Kup's Chicago - Irv Kupcinet [87]
No sampling of night life would be complete without a visit to a Rush Street night club. One of the most popular is Mister Kelly’s.
This Chicago showcase for comedians Mort Sahl, Shelley Berman, Bob Newhart, Shecky Greene, and other leading entertainers, is nearing its tenth anniversary as a small but outstanding center of good food, good music, and good entertainment. Owners George and Oscar Marienthal, the city’s (and probably the nation’s) foremost team of café operators, also own three other places: the London House, famous for its fine steaks and jazz; the Happy Medium, an upstairs-downstairs theater night club; and the Brief Encounter, a daytime coffee shop.
Then there is Al Segal’s Living Room (which was formerly The Tradewinds); Easy Street, a “hole-inthe-wall” club in an alley, presided over by the jovial “mayor” of Rush Street, Johnny Jonassen; The Gate of Horn, a leading folk-music cabaret; Bourbon Street, featuring Dixieland music by such groups as Bob Scobey’s band; and two places which feature the Twist – the Scene and Rumpus Room – where the customers, flinging themselves in wild abandon, provide a floor show that few professional entertainers can match.
There is also The French Village, a picturesque complex of clubs in Tooker Alley just off Rush, complete with iron grillwork and other French touches. The Village includes Le Bistro, which features an intimate combo, Basin Street, where the music is jazz, and Kismet, which offers Egyptian belly-dancers in an Arabian Nights setting. On South Michigan Avenue (“Boul Mich”) there is The Blue Angel, which was first to introduce calypso to this country.
No recitation of Chicago night life would be complete without special mention of the Club Alabam, on Rush Street near Chicago Avenue. This is the nation’s oldest night club continuously operated under one management. Owner Gene Harris recently observed his thirty-sixth year of doing business at the same stand. The Club Alabam hasn’t changed in decor in all those thirty-six years. And Harris deadpans that his floor shows are the “world’s worst.” There is a reason behind his derogation.
“We always have catered to a fun-loving group,” he says. “In the early days, it was millionaires who wanted to get out “on the town.” The millionaires are gone today, but we still have many of our old-time customers. And they like to get rowdy, sing out loud, walk across the stage during the floor show, and call out to one another. You can’t do that with high-priced talent. Some of them won’t even let you serve during a performance. So our policy is to hire the kind of entertainers who don’t mind these little interferences. And what kind of acts permit this? That’s why I say, and say it proudly, we have the world’s worst floor show. My customers come first, the entertainers second.”
The Club Alabam floor shows aren’t that bad, of course. But the customer and his shenanigans do come first with Gene Harris and woe to any performer who insists on “quiet” while working.
Something old and something new help make the Alabam one of Chicago’s more popular joints. The “old” is a private upstairs room that seldom closes. Here the most prominent persons in town “relax” in comfort and privacy. The “new” is an upgrading of the food, supervised by maître d’ Art Carter. The Alabam’s floor show may be the “world’s worst,” but its food ranks with the finest.
Along with at least one Rush Street club you will also want to visit a cabaret featuring the improvisational satire for which Chicago has become famous. Best known is The Second City, located in a renovated building on North Wells near Lincoln Park. New revues are introduced here several times a year, and it was one of these, From the Second City, that moved on to New York and, after a brief run on Broadway, settled in an off-Broadway house for a longer period.
Equally successful has been the