THE GOLDEN ERA OF RAW MEAT

I'm generally not sentimental about New York's endlessly changing landscape, especially the gay landscape.   As a native, you learn at a very early age to not become too attached to any nightlife landmark or "in" neighborhood, especially on the gay scene.  But there was a time when meat was packed in Manhattan's Meatpacking District both by butchers in the warehouses and queers between the trucks; and when the work was done there was always a good cut of beef grilling behind the counter at Restaurant Florent.  The meatpackers are gone, both in the warehouses and between the trucks, and now at long last Florent will also pass into the mists of New York gay history, and I am sad.

You learn to derive pleasure and satisfaction from pointing knowingly and fondly at the Emigrant Savings Bank on Second Avenue near 6th Street, smiling and remembering that it used to be The Saint, the world's most famous gay disco, the Adam and Eve of circuit parties.  And before it was The Saint it was the East Coast ground zero of rock & roll, Fillmore East.

You notice a persistent irregularity in the middle of 14th Street and wonder if it's caused by a buried rail from the old trolley car you rode as a kid.  You stumble out of a chic art gallery on West Broadway and recall how SoHo was not so long ago one of the city's most crime-plagued neighborhoods.  The check comes to your table in an exclusive Lower East Side restaurant on Stanton Street and you smile at the fact that the check is three times the amount your grandmother paid for rent in that very same building some half a century earlier.

New York memories of what used to be are sweetened by the fact that the extraordinary rate of change in New York helps fuel the fierce creative energy and even frenzy that is uniquely us.

And as quickly as things change in the mainstream, it is nothing compared to the blinding speed of gay change.

I loved Wonder Bar, Crowbar, Uncle Charlie's, XL, Champs, Star Sapphire, Universal Bar & Grill and Rounds.  Area, Roxy, Mars, Palladium (my personal favorite and today an NYU Residence), Exit, Sound Factory (1 and 2), Private Eyes (my other personal favorite), The Men's Room, Boy's Room, Zone DK, Save The Robots.  I won't even bother with the long list of bath houses and burlesque cum whore houses.

All gone.  The era of huge warehouses converted into vast pulsating gay clubs housing 5,000 sweating bodies gyrating to the music of Junior--all gone.  Dungeons with dirt floors and beer blasts under far west side motels.  All gone.

You learn to deal with it and move on. 

But Florent still stood.  Defying the odds and standing as an anchor for club kids, bears, twinks, yellow hankie lefts, bikers, politicos, activists, fashionistas, Chelsea muscle boys, transgender and transvestite hookers, drag queens, celebrities ranging from Bjork to Roy Lichtenstein to Keanu Reeves to Calvin Klein (when he wasn't down the street at the Anvil or the Lure), writers, poets, rough trade hustlers and edgy francophiles, Florent was the ultimate destination at 4 in the morning as the Ex waned and the appetite grew, for a 4 PM Sunday brunch or just a casual weeknight dinner at 2 AM with friends.  In so many ways nothing was more New York gay edgy than Florent.  Too small, always packed but somehow always able to shove you into a corner and stuff your face with damned good food.

The closing of Florent after 23 years (that's 161 in dogs years and 230 in New York gay years) hurts. 

Bastille Day in the Meatpacking district will never be the same.

Among other things, Florent was also mostly a tourist free zone.  Broken street lamps, outrageous street walkers and rotting meat (when the butchers were still there) kept the tourists and B&T crowd far away.  The owner of Florent, Florent referred to it as his "velvet rope". If customers were too timid to brave the spooky world of Gansevoort Street, they didn't deserve to enjoy the pleasures of Florent's cuisine and ambiance.

Here's a profile of Florent from an old copy of New York Magazine:

Since Florent rarely closes for longer than it takes the staff to change clothes and fix their makeup, there's almost no excuse for winding up in the Empire Diner. For almost two decades, in a space as disarmingly charming as its owner, Florent has been the original meat-market destination, the archetypal version of a Les Halles coffee shop that doesn't exist anywhere in France. At any time, fragrant mussels, dense boudin noir, or a free-range chicken is available for not much more than you'd pay for grilled cheese in a greasy spoon. What's more, there's no drunk in the next booth singing along with Sinatra's "Come Fly With Me." Added bonus: Florent Morellet is the patron saint of the meatpacking district. His diligence in fighting for the integrity of this neighborhood, people with HIV/aids, the High Line, the right to die, and gay rights, among other causes, is humbling. And his annual Bastille Day party is more fun than anything they throw in Paris. Support his restaurant, because most likely he supports you and people you love.

Every gay New Yorker worth the salt on a Margarita has a Florent memory--at least one.  Sure, I remember taking a piss behind a potted palm in the VIP lounge at Roxy because the bathroom lines were just too fucking long.  And I fondly remember holding court in the Palladium balcony surrounded by gorgeous young gay boys who were convinced by too many doses of Ex that I was Sean Connery; and I was high enough to thoroughly enjoy the game and pour on the brogue; but somehow Florent memories have more depth and durability.  Things happened at Florent that moved life forward.

In 1990 something, my friends ganged up on me and insisted that I drag it up for Wigstock.  I resisted but finally promised to do "something".  This now sadly defunct annual street fair tribute to New York drag required that everyone do something: wear a wig, a frock, Max Factor, something.  After much self-imposed and anal compulsive anxiety, I settled on dynasty-length Chinese red artificial fingernails to counter balance my unbreakable habit of wearing button down Brooks Brothers shirts, khakis and penny loafers (albeit hand made by J.M. Weston.)

After two days of abysmal attempts to master the art of applying artificial nails, including one awful bout with Krazy Glue, I finally succeeded in perfect nails extending in all their shiny sparkly red glory more than a curved inch beyond natural.

But then we had a crisis.

An urgent call to my friend Barry had him rushing over to my apartment when I realized I was physically incapable of dressing myself thanks to my new fabulousness.  Couldn't button my shirt, pull up my zipper, thread or buckle my belt.  The endlessly long fingernails stood between me and basic functioning.

Barry saved me.  Barry dressed me.  I kissed him on the cheek.  "Thank you, Mommy."

And off we went to Wigstock, myself in preppy glory with the red fingernails of a Chinese Empress, Barry in some awful synthetic Cher wig.  Tacky.

Surprisingly, the juxtaposition of my otherwise Brook Brothers demeanor and the nails were a huge hit.  Complements flew, I scored phone numbers and the envy of my bewigged (so cliche) friends.  But after a long afternoon in the hot sun, we decided a good meal was in order before the the evening drag shows.

"We'll never get a table in Florent, the line will extend all the way to Jersey."  Of course, we did.  Even if boys had to sit in the laps of other boys, Florent provided service.

And then came another crisis.  The bladder had endured enough denial and backed me into a corner: hit the toilet line or piss my pants.  I had dreaded this moment more than my Selective Service physical in 1966.

It was a simple and yet overwhelming problem.  I could neither unbuckle nor unzip my own pants.  Barry understood my problem and was willing to unzip me before I headed for the line, but I was not about to stand on a long line in the middle of a packed restaurant full of gay men with my fly open.  Sure, if this had been Zone DK and 3 in the morning things would have been different, but context is everything, n'est-ce pas?

I convinced myself that somehow I would solve this in the privacy of the small one toilet toilet.  I was a man and men can solve any problem on their own; which is why we don't ask for directions.

As I stood on line, contemplating the possibility of letting urine discretely run down my leg in the hope that no one would notice, I furiously worked to map out a zipper opening or pants dropping battle plan.  I may have been cursing under breath.

I felt a tap on my shoulder.

I turned my head to find a Latino god towering over my 5 foot 11 inch self.  Tanned, tank topped, shoulders that would have spanned the Grand Canyon and just enough muscle to not look too gym body, he said:  "You OK?  You seemed stressed out."

I laughed, showed him my nails and muttered something about trying to figure out how to pull down my zipper and pull out my dick so that I could piss the mother of all pisses.

"Want my help?"  I expected a hot tip on how to manage a zipper with dynasty-length artificial finger nails, instead he offered to join me in the toilet, pull down my zipper, pull out my dick, aim it so that I could pee, give it that ever important final squeeze and shake and then tuck it carefully back into my Egyptian cotton boxers.

Not taking him seriously, I of course agreed, assuming it was a flirt and nothing more.  When my turn arrived, I opened the door and my lord and savior locked stepped and we crowded into the small room together.  I consider screaming for help; perhaps he intended to rape me.  (Damn, I knew I should have douched!) But I remained passive giving myself and the fate of my bladder up to him.

The conversation was sparse, including my involuntary orgasm moan. (I'm loud; can't stop myself.)

He pressed up against my back, reached around, pulled down my zipper and pulled out my erection.  "I can't pee like this," I said. "Yes you can."  His left hand slid under my shirt so that he could work my nipple.  He used his tongue on my ear and jerked me off into the toilet.  He waited patiently until I was finally able to  pee.  I had never before nor ever since urinated while another man held my penis, adding to the profound richness of this particular Florent memory.

My dick back in my pants, zipped up, we traded places. I offered to reciprocate. He declined but invited me to watch.  Have you ever seen the movie "The Thirst"?  Enough said, but I satisfied myself with the view.

He washed his hands and we exited the toilet.  Lord knows what they were thinking but they sure had been hearing.  The entire restaurant was looking our way and broke into applause.  Fucking great.  I had to be an involuntary moaner.  Oh well.  Ah, Florent.  I should have been embarrassed beyond comprehension, but the ham in me (some would say pig) kicked in so I bowed, agreed to sign autographs after lunch and wove my way through the crowd of adoring fans back to my table.  Florent himself came over to our table to inform us that lunch was on the house. He thanked me for providing entertainment and complemented me on my nails saying,"Very clever...better than any pick up line I've ever used."

My savior waved to me from the door as he disappeared into the street crowds never to be seen again.  I thought: "Oh well, we'll always have the toilet."

Restaurant Florent on Gansevoort Street was not just unique, it somehow conferred  uniqueness on its patrons.  Florent not only permitted chaos, he demanded it, especially on Bastille Day when Florent would mysteriously disappear only to be replaced by Mary Antoinette in full court dress.

 

Until very recently Gansevoort was one of those streets cabs couldn't find and tourists couldn't imagine.  It was world of gay s&m sex clubs: The Anvil, Jay's, The Lure; but today we have Sex and the City tours and the uber chic Hotel Gansevoort drawing the "in" crowd from the four chic corners of the earth.

This new hotel describes itself as "New York's first urban luxury resort that transformed the Meatpacking District from gritty to chic"--and put Florent out of business, not on its own, but as Florent is an icon of the old Meatpacking district, Hotel Gansevoort is an icon of the new.

Almost 23 years ago a young Frenchman named Florent Morellet, the youngest son of the conceptual artist François Morellet, took over a diner named the R & L on Gansevoort Street.  In Paris he had owned a little restaurant, which had lost more than a little money, and he made friends promise not to let him open a restaurant again. They let him down.

He didn’t do much to the R & L’s proudly grungy looks, keeping the long Formica lunch counter on one side. He put his first name--the restaurant’s name--in pink neon in the front window. He constructed a menu of French standards and American classics served 24/7: onion soup, mussels, pâté, steak frites, hamburgers, cheeseburgers. And he created an institution that became both a timeline and a time capsule of downtown life.

Nestled among meatpacking plants and hard-core gay bars, Florent was an anomalously egalitarian enclave beloved in equal measure by celebrities on the A list and hedonists on the edge, and a prism through which certain aspects of the city’s evolution could be seen with unusual clarity.

On June 29 Florent will close. Its rent was to rise to more than $30,000 a month.  The 54-year old Florent started out paying $1,350.

Florent's father had a major show at the Brooklyn Museum, a retrospective, in February of ’85, and the young man organized a huge party for him, assembling a guest list of over 3,000 New Yorkers.  The party was a huge success and Florent saw no reason for it to end...so within  very short time, he opened his restaurant and the museum crowd followed.  They followed him into one of the city's most fringe neighborhoods.

"I knew people would follow me wherever I would open a restaurant. I didn’t have to open on Main Street. I could open on a back street, which I wanted to do because it’s kind of more exciting, and also a lot cheaper, Florent recently told The New York Times.

"I went many nights to the Anvil, the Mine Shaft. At 2, 3, 4 o’clock in the morning you came out into an explosion of life, of light, of noise, of traffic jams, trucks honking, meatpackers yelling, “Hey, Tony, move your truck!” And the transgender hookers: “Hey, baby, you want to come have fun?” And showing a lot of their private parts.

You’d come out and just go: “Oh, gosh! I’m so happy to live in New York!”

Opening night was in late August 1985. We didn’t tell anybody for the first week. We just called friends. And it did build up very quickly."

And now, once again, all we will have are our fond memories of boudin noir, cum and Marie Antoinette with a penis.

The final five weeks of the restaurant’s existence, beginning this week, will be marked with decorations, events and performances that reflect a new theme each week. The themes will be taken from the Kübler-Ross stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and, finally, acceptance.

But I can't imagine ever accepting this:

Shoot me in the head. NOW.

Comments

[Alex form Germany]

I can hold the revolver, if you need a hand.

[Alan down in Florida]

As Brooklyn born and raised I can certainly understand the constant turnover of pieces of our past as they continue to (as Joni Mitchell said) "pave paradise and put up a parking lot."

I drive 45 minutes once a month to Fort Lauderdale now for a gay book discussion group and I am amazed, bewildered and saddened how from one month to the next whole blocks disappear.

Even in the smallish town I live in the downtown area (very gay) is rapidly gentrifying to the degree that things seem to disappear overnight. My therapist and I continually discuss my feelings that the world is moving on and leaving me behind.