Gerard Renny, former bouncer at Studio 54, now owns Ethyl's bar at Higher East Facet.
Stefano Giovannini
Studio 54 could possibly be an actual zoo.
Although many had been turned away on the door of the late, nice NYC icon — which opened 45 years in the past April 26, 1977 — loads of animals managed to get in.
“The dwell leopard was my favourite — a pair introduced it in on a leash,” recalled Gerard Renny, who landed a gig working safety at Studio 54 when he was simply 18. “They stated I might pet it and wanted to maintain company away from it.”
“I suppose I used to be its bouncer-bodyguard that evening,” stated Renny, 63, an Higher East Sider who's now director of operations on the ‘70s-themed watering gap Ethyl’s.
There was additionally a snake — the plus one in all one other visitor — slithering on the bar one evening.
“I received referred to as in to come back to the primary bar as a result of somebody stated there was a boa constrictor there,” stated Chuck Garelick, who was 19 when he began as the top of safety at Studio in 1977. “It turned out to not be … however it was a really massive, very lengthy snake that somebody had introduced of their bag.”
However some animals gained entry on the orders of membership house owners Steve Rubell and Ian Schrager.
“There was one Halloween the place the entrance foyer was adorned as a enjoyable home, and it had a maze on the ground that was lined in plexiglass, and there will need to have been a pair hundred white mice,” stated Garelick, 64, who now lives in Union Sq. and is a safety govt.
“It was all blacklights, so that they put a stripe of UV paint [on the mice]. After we cleared that out, they had been round that place for a very long time. We had white mice operating round for months,” he stated.
Issues received slightly fishy on Valentine’s Day in 1979, when administration put in steel fish ponds within the foyer.
That evening, a fireplace at a unique Manhattan membership sparked shock FDNY inspections. They ordered the membership to do away with the goldfish-filled ponds.
“So a bucket brigade was shaped with every kind of employees, safety and the busboys — who on the time had been carrying brief shorts, sneakers, no shirts and angel wings,” Garelick recalled.
“We poured [the ponds] proper onto 54th Road, not even desirous about the goldfish,” he stated. “It was actually chilly that evening, and after we left that morning, there have been frozen goldfish all around the curb.”
The membership shut down in 1980 after the founders had been convicted of evading taxes, and operated beneath new possession from 1981 to 1986. Ex-Studio staff — who name themselves the “Class of 54” — are gathering at Ethyl’s on April 24 for an anniversary and reunion celebration. Some recalled bringing their very own pets previous the velvet ropes.
“Throughout the day should you labored at Studio you possibly can convey your canine to work,” stated Myra Scheer, who was in her mid-twenties when she labored as govt assistant to Rubell and Schrager,
There was a trio of canines — Scheer’s English shepherd Mateus; Pal, a setter who belonged to Neil Wilson on the tech crew; and Pepe, a chow that belonged to Studio’s personal celebration booker, Shay Knuth — that had free reign.
Scheer, 71, who now co-hosts “The Marc and Myra Present” on Sirius’ Studio 54 Radio, stated, “Essentially the most glamorous, unique place in New York Metropolis at evening had three common canines that roamed the dance flooring.”
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