 If New York’s five boroughs, Staten Island has always held a particular fascination for me. It’s the one that everyone forgets about, floating out there on its own. Even the things we most associate with the island—garbage dumps, guidos, the ferry—seem like they belong more to a suburb than to an actual part of New York City.
But since it is a part of the city, I was intent on finding a gay bar on Staten Island and going to check it out. A cursory search yielded a bunch of closed establishments and out-of-service phone numbers, so I went where any good gay boy goes when looking for other queers in an unknown area: Craigslist.
I find a promising post and chat with a nice gentleman who alerts me to the opening of a new gay bar, the only one on the island, he says, called Club 718, which just opened February 9. Bingo.
I can’t find a web site or even a phone number for the club, but I do find a MySpace page—the vehicle of startup promoters everywhere. I find their address and some testimonials from locals who had a blast at the opening a few days before.
The only thing left to do is get there, so I rope my friend Sam into driving from Manhattan and enlist my friend Ray, always up for a good adventure, for moral support. Armed with our trusty MapQuest directions, we’re off to Staten Island to check out the newly minted establishment the Saturday after it opened.
Our journey to the fifth borough involves a tunnel into Brooklyn and then the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge, and it’s quite a pleasant one until we spot a garbage barge in the water as we cross the bridge.
Once we’re over the bridge, the first thing we do, of course, is get lost. We pull into a gas station and Sam approaches someone to ask directions.
Before Sam can open his mouth, the man asks, “Do you know how to get to MLK Boulevard?”
“No. Do you know how to find Midland Avenue?” Sam replies. They do not, but another motorist gives us sketchy directions telling us we’re going in the wrong direction.
Ten minutes and some tricky navigating later (what, Staten Island is too good for a grid?) and we’re back on course, driving past small houses huddled too close together and strange-looking duplexes with frosted glass doors and garages on the ground level. It feels like we’re driving through the opening credits of The Sopranos.
Finally we find the right address, but are thrown off by the large neon sign reading “Hotel” on the side of the building. We park the car on the street—deserted except for one guy shivering and smoking while waiting for the bus—and approach the brown stucco building.
There’s a strip of yellow plastic “Grand Opening” flags stretched across a fence near an open door. So far, so good. Inside, however, is another story. It looks like a banquet hall with a dance floor placed over a carpet, a DJ set up on a folding table, some cheap swirling lights and a handful of adults standing around the edge of the dance floor. If a high school dance were held where only the chaperones showed up, this is exactly how it would look.
I ask the bouncer if this is Club 718, praying we’re somehow in the wrong place. He directs me to the woman selling tickets and I repeat the question.
“No, that’s downstairs,” she says. “But it’s not open yet,” she adds.
“Really?” I ask. “It’s almost midnight. When is it going to open?”
“No, it isn’t going to open for another few months,” she says.
“Oh,” I say, perplexed. “Weren’t they open last weekend?”
“I guess so,” she says. “But they ain’t open now.”
I thank her and tell the boys behind me. On the way back to the car, we notice that the black awning stretched across the entrance leading to the basement says “Club 718” but the white lettering has been covered over with black spray paint.
There’s nothing left for us to do but turn around and join the rest of the bridge-and-tunnel crowd now streaming into Manhattan looking for a bona fide good time.
The next day, I check my MySpace page for news from my new “friend” Club 718 and find a bulletin they posted the previous afternoon saying, “We decided to close the club until we get everything together…We have a few minor things to take care of.” From other postings it seems that a liquor license may have been one of those minor things. I tried to reach the owner via MySpace and I get a phone number, but my calls weren’t returned by press time.
With my curiosity about the Island satisfied, this friend of Dorothy will remember the famous phrase: “There’s no place like home.”
 The Bronx is Up
Everyone knows you have to head to the Bronx to go to New York City’s biggest Zoo or a Yankees game, but there’s more to the Bronx than baboons, bears and baseball. Here are five other things that have us hopping a subway that goes so far uptown, you’re in an entirely different borough.
BRONX COMMUNITY PRIDE CENTER
448 E 149th St, 2nd Floor, 718-292-4368, BronxPride.org
The official gay community center of the Bronx offers everything from dance classes to discussion groups. What’s more, The Spot Next Door is the only drop-in center for gay youth in the entire borough. A full schedule of programs is on the Center’s web site.
CLUB VIDa
3206 Third Ave, PolarisBomb2005@aol.com
Host Polaris Bomb cultivates two gay nights at this hot spot: Da Bomb Wednesdays and Magic Stick Saturdays. A mixed crowd of both men and women means you’ll find plenty of hot urban gays and local cuties out for a night on the town. DJ Rico spins at both event and specializes in house, hip-hop, R&B and Raggaeton.
Strange Fruits
StrangeFruits.tv
Imagine Dynasty with none of the production budget and parts played by drag queens and you’ll have this long-running BronxNet Public Access show about the sprawling story about Miss Bebe Montana and her various hangers on. Episodes air on BronxNet Saturdays at 11pm; check the web site for more air dates and recent episodes.
Bronx Academy of arts and dance
841 Barretto St, 2nd Floor, 718-842-5223,
BronxAcademyofArtsandDance.org
A 70-seat performance space dedicated to producing work by women, people of color and queer artists, BAAD! was founded 10 years ago in a space that used to be a sewing room. Stop by in March for their BAAD! Ass Women Festival or in June for their all-gay, month-long Out Like That program.
Woodlawn Cemetery
Webster Ave at E 233 St, TheWoodlawnCemetery.org
Sure, it may sound a little Goth, but this 400-acre graveyard is home to some of the most elaborate and inventive mausoleums and grave markers anywhere in the world. Weekends bring walking tours of notable sites (including the resting places of jazz greats), lectures and even outdoor concerts.
|
