living their best life out of vainglorious arrogance.

2120
01:59:20,720 --> 01:59:21,920
Speaker 1: Oh, it gets worse.

2121
01:59:22,440 --> 01:59:24,440
Speaker 2: If you go to Harvard, they tell you not to

2122
01:59:24,520 --> 01:59:31,680
Speaker 2: do this stuff. They paid eight thousand dollars in taxes

2123
01:59:31,760 --> 01:59:36,920
Speaker 2: that year after taking in multiple millions. Rubel also gave

2124
01:59:36,960 --> 01:59:38,880
Speaker 2: an interview to New York Magazine in which he said

2125
01:59:39,240 --> 01:59:40,720
Speaker 2: profits are astronomical.

2126
01:59:41,160 --> 01:59:42,840
Speaker 1: Only the mafia does better.

2127
01:59:43,880 --> 01:59:46,760
Speaker 2: This proved to be the literal straw that broke the

2128
01:59:46,840 --> 01:59:49,720
Speaker 2: camel's back, and that it also probably did some cocaine

2129
01:59:49,760 --> 01:59:53,880
Speaker 2: through because a copy of that article was literally sent

2130
01:59:53,960 --> 01:59:58,920
Speaker 2: to the IRS with the quote underlined. Supposedly, a disgruntled

2131
01:59:58,960 --> 02:00:01,760
Speaker 2: former employee of this video contacted the IRS and told

2132
02:00:01,760 --> 02:00:04,680
Speaker 2: them that Rubelle and Schreger were skimming money and they

2133
02:00:04,760 --> 02:00:10,800
Speaker 2: were narrative voice shaker. In one year, they grossed.

2134
02:00:10,520 --> 02:00:14,480
Speaker 1: Three million and skimmed two point five million off the top,

2135
02:00:14,640 --> 02:00:17,480
Speaker 1: hiding their tracks with the classic two sets of books.

2136
02:00:17,560 --> 02:00:20,400
Speaker 1: Trick skimming, for those of you who've never seen a

2137
02:00:20,440 --> 02:00:22,680
Speaker 1: mob movie, is when money is taken home and not

2138
02:00:22,840 --> 02:00:25,760
Speaker 1: reported to the IRS to pay taxes on the.

2139
02:00:25,800 --> 02:00:28,040
Speaker 2: Only problem was that they hid a tremendous amount of

2140
02:00:28,120 --> 02:00:32,360
Speaker 2: undeclared cash on the premises, which isn't good when you're

2141
02:00:32,400 --> 02:00:35,960
Speaker 2: being investigated, since that tends to be the first place

2142
02:00:36,040 --> 02:00:42,200
Speaker 2: the IRS will look dipshits. Nightclubs are cash. Nightclubs are

2143
02:00:42,360 --> 02:00:45,520
Speaker 2: cash industry, and they had so many bills in their

2144
02:00:45,560 --> 02:00:48,840
Speaker 2: bar regis that would overflow and they literally couldn't close it,

2145
02:00:49,360 --> 02:00:51,720
Speaker 2: so they'd take the cash out every hour or so

2146
02:00:51,920 --> 02:00:55,040
Speaker 2: to empty it. Steve Bell wore a huge puffer coat

2147
02:00:55,080 --> 02:00:58,040
Speaker 2: that he had lined with cash, like a kid smuggling

2148
02:00:58,120 --> 02:01:01,919
Speaker 2: suits out of a candy shop. Each morning, massive portions

2149
02:01:01,920 --> 02:01:04,400
Speaker 2: of the previous night's take would be stuffed in garbage

2150
02:01:04,480 --> 02:01:08,480
Speaker 2: bags and hidden above ceiling panels, eventually smuggled home to

2151
02:01:08,600 --> 02:01:12,640
Speaker 2: Rebel's apartment and concealed in a secret room. All in all,

2152
02:01:12,920 --> 02:01:16,280
Speaker 2: it wasn't smart to openly brag about your egregious and

2153
02:01:16,480 --> 02:01:20,200
Speaker 2: poorly concealed crimes, and when one of their disgruntled ex

2154
02:01:20,240 --> 02:01:26,040
Speaker 2: employees tipped off the RS, the probable cause was quite probable.

2155
02:01:27,720 --> 02:01:30,080
Speaker 2: Studio fifty four was rated at nine thirty am on

2156
02:01:30,200 --> 02:01:33,600
Speaker 2: December fourteenth, nineteen seventy eight, somewhere between thirty and forty

2157
02:01:33,680 --> 02:01:36,720
Speaker 2: IRS agents knocked on the door, which was opened by

2158
02:01:36,760 --> 02:01:39,840
Speaker 2: the cleaning guy. Ian Schreeger showed up, was found to

2159
02:01:39,880 --> 02:01:42,240
Speaker 2: be in possession of an envelope of cocaine and was

2160
02:01:42,280 --> 02:01:45,560
Speaker 2: promptly arrested. In addition to finding large amounts of drugs

2161
02:01:45,600 --> 02:01:48,240
Speaker 2: and cash and garbage bags stuffed above the ceiling panels,

2162
02:01:48,600 --> 02:01:51,520
Speaker 2: the IRS came across two sets of books, one for

2163
02:01:51,600 --> 02:01:54,600
Speaker 2: the IRS and one for the three partners. They would

2164
02:01:54,640 --> 02:01:58,200
Speaker 2: literally write skim or sk which.

2165
02:01:58,080 --> 02:01:59,800
Speaker 1: Was helpful for the IRS.

2166
02:02:00,440 --> 02:02:03,040
Speaker 2: Ultimately, the books revealed that they'd taken eighty percent of

2167
02:02:03,120 --> 02:02:07,240
Speaker 2: the club's earnings. Schreger called it the Richard Nixon of skims.

2168
02:02:08,240 --> 02:02:11,640
Speaker 2: Rubelle apparently felt the same way. He greeted news cameras

2169
02:02:11,680 --> 02:02:14,160
Speaker 2: that day with a gleeful I feel like the President.

2170
02:02:16,520 --> 02:02:18,720
Speaker 2: This was one of the biggest busts in IRS history.

2171
02:02:19,040 --> 02:02:20,960
Speaker 2: One hundred thousand dollars in cash was found in the

2172
02:02:21,000 --> 02:02:23,920
Speaker 2: trunk of Steve's car and nine hundred thousand in a

2173
02:02:24,000 --> 02:02:28,280
Speaker 2: safety deposit box at citibank. These financial books also contained

2174
02:02:28,440 --> 02:02:32,240
Speaker 2: detailed entries for party favors for guests, which, as we'll discuss,

2175
02:02:32,480 --> 02:02:36,400
Speaker 2: led to some hilarious revelations. The books literally outlined exactly

2176
02:02:36,520 --> 02:02:40,000
Speaker 2: who was being given which drugs, and the FEDS also

2177
02:02:40,040 --> 02:02:45,040
Speaker 2: found hundreds of thousands of party favors drugs in a

2178
02:02:45,200 --> 02:02:48,120
Speaker 2: safe in the club's basement. What had begun as an

2179
02:02:48,120 --> 02:02:52,360
Speaker 2: investigation at tax evasion quickly spiraled into multiple felonies, and

2180
02:02:52,520 --> 02:02:57,160
Speaker 2: yet Rubel and Schreger's hutzpah was undimmed. When one of

2181
02:02:57,200 --> 02:02:59,480
Speaker 2: the IRS agents at the US Attorney's Office asked Rubell

2182
02:02:59,520 --> 02:03:01,640
Speaker 2: if they'd let him into Studio fifty four if they

2183
02:03:01,680 --> 02:03:06,040
Speaker 2: saw him waiting on the street, Steve replied, Nah, you're

2184
02:03:06,080 --> 02:03:06,960
Speaker 2: one of the gray people.

2185
02:03:09,840 --> 02:03:15,480
Speaker 1: The way you got to admire that to have just

2186
02:03:15,520 --> 02:03:21,760
Speaker 1: a fraction of that confidence in anything I do. This

2187
02:03:21,920 --> 02:03:23,880
Speaker 1: is one of my favorite stories of this episode. One

2188
02:03:23,960 --> 02:03:27,280
Speaker 1: of the many revelations found in the Party Favors book

2189
02:03:28,000 --> 02:03:30,360
Speaker 1: was a hilariously petty move on the part of the

2190
02:03:30,400 --> 02:03:34,560
Speaker 1: Studio fifty four owners. In August nineteen seventy eight, Steve

2191
02:03:34,600 --> 02:03:38,720
Speaker 1: Rebill celebrated Andy Warhol's fiftieth birthday by presenting him with

2192
02:03:38,800 --> 02:03:41,800
Speaker 1: a garbage can filled with one thousand dollars in crisp

2193
02:03:42,080 --> 02:03:46,560
Speaker 1: new one dollar bills. Warhol told his friends that it

2194
02:03:46,600 --> 02:03:49,720
Speaker 1: was the best present he'd ever received. In one especially

2195
02:03:49,800 --> 02:03:53,360
Speaker 1: playful moment, his friends tipped the garbage can over Warhol's

2196
02:03:53,440 --> 02:03:56,320
Speaker 1: head and showered him with the cash. He was not

2197
02:03:56,440 --> 02:03:58,720
Speaker 1: amused and got down on his hands and knees in

2198
02:03:58,800 --> 02:04:01,120
Speaker 1: a desperate attempt to collect all the bills.

2199
02:04:02,120 --> 02:04:02,880
Speaker 3: Studio fifty four.

2200
02:04:02,960 --> 02:04:05,880
Speaker 1: His bookies kept meticulous records of all these gifts, and

2201
02:04:06,080 --> 02:04:08,520
Speaker 1: after these records were seized by the irs, New York

2202
02:04:08,560 --> 02:04:12,280
Speaker 1: Magazine published a list of these party favors, and Warhol

2203
02:04:12,480 --> 02:04:16,000
Speaker 1: was shocked to discover that his pale of cash only

2204
02:04:16,120 --> 02:04:20,440
Speaker 1: contained eight hundred dollars and not a full thousands like

2205
02:04:20,600 --> 02:04:26,400
Speaker 1: he was told. Warhol colleague Bob Cachello wrote in his memoir,

2206
02:04:26,960 --> 02:04:30,640
Speaker 1: Andy's first reaction was, you mean they told me there

2207
02:04:30,760 --> 02:04:32,880
Speaker 1: was one thousand dollars in there and there was only

2208
02:04:32,960 --> 02:04:36,160
Speaker 1: eight hundred. Oh I knew I should have counted it.

2209
02:04:36,880 --> 02:04:37,960
Speaker 2: H true.

2210
02:04:37,960 --> 02:04:47,080
Speaker 1: Pittsburgh legend money before arc stevervilla And and Schrager spent

2211
02:04:47,200 --> 02:04:49,560
Speaker 1: a night in jail and will release the next morning

2212
02:04:49,640 --> 02:04:52,920
Speaker 1: on fifty thousand dollars bail apiece worked out by their lawyer,

2213
02:04:53,360 --> 02:04:58,720
Speaker 1: the legendary Roy Kohane, familiar to drama fans for being

2214
02:04:58,760 --> 02:05:01,880
Speaker 1: a character in play right Tony Kushner's epic Angels in

2215
02:05:01,960 --> 02:05:06,760
Speaker 1: America and No Fixer Well. He might have been Trump's

2216
02:05:06,800 --> 02:05:09,000
Speaker 1: lawyer in the eighties. He's probably one of the most

2217
02:05:09,000 --> 02:05:10,680
Speaker 1: famous lawyers of all time. He was known as the

2218
02:05:10,840 --> 02:05:14,760
Speaker 1: legal Executioner. He was the man who'd sent the Rosenbergs,

2219
02:05:14,920 --> 02:05:17,800
Speaker 1: Julius and Ethel Rosenberg to the electric chair in the fifties,

2220
02:05:18,200 --> 02:05:21,640
Speaker 1: and served as Senator Joe McCarthy's personal pit bowl during

2221
02:05:21,720 --> 02:05:24,760
Speaker 1: the Great Red Scare of the fifties before going on

2222
02:05:24,840 --> 02:05:27,000
Speaker 1: to be a lawyer for a number of heavy duty

2223
02:05:27,120 --> 02:05:30,640
Speaker 1: mob guys. Rebel and s Traeger were close to Roy Cone,

2224
02:05:30,680 --> 02:05:33,160
Speaker 1: even socially they threw him a birthday party at Studio

2225
02:05:33,240 --> 02:05:37,080
Speaker 1: fifty four, sending out invites that looked like subpoenas, which

2226
02:05:37,120 --> 02:05:40,920
Speaker 1: I appreciate. So this partially explains why the Studio fifty

2227
02:05:40,960 --> 02:05:43,760
Speaker 1: four guys acted with such impunity. With roy Cone on

2228
02:05:43,800 --> 02:05:47,640
Speaker 1: their side, they basically felt like gods. But they also

2229
02:05:48,200 --> 02:05:50,760
Speaker 1: put their schems money to good use because roy Cone

2230
02:05:51,320 --> 02:05:54,960
Speaker 1: was apparently just one of This might have been an exaggeration,

2231
02:05:55,120 --> 02:05:58,960
Speaker 1: but I've seen this number sided thirty seven lawyers that

2232
02:05:59,080 --> 02:06:02,000
Speaker 1: the owners of Studio fifty four hired to defend them.

2233
02:06:02,640 --> 02:06:05,200
Speaker 1: This included the guy who put Jimmy Hoffer in prison,

2234
02:06:05,640 --> 02:06:08,360
Speaker 1: the man who represented Attorney General John Mitchell at the

2235
02:06:08,400 --> 02:06:13,080
Speaker 1: Watergate trial, and to others. In an effort to get

2236
02:06:13,120 --> 02:06:15,680
Speaker 1: their clients out of this self created mess, they took

2237
02:06:15,720 --> 02:06:20,040
Speaker 1: the novel approach of going after the presidential administration, which

2238
02:06:20,160 --> 02:06:23,440
Speaker 1: is the legal equivalent of drop kicking a hornet's nest.

2239
02:06:24,160 --> 02:06:27,000
Speaker 1: They alleged that Jimmy Carter's White House Chief of Staff,

2240
02:06:27,120 --> 02:06:30,160
Speaker 1: Hamilton Jordan, had been one of the VIPs to partake

2241
02:06:30,200 --> 02:06:33,520
Speaker 1: in cocaine in Studio fifty four's basement, Though, as an

2242
02:06:33,640 --> 02:06:36,160
Speaker 1: article in People Magazine read at the time, not even

2243
02:06:36,240 --> 02:06:39,720
Speaker 1: Jordan's defenders deny his reputation as a party guer. This

2244
02:06:39,840 --> 02:06:44,200
Speaker 1: strategy backfired. No charges were brought against Hamilton Jordan, and

2245
02:06:44,360 --> 02:06:47,120
Speaker 1: now the President's office, the highest office in the land,

2246
02:06:47,880 --> 02:06:51,720
Speaker 1: was pissed at Rebel and Trager. George blue voyce, I

2247
02:06:51,800 --> 02:06:57,720
Speaker 1: have the worst attorneys. Why would you do that? Why

2248
02:06:58,120 --> 02:07:01,920
Speaker 1: I pick a fight with Yeah, you already have no

2249
02:07:02,160 --> 02:07:07,960
Speaker 1: leverage at all, Oh man, I don't know. On June

2250
02:07:07,960 --> 02:07:10,880
Speaker 1: twenty eighth, nineteen seventy nine, a grand jury indicted Rebel

2251
02:07:10,920 --> 02:07:14,480
Speaker 1: and s Traeger on twelve counts, including fraud, tax evasion,

2252
02:07:14,600 --> 02:07:19,800
Speaker 1: obstruction of justice, and conspiracy. One of the prosecutors couldn't

2253
02:07:19,800 --> 02:07:21,920
Speaker 1: believe that they had tried to get away was skimming

2254
02:07:22,000 --> 02:07:24,440
Speaker 1: eighty percent of their revenue, he said in a twenty

2255
02:07:24,520 --> 02:07:28,120
Speaker 1: seventeen documentary. In the thirty three months they were doing it,

2256
02:07:28,440 --> 02:07:30,560
Speaker 1: I think there was a skim of two point five

2257
02:07:30,680 --> 02:07:34,000
Speaker 1: or three million dollars, an astronomical amount of skim, which

2258
02:07:34,080 --> 02:07:38,080
Speaker 1: was ridiculous. If you're gonna skim, skim ten twenty percent,

2259
02:07:38,280 --> 02:07:42,720
Speaker 1: not eighty. They were being pigs about it. Maybe the

2260
02:07:42,880 --> 02:07:45,960
Speaker 1: RS guy was like, Okay, we know this happens, but yeah, Jesus,

2261
02:07:45,960 --> 02:07:48,800
Speaker 1: this was a bridge too far. Yeah, Rebel and Schrager

2262
02:07:48,920 --> 02:07:51,320
Speaker 1: was sentenced to three and a half years in prison,

2263
02:07:51,480 --> 02:07:54,840
Speaker 1: plus a fine of twenty thousand dollars. This was a

2264
02:07:55,040 --> 02:07:58,240
Speaker 1: very long sentence for first time offenders, but public sympathy

2265
02:07:58,400 --> 02:08:02,280
Speaker 1: was largely not in their favor, especially after what jerks

2266
02:08:02,280 --> 02:08:04,120
Speaker 1: they'd been to people on the street.

2267
02:08:04,560 --> 02:08:08,880
Speaker 2: All right, like yeah again, unbridled hubris, Yes people, people

2268
02:08:08,960 --> 02:08:11,920
Speaker 2: clapping as your wax wings felt, and Melton, you've fall

2269
02:08:11,960 --> 02:08:12,480
Speaker 2: into the sea.

2270
02:08:14,040 --> 02:08:16,960
Speaker 1: The overall sense was that these guys finally got what

2271
02:08:17,080 --> 02:08:20,000
Speaker 1: was coming to them. But before they were sent down river,

2272
02:08:20,480 --> 02:08:23,920
Speaker 1: they were determined to throw one final party, an epic

2273
02:08:24,040 --> 02:08:26,400
Speaker 1: going away bash that they intended to be the best

2274
02:08:26,480 --> 02:08:30,080
Speaker 1: party Studio fifty four had ever seen. Set for the

2275
02:08:30,160 --> 02:08:33,400
Speaker 1: evening of February second, just two days before they were

2276
02:08:33,440 --> 02:08:36,720
Speaker 1: two to start their prison sentence. The final blowout was

2277
02:08:36,800 --> 02:08:40,960
Speaker 1: billed as the end of modern day Gomorrah. The event

2278
02:08:41,040 --> 02:08:44,040
Speaker 1: list featured two thousand of Studio fifty four's most faithful,

2279
02:08:44,120 --> 02:08:51,400
Speaker 1: including Richard gear Halston, Jack Nicholson, Reggie Jackson, Calvin Kleine,

2280
02:08:51,800 --> 02:08:56,560
Speaker 1: Andy Warhol, who I guess forgave them for the short

2281
02:08:56,680 --> 02:09:00,640
Speaker 1: two dollars and as Yeah, Sylvester Stallone, who I can't

2282
02:09:00,680 --> 02:09:05,360
Speaker 1: really imagine. At fifty four and Laurna left, Diana Ross

2283
02:09:05,400 --> 02:09:08,400
Speaker 1: serenaded the owners from the DJ booth, and Laura's sister

2284
02:09:08,560 --> 02:09:11,920
Speaker 1: Liza Minelli saying New York, New York to them. Steve

2285
02:09:11,960 --> 02:09:14,760
Speaker 1: Rebell got into the Sinatra spirit by wearing a fedora

2286
02:09:14,960 --> 02:09:18,080
Speaker 1: and playing My Way over and over and over again,

2287
02:09:18,320 --> 02:09:21,879
Speaker 1: along with I Will Survive, both of which he drunkenly

2288
02:09:21,960 --> 02:09:25,160
Speaker 1: warbled along to. He also gave a speech from a

2289
02:09:25,200 --> 02:09:29,160
Speaker 1: mechanical platform high above the dance floor, hilariously framing his

2290
02:09:29,280 --> 02:09:33,680
Speaker 1: nightclub and subsequent's financial fraud as a noble act. Steve

2291
02:09:33,800 --> 02:09:36,160
Speaker 1: was coked out of his mind, remembered one in attendance.

2292
02:09:38,640 --> 02:09:41,200
Speaker 1: Bianca was hugging him and he was saying, I love

2293
02:09:41,280 --> 02:09:43,080
Speaker 1: you people. I don't know what I'm going to do

2294
02:09:43,160 --> 02:09:47,280
Speaker 1: without studio, and everyone was crying and weeping. The moon

2295
02:09:47,400 --> 02:09:50,320
Speaker 1: with the spoon came down and everyone cheered as Steve

2296
02:09:50,480 --> 02:09:53,760
Speaker 1: kept playing My Way and I Will Survive over and

2297
02:09:53,960 --> 02:10:00,840
Speaker 1: over until the dawn came hunting. Whatever happened to the moon,

2298
02:10:02,560 --> 02:10:05,600
Speaker 1: I don't know, believe me, I've looked into it. I

2299
02:10:05,760 --> 02:10:09,440
Speaker 1: know that hard Rock bought. There was a Sun that

2300
02:10:09,720 --> 02:10:13,720
Speaker 1: didn't have any drug paraphernalia with it. I actually interviewed

2301
02:10:13,760 --> 02:10:17,200
Speaker 1: one of the hard Rock cafe historians and they said

2302
02:10:17,200 --> 02:10:20,280
Speaker 1: that hard Rock decline to purchase the Moon with a spoon.

2303
02:10:20,400 --> 02:10:22,040
Speaker 2: I don't know where it is now. I'd very much

2304
02:10:22,120 --> 02:10:25,480
Speaker 2: like to know if you were a loved one. The

2305
02:10:25,600 --> 02:10:28,000
Speaker 2: morning after the party ended, Rebel and Schreger were taken

2306
02:10:28,040 --> 02:10:32,040
Speaker 2: to Manhattan's Downtown Correctional Facility, the d Rigger spot for

2307
02:10:32,160 --> 02:10:36,480
Speaker 2: New York's hottest white collar criminals, where Jeffrey Epstein is

2308
02:10:36,520 --> 02:10:42,160
Speaker 2: found dead allegedly of suicide nearly forty years later. The

2309
02:10:42,320 --> 02:10:44,600
Speaker 2: Rebel and Schreeger vowed to keep Studio fifty four open

2310
02:10:44,640 --> 02:10:47,120
Speaker 2: while they served their time. It immediately became apparent that

2311
02:10:47,200 --> 02:10:50,520
Speaker 2: things were not the same. Their legal and financial problems

2312
02:10:50,640 --> 02:10:54,000
Speaker 2: also continued to mount. After the IRS bus, it became

2313
02:10:54,080 --> 02:10:56,360
Speaker 2: open season on the pair, and as soon as judges

2314
02:10:56,360 --> 02:10:58,680
Speaker 2: saw Studio fifty four in the briefings, it was basically

2315
02:10:58,680 --> 02:11:02,160
Speaker 2: an open and shut case. Some people even sued because

2316
02:11:02,160 --> 02:11:05,120
Speaker 2: the dorman had been mean to them. They lost their

2317
02:11:05,160 --> 02:11:07,080
Speaker 2: liquor license because the state of New York doesn't give

2318
02:11:07,120 --> 02:11:09,680
Speaker 2: them to convicted felons, and with all their offenses, it

2319
02:11:09,720 --> 02:11:11,920
Speaker 2: would cost somewhere in the neighborhood of a million dollars

2320
02:11:12,000 --> 02:11:15,879
Speaker 2: in insurance each year to keep the place open. Ultimately,

2321
02:11:15,960 --> 02:11:18,080
Speaker 2: they sold Studio fifty four while they were in prison,

2322
02:11:18,200 --> 02:11:21,120
Speaker 2: despite Rebel's insistence that he never would. One of the

2323
02:11:21,120 --> 02:11:24,240
Speaker 2: people interested in buying Studio fifty four was reportedly Dick Clark,

2324
02:11:24,440 --> 02:11:30,600
Speaker 2: which lol lmao. After a lot of complicated legal wrangling,

2325
02:11:30,680 --> 02:11:32,920
Speaker 2: the likes of which is not very interesting, the club

2326
02:11:32,960 --> 02:11:35,440
Speaker 2: wound up in the control of restaurant tour Mark Fleischmann,

2327
02:11:35,440 --> 02:11:37,400
Speaker 2: who did the deal with Rubel and Scheger in jail

2328
02:11:37,440 --> 02:11:40,360
Speaker 2: for four point seventy five million. They would stay on

2329
02:11:40,440 --> 02:11:43,800
Speaker 2: as glorified consultants, but their involvement from then on was minimal.

2330
02:11:44,680 --> 02:11:47,040
Speaker 2: Fleischman was quoted as saying, I just wanted to make

2331
02:11:47,080 --> 02:11:49,200
Speaker 2: the place look straight and make it look reasonable and

2332
02:11:49,280 --> 02:11:52,640
Speaker 2: not so far out and not so illegal looking, thus

2333
02:11:53,560 --> 02:11:55,280
Speaker 2: robbing it of all of its appeal.

2334
02:11:56,120 --> 02:11:59,200
Speaker 1: But also a fairly low bar for a club owner.

2335
02:11:59,520 --> 02:12:02,640
Speaker 1: True tru two things canna be true at the same time.

2336
02:12:02,840 --> 02:12:05,440
Speaker 2: Yeah, everyone agreed that it had lost its luster, both

2337
02:12:05,440 --> 02:12:07,680
Speaker 2: because it lacked the audacity of Rebel and Schreger and

2338
02:12:07,960 --> 02:12:10,680
Speaker 2: you know, changing tastes as the me decade turned into

2339
02:12:10,680 --> 02:12:14,360
Speaker 2: the yuppie eighties. Case in Point, nineteen eighty two, radical

2340
02:12:14,440 --> 02:12:19,320
Speaker 2: social activist Jerry Rubin started hosting Business Networking Salons, a

2341
02:12:19,440 --> 02:12:23,320
Speaker 2: networking event for business people at the club on Wednesday nights.

2342
02:12:23,560 --> 02:12:27,440
Speaker 2: Jerry Rubin one of the original yippies alongside Abbey hobby.

2343
02:12:28,680 --> 02:12:28,880
Speaker 1: Oi.

2344
02:12:30,480 --> 02:12:32,360
Speaker 2: Prospective guests would only be admitted if they had a

2345
02:12:32,400 --> 02:12:36,080
Speaker 2: business card, which is not a bit from American Psycho,

2346
02:12:36,200 --> 02:12:38,880
Speaker 2: but sure seems like one disco had died at the

2347
02:12:38,920 --> 02:12:41,040
Speaker 2: dawn of the eighties and hip New Yorkers now looked

2348
02:12:41,120 --> 02:12:44,200
Speaker 2: downtown for their nightlife. Studio fifty four passed through a

2349
02:12:44,200 --> 02:12:46,040
Speaker 2: handful of owners, and by nineteen eighty nine it was

2350
02:12:46,040 --> 02:12:48,800
Speaker 2: a shell of its former self, with peeling paint and

2351
02:12:48,920 --> 02:12:52,120
Speaker 2: a dropped ceiling covering the famous dome. It's like that

2352
02:12:53,360 --> 02:12:56,839
Speaker 2: CVS on green Point Avenue, that is, or Manhattan Avenue

2353
02:12:56,880 --> 02:12:58,200
Speaker 2: in green Point that used to be a disco.

2354
02:12:58,880 --> 02:13:02,680
Speaker 1: I just walked by. Yes, it's been like completely redone sad.

2355
02:13:03,200 --> 02:13:05,680
Speaker 2: Oh were they maybe making it into or are it's

2356
02:13:05,720 --> 02:13:07,720
Speaker 2: still a CVS or they're making it in No, it's.

2357
02:13:07,640 --> 02:13:09,880
Speaker 1: Like it's like a shell. Now it's just like it

2358
02:13:09,920 --> 02:13:11,960
Speaker 1: looks like a building facade. You can like look all

2359
02:13:12,000 --> 02:13:12,520
Speaker 1: the way through it.

2360
02:13:12,640 --> 02:13:12,760
Speaker 3: Now.

2361
02:13:13,160 --> 02:13:16,720
Speaker 1: They cleared it out, they gutted it and said ultimately.

2362
02:13:16,880 --> 02:13:19,200
Speaker 2: Studio fifty four was leased to the owners of the

2363
02:13:19,280 --> 02:13:22,720
Speaker 2: Ritz Nightclub, who relocated their club there, and clubs have

2364
02:13:22,840 --> 02:13:25,480
Speaker 2: operated at the venue under various names until nineteen ninety six,

2365
02:13:25,600 --> 02:13:27,920
Speaker 2: when it underwent a conversion back to a theater, which

2366
02:13:27,960 --> 02:13:29,320
Speaker 2: it has been since nineteen ninety eight.

2367
02:13:29,920 --> 02:13:31,880
Speaker 1: It is currently gearing up for production of the.

2368
02:13:31,880 --> 02:13:35,560
Speaker 2: New musical Days of Wine and Roses, a bittersweet coda

2369
02:13:36,760 --> 02:13:40,000
Speaker 2: and then Everyone Died. Steve and Ian were released from

2370
02:13:40,040 --> 02:13:42,600
Speaker 2: prison in April of nineteen eighty one after serving just

2371
02:13:42,720 --> 02:13:45,839
Speaker 2: fourteen months. They'd been given a reduced sentence in exchange

2372
02:13:45,880 --> 02:13:48,440
Speaker 2: for cooperating with the government and other tax evasion cases,

2373
02:13:48,840 --> 02:13:54,320
Speaker 2: in short, turning rat a classic Roy Khan defense technique.

2374
02:13:54,400 --> 02:13:57,160
Speaker 2: This was also the guy who helped preside over the

2375
02:13:57,240 --> 02:14:03,040
Speaker 2: House Investigation American activities in the nineteen fifties, and as

2376
02:14:03,080 --> 02:14:06,040
Speaker 2: a result, their reputation took a hit. The prison sentence

2377
02:14:06,080 --> 02:14:08,800
Speaker 2: probably didn't help ether They tried their hand at opening

2378
02:14:08,800 --> 02:14:11,880
Speaker 2: another club down on fourteenth Street called the Palladium. It

2379
02:14:11,960 --> 02:14:14,080
Speaker 2: did become a popular hotspot for new wave acts and

2380
02:14:14,160 --> 02:14:17,320
Speaker 2: downtown New York artists like Boscot and Keith Herring, but

2381
02:14:17,440 --> 02:14:20,160
Speaker 2: the exuberant hedonism of the disco era was hampered by

2382
02:14:20,200 --> 02:14:22,720
Speaker 2: the scourge of AIDS, which decimated the scene that had

2383
02:14:22,800 --> 02:14:25,880
Speaker 2: hung out at Studio fifty four. It claimed the lives

2384
02:14:25,920 --> 02:14:28,040
Speaker 2: of at least half of the bartenders and most of

2385
02:14:28,080 --> 02:14:30,320
Speaker 2: the set designers, not to mention many of the guests.

2386
02:14:30,680 --> 02:14:33,920
Speaker 2: Halston diedes of complication from AIDS, as did Studio fifty

2387
02:14:33,920 --> 02:14:37,360
Speaker 2: four's notorious attorney, Roy Kahan, so did the club's host,

2388
02:14:37,520 --> 02:14:40,640
Speaker 2: Joe Remy, and ultimately so did Steve Rubel, who died

2389
02:14:40,680 --> 02:14:42,960
Speaker 2: in July nineteen eighty nine at the age of forty five.

2390
02:14:43,600 --> 02:14:45,800
Speaker 2: Rubelt was closeted most of his life, and his cause

2391
02:14:45,840 --> 02:14:48,600
Speaker 2: of death was reported at the time as hepatitis and

2392
02:14:48,680 --> 02:14:51,840
Speaker 2: septic shock. He was given the diagnosis by his brother,

2393
02:14:52,000 --> 02:14:54,760
Speaker 2: a physician, and they agreed not to tell their parents

2394
02:14:55,000 --> 02:14:59,280
Speaker 2: and by extension, the public, the truth. His funeral featured

2395
02:14:59,520 --> 02:15:05,360
Speaker 2: miniature velvet ropes, which, fitting his gravestone, is emblazoned with

2396
02:15:05,440 --> 02:15:10,000
Speaker 2: the phrase the quintessential New Yorker Ian Schrager meanwhile became

2397
02:15:10,040 --> 02:15:12,600
Speaker 2: one of the premier developers of hotels in the country,

2398
02:15:13,160 --> 02:15:17,640
Speaker 2: and on January seventeenth, twenty seventeen, he received a presidential

2399
02:15:17,800 --> 02:15:19,760
Speaker 2: pardon from President Barack Obama.

2400
02:15:25,080 --> 02:15:32,919
Speaker 1: This country a bizarre end to a bizarre story. In America,

2401
02:15:33,000 --> 02:15:35,840
Speaker 1: your ability to throw a good party trumpsaw.

2402
02:15:37,040 --> 02:15:37,200
Speaker 3: You know.

2403
02:15:37,640 --> 02:15:39,320
Speaker 1: I touched on this at the start of the episode.

2404
02:15:39,360 --> 02:15:41,600
Speaker 1: I have to admit my feelings about Studio fifty four

2405
02:15:41,760 --> 02:15:45,480
Speaker 1: shifted the more I learned about it for this episode. Initially,

2406
02:15:45,600 --> 02:15:47,120
Speaker 1: I thought this was just gonna be an excuse to

2407
02:15:47,200 --> 02:15:50,480
Speaker 1: tell tales of absurd and off obscene, decadentes and depravity

2408
02:15:50,480 --> 02:15:51,840
Speaker 1: among the rich and obnoxious.

2409
02:15:52,000 --> 02:15:52,760
Speaker 3: And we had that.

2410
02:15:52,920 --> 02:15:56,120
Speaker 1: We certainly had that, especially especially in the last hour.

2411
02:15:57,160 --> 02:15:59,520
Speaker 1: But learning about the scenes roots in the post Stone

2412
02:15:59,560 --> 02:16:02,280
Speaker 1: Wall law parties and seeing what a haven fifty four

2413
02:16:02,520 --> 02:16:06,320
Speaker 1: was for an extremely wide demographic of often disenfranchised people

2414
02:16:06,840 --> 02:16:10,000
Speaker 1: made me rethink a lot of my cynical preconceptions about

2415
02:16:10,000 --> 02:16:13,560
Speaker 1: the club and dis misiviews of disco. It may have

2416
02:16:13,640 --> 02:16:16,960
Speaker 1: been naive and irresponsible, but for many, Studio of fifty

2417
02:16:17,000 --> 02:16:19,840
Speaker 1: four was emblematic of an all too fleeting era of

2418
02:16:20,000 --> 02:16:24,760
Speaker 1: freedom without fear, fear of legal persecution, fear of sexual diseases,

2419
02:16:24,880 --> 02:16:28,200
Speaker 1: fear of drug addictions, fear of social judgment, and all

2420
02:16:28,240 --> 02:16:31,920
Speaker 1: the insanity was an offshoot of that giddy, giddy feeling

2421
02:16:32,080 --> 02:16:35,880
Speaker 1: before the advent of AIDS, crack and the social regressions

2422
02:16:35,920 --> 02:16:39,760
Speaker 1: of Reagan's America. Journalist Michael Musto ends an e true

2423
02:16:39,800 --> 02:16:43,000
Speaker 1: Hollywood story doc on Studio fifty four by saying, we

2424
02:16:43,120 --> 02:16:46,400
Speaker 1: knew it couldn't last forever. It had doom written on

2425
02:16:46,600 --> 02:16:54,640
Speaker 1: every piece of glitter. Nothing that fabulous could last forever, right,

2426
02:16:55,280 --> 02:17:04,000
Speaker 1: Housto just got mustad, folks, And Bianca Jagger was there

2427
02:17:07,800 --> 02:17:12,560
Speaker 1: on a horse, and the horse was also present. That

2428
02:17:12,680 --> 02:17:13,640
Speaker 1: horse got turned into.

2429
02:17:13,520 --> 02:17:22,600
Speaker 2: Glue use on the envelope to the subpoena Sunrise, Sunset,

2430
02:17:23,040 --> 02:17:26,800
Speaker 2: the Circle of Life and so forth. Folks, thank you

2431
02:17:26,879 --> 02:17:28,520
Speaker 2: for listening. This has been too much information.

2432
02:17:28,879 --> 02:17:31,720
Speaker 1: I'm Alex Heigel and I'm Jordan Runtalg. We'll get you

2433
02:17:31,879 --> 02:17:39,920
Speaker 1: next time. Too Much Information was a production of iHeart Radio.

2434
02:17:40,200 --> 02:17:43,400
Speaker 1: The show's executive producers are Noel Brown and Jordan Runtalk.

2435
02:17:43,600 --> 02:17:46,000
Speaker 1: The show's supervising producer is Michael Alder.

2436
02:17:46,120 --> 02:17:49,320
Speaker 2: June, the show was researched, written and hosted by Jordan

2437
02:17:49,400 --> 02:17:50,959
Speaker 2: run Talk and Alex Heigel.

2438
02:17:50,800 --> 02:17:54,000
Speaker 1: With original music by Seth Applebaum and the Ghost Funk Orchestra.

2439
02:17:54,360 --> 02:17:56,400
Speaker 1: If you like what you heard, please subscribe and leave

2440
02:17:56,480 --> 02:17:59,400
Speaker 1: us a review. For more podcasts on iHeartRadio, visit the

2441
02:17:59,440 --> 02:18:02,560
Speaker 1: iHeartRadio you app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to

2442
02:18:02,600 --> 02:18:03,480
Speaker 1: your favorite shows.