Club founders Steve Rubell and Ian Schrager provided premium guests with premium cocaine and spent up to $100,000 on a single nights party decor. Since then, the photographer said, there's never been another club like it, though many have tried to recapture the spirit (including Rubell and Schrager, who opened the nightclub Palladium after their stints in jail). Marc Benecke, doorman for the disco club, would stand on a stepping stool and select club candidates from the crowd. AsOZYnotes, disco was getting big, the drugs flowed freely, and the AIDS epidemic hadn't yet turned casual, unprotected sex into a death sentence. Once I get down, I can't get off the floor. Exclusively men, it's unclear if any of them owned a shirt. What was your approach to turning someone away? Beyond Studio 54's velvet ropes, beauty thrived. Dustin Pittman was one of many photographers who entered the hallowed grounds of, The storied celebrity photos that shaped Hollywood. Feds had previously discovered $600,000 in garbage bags, 300 quaalude pills, and cocaine during a raid of the club. Studio 54 was the first club that worked with a strict door policy. I have heard that, yes! Im not even going to attempt to convert that to 2021 dollars, but was that a lot of money for the industry and the job?No not really, I was making more working at McMullens. But, like so many creatives, he found such a traditional job confining and decided he had a better idea, which he presented to the club's owner after less than one shift. View of an animated Man in the Moon and Spoon lighted sign at Studio 54, New York, New York, May 9, 1978. People told me theyd say, I cant write this, and hed say, Oh, of course you can. I think that was a huge part of the allure, that people felt comfortable [at the Factory]. People would dance, get to know each other, do a little coke, and then go up to the balcony because it was an old theater, you could hardly see up there and hook up. The law was willing to look the other way on that stuff. Warhol was known to capture the spirit of the era, and all of his friends, through snapshots on instant film. One year, we spent $50,000 transforming the main entrance hall into a haunted mansion that included live monsters jumping out at our guests as they made their way across rickety bridges through a graveyard, while howling and other very strange loud noises played in the background. Describing one party, former model Kevin Haley told Vanity Fair in 1996, As you came up the ramp in the foyer, you looked through little windows into little booths with midgets doing things. If Benecke granted you entry, you were whisked through the Corridor of Joy, a long hallway echoing screams of happiness before partygoers melted into the eye of the disco storm, Studio 54s dance floor. Nile Rodgers on Writing 'Le Freak,' Grace Jones, and the Disco Backlash. Halloween was always the biggest night of the year, drawing crowds of over 2,500, recalled Fleischman. It was kind of a celebration of people from the arts, dance, fashion, music, theater, entertainment, the gay world; this incredible mix of Manhattanites in the late 70s, before the AIDS epidemic basically wiped out at least half of the creative people in New York. Schrager was all business, happy to stay behind the scenes and run things that way. Nancy Neimeth - book-keeper. ", What makes a man? This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google In this video (warning: strong language), recorded in 1982, the host introduces the act as "the world premiere of [record label] Sire recording artist Madonna!" He could have been so generous and spending so much, and he just wasnt. Watch on. It was like a hipster version of a Studio 54 doorman. The scale went from $30 to $250 (she told New York Magazine Alice Cooper was worth $60 while Sylvester Stallone was $80), with $250 bonuses if pictures of the stars at Studio 54 made the papers. 2hrs. And where it was okay, where it was welcomed. It was a short window of excess, wedged in just before the AIDS epidemic took hold. Of course you had a lot of people burning out and most unfortunately, a whole lot of people died. We negotiated for a week or two and then one night, at 10 oclock, I put on my black velvet pants and my white Capezio jazz shoes and an old double-breasted dinner jacket. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our User Agreement and Privacy Policy and Cookie Statement and Your California Privacy Rights. "When you walked in the front door, not only did you get the sound of the disco music, the smell of sex and taste the sweat, but you got the smell of all those live gardinias. Knowing his time was coming to an end and not wanting to die suffering, the former bouncer invited some of his closest friends to his apartment, including Madonna, who joined by telephone (viaNew York Magazine). It was like a hipster version of a Studio 54 doorman. . Whats the orb for? He said he had to explain to Valentino why he was doing it that way. In front is famous artist Andy Warhol. What were we thinking?, Steve Rubell and Diana Ross went up to control central, the DJ boothDiana Ross began to sing out over the crowd. George Kennedy: [ singing ]"All the hip joints knew my face. ), Hey, he said after my stunned pause, you asked., Nothing could shock me anymore, added Gaines, whose book Simply Halston is the basis for Netflixs limited series starring Ewan McGregor as the late fashion designer. "My style is the Andy Warhol Polaroid school of photography," Pittman said of the artist's influence on his work. The stockbrokers were all doing cocaine. It had to be later than 1976 because Studio 54 didn't open until 1977. There were people that were just flat-out fabulous, that would get in no matter what. Miestorm, who got the nickname "Lenny 54," got the best job in the world a paid partygoer. Actor Al Corley was a doorman during the late 1970s. By the next night, he was put behind the bar when another guy called in sick. The former opera house-turned-television studio became a playground for dancing, drugs, sex and diamond dust during the nightclub's brief but meteoric rise, before founders Steve Rubell and Ian Schrager were jailed for tax evasion and the studio closed its doors. I do! But he had a distant cousin who was hired to be bouncer at Studio 54, and after having lunch together one day, they wandered over. Bobby (touching his face) and Steve Rubell (foreground) in the 2018 Netflix Documentary, Studio 54. I tripped the light with Jackie O. I danced all night with Brooke and Bo. He tipped off the IRS and the IRS pounced." This was like a different person. So I was hired, and I was paid $625 a week. Now, people used to tip us occasionally on the way out, and my tips often came in cocaine and quaaludes. There was a lot of media, especially on nights when there were parties, like when Dolly Parton showed up we had decorated the inside of the club like a barnyard, there were animals, bales of hay. I brought these questions to Robert Bobby Sheridan, who worked the door at Studio 54, alongside Marc Benecke, from just after its opening to around the time of the bust, in 1979. But at Studio, it was limitedPaloma Picasso used to go there, Salvador Dal. In fact, it was a free-for-all for stars and partygoers alike. It was New Year's Eve, 1977. The doomsday mom, who wanted to rid the world of zombies, is accused of murdering two of her children. (It involved bodily fluids expelled competitively in the Studio 54 basement. I think about 54 as the end of the 60s, in a way. This is what it was like to work at Studio 54. CARMEN D'ALESSIO, 59 Then: Public Relations. . (The downside the drugs became a serious problem until he finally realized years later he needed to sober up.). So you didnt want to let anybody in who you thought might approach a celebrity, might hassle gay people, anything like that. Opened by Steve Rubell and Ian Schrager in 1977the same year Saturday Night Fever came outtheres never been a club like it since, with celebrities, socialites and scene- makers clamoring for a ticket in. The former editor of Interview, Bob Colacello, said of Studio 54, "Even if you weren't having sex with someone every night, you felt like you could.". Studio 54 is a Broadway theater and a former disco nightclub at 254 West 54th Street in the Midtown Manhattan neighborhood of New York City. I grew up in the West Village, in the late fifties and sixties, when this area . Steve introduced me to Andy Warhol, and Andy wouldnt let go of my hand. Steve had this passion for Diana. Weve been on this long journey to figure out what happiness is. May 22 2021 05:00 AM. Wed see them coming a half a block away and they already were not going to get in. And Montaug was one of the victims,dying from the disease in 1991 (via The New York Times). Since everyone knew, at least vaguely, what was up, this made it easy for an unhappy employee, mad about his treatment by the club, to squeal to the feds. But most celebrities knew there would be paparazzi there, and they could be on Page Six the next day. Andy Warhol was one of the few well-known artists in the world [that came to Studio 54]. This article originally appeared on Vogue US. There were a lot of ordinary people eking out a living in Manhattan, going out to have fun, but they knew what the club was about and they knew it was about acceptance and celebration. What Halstons been most upset about in the Studio 54 bust is that the IRS agents discovered another little room that nobody knew about, and Halston is hurt because hes such a close friend and Steve hadnt told him about it., After Jen Shahs Arrest, How Can We Keep Enjoying Real Housewives? Barry Jenkins on Bringing The Underground Railroad to TV How Swimming With Sharks Tried to Warn Us About Scott Rudin Quil Lemonss 2021 Vanity Fair Oscar Portraits Andrew McCarthy on Pretty in Pink and the Brat Pack The 2021 Oscar Ceremony Was a Noble, Doomed Experiment Elliot Page Finally Feels Able to Just Exist From the Archive: The Unsinkable Jennifer Aniston. I wasnt good at that, because in some ways Im naturally shy. Surrounded by those he loved, he swallowed five barbiturate pills intending to overdose. I'm going to entertain your guests. To an extent. I have the 12" of the Dana & Gene version - I haven't listened to it in years though. Sally Lippman, also known as "Disco Sally", was a 77-year-old widow and regular . Benecke wanted to be a lawyer, according to the Edition Broadsheet. Rubell had the waiters dressed up like Pilgrims and he was serving turkey, recalled Warhol in his published diaries. In the three short years of Studio 54s heyday, Marc Benecke was who you had to get past to enjoy the hedonistic other side. Were you interested in the club scene then? "I'm the most important person to talk to." According to the modest Peruvian, she brought . To revist this article, visit My Profile, then View saved stories. It was as important to be onPage Six as it is today. The bartenders at McMullens were making $800 or $900 a week, because it was so successful. Privacy Policy and She sent out some invites, and opening night saw big names like Cher, Henry Winkler, JFK Jr., and Warren Beatty show up. According to The Independent, he said that he "sometimes" took them up on it. Realizing you really could pay for publicity like that, the job of celebrity wrangler was born. All rights reserved. But no one ever came with anybody other than themselves and whomever they were with. There were the front of house employees who danced around with the celebrities, then there were the people on the business side behind the scenes, who actually worked a real job to make the club a success. Perhaps it was the blank slate Benecke offered that Rubell liked. The last place you want to eat meat from is a discotheque, but later I saw Stevie eating the turkey, too, so I guess it was okay., For Christmas, according to Inside Studio 54, Schrager put together disco-appropriate holiday gifts: baggies of cocaineeach one had a ribbon on it, along with cards addressed to such famous names as Calvin Klein, Bianca Jagger, Andy Warhol, Halston, and so on., The night before Rubell and Schrager went to prison for corporate tax evasion, the duo threw a party at which Rubell wore a Frank Sinatrastyle fedora and serenaded the club with I Did It My Way. When I look back at it now, Schrager said in 2018s Studio 54 documentary, it was so preposterous. He had every single song in his car., Ross prodded an even more trashed Rubell into singing himself. You met amazing people you knew that you were at the epicenter of something really remarkable. Madonna And The Beastie Boys Owe Their Career To A Studio 54 Doorman. Steve wanted a salad of people, is what I keep reading.A lot of wealthy people were there and a lot of celebrities, but there were a lot of kids who were busboys at restaurants in the Village who had a great look. And Studio 54 doorman Marc Benecke as his witness, looking the part above the neck went a long way. Beyond being just the bouncer, he was also the gatekeeper for the "look" of the club, and anyone who didn't fit his definition of what that look was would find themselves at the end of the line. Are there maybe, lets say, surprising celebrity interactions that stick out in your mind?Yeah. For a nightclub that only lasted a few years and closed more than four decades ago, the strength of Studio 54's sustained cultural influence astonishes me. I was having lunch with him and he was like, What are you doing the rest of the day, howd you like to come over to this new club were doing security for? We walked over there and I got interviewed by Steve Rubell. Marc Benecke, center, a Studio 54 doorman. Are there dress-code tips, tricks?People ask this all the time, who got in, what was it? Sometimes the stars would even come hide out in the coat check room to relax a bit outside of the craziness of the club. A Black teen in Kansas City was shot when he went to the wrong house to pick up his siblings. The busboys were running around in tiny shorts, for goodness sake. If there was already a similar type like you inside, you could easily be refused at the door. Thats really what happened. In just a minute, I want to go back to the secret language at the door.Well, we would identify certain people that we wouldnt let in, like we would say, BBQ house party if, say, eight straight white guys dressed like John Travolta showed up at the door. I said, Hi, Rod, and he walked in. IRS agents raided Studio 54 on December 14th, 1978, seizing garage bags of cash, financial documents and five ounces of cocaine. As OZY reports, they, too, appeared in a Montaug-managed revue, although there appears to be no footage of this on the internet. We went up to the balcony and just sat and talked, I told him about my background. While the other bartenders danced at the end of the night, he took out the trash and swept up. Anything went, as long as no one got hurt. According to New York Magazine, Lenny Miestorm was a teenaged art student who grew up on a farm and one of the original hires at Studio 54. As Taylor gamely cut a good luck slice from the buttercream bosom, Warner fled the paparazzi., A dozen well-endowed hunks, naked but for sequined posing-pouches, and some with joints dangling from the corners of their mouths, scattered gardenia petals in the couples path as they entered,wrote Taylor biographer David Bret in The Lady, The Lover, The Legend. (This interview has been edited and condensed for length and clarity.). I was right behind him, and he got on the floor and they put his album on.