How did you find out about the Gaiety?

[camshaft9]

RE: Just Curious

 

I'm a pioneer from the early 1980's. Always used the $1.00 coupon

from the Village Voice. It seems that Denise was there at the time.

I kinda remember 2 women working the door. Maybe it was the drugs.

There was always a cat prowling around, and free coffee. Two dancers

from the Madonna book are Joey Stephano and Rocky (a G favorite).

And yes, that facist Guiliani was responsible for the clean-up. It's no surprise that he sold his soul to Bush. 4 months at the end of 2001 didn't make up for the other 7 1/2 years.x(

[+ bigjoey]

RE: Just Curious

 

my first trip to the gaiety resulted from reading an article in vanity fair about the place; it talked about the SEX book and had a few pictures. i had seen the old posted pictures outside the place in the 80's but would never go in. somehow after reading the story and walking around the entrance several times (people must have thought i was a picket) i darted inside.this was about 1992.

 

it took me several trips to figure out what was going on inside the side room. a poen star, corey evans was on stage and i thought he was the most beautiful man i had ever seen (no one like him in my high school or college gym class). i did not have the courage to talk to him but just hand him a $20.00 bill in the side room and say "you put on the best show" and immediately run out of the theater; those were the first words as a gay person i had ever said to anyone. later i came back (i did not understand that men were not always on stage) and a movie was playing; corey was sitting in the side room alone and recognized me and patted the seat next to him and said come and sit down. he invited me to a "private" (not sure of the cost or what would happen) and then added: "nothing that hurts or causes pain" (that was a relief).

 

we ended up going back to his room at the milford plaza where i had my first male sex. i was blown away. while i have not seen corey in a long time (but do have his videos and magizine pictures) i am still friendly with his room mate and "brother" (so billed at the time) jessie tyler. they say you never forget your "first" and i'll always remember corey (i flew him out to my home many times for weekends and we did some traveling together to hawaii, los vegas, etc.) he was my exclusive sexual partner for a year and was an interesting way to be introduced to the gay world.

[mansor47]

I first went to the Gaiety in 1976 lured by an ad I saw in the Village Voice. I was living in the foothills of the Canadian Rockies at the time. As part of the American Bicentennial celebration, Greyhound had a promo that allowed you to go anywhere in the continental US for two weeks for something like $75. The farthest south I went was Washington DC where I went to see the Hope diamond and the Columbus exhibit at the Smithsonian and watched loops of Brentwood early gay porn in the peepshow parlours. Next stop was NY where after roaming the halls of the Metropolitan by day I then made my visits of the Adonis at night where I watched a movie called Reflections of Youth starring Big Bill Eld. I then went in to check out the Follies a couple of blocks up from the Gaiety where pretty much the same thing was happening.

 

I do not recall clearly going back to the Gaiety until the beginning of 1980 when a trip to NY became a semi-annual event for me. Denise was alreay “manning” the box office at that time. In one of the lulls of interest in the movie being shown, I left the theater area and took a seat in the lounge where I noticed that some customers were disappearing into the woodwork with some of the performers so I asked this older gentleman beside me what was going on in there and his reply was an emphatic “prostitution.” This man became my first Gaiety friend that same night and taught me a lot of things about life and therefore about being gay. After the first finale he offered to show me the village where we hopped from one gay bar to another and finally ended the evening in his book-and-antiques-filled apartment on Christopher Street. He introduced me to the Loeb classics (red for Latin and green for Greek) and the works of Marguerite Yourcenar and Mary Renault. The following day, a Saturday, we met again at the lounge and he encouraged me to try a private show with a dancer from Cuba named Alexander who reminded me of Praxiteles’ Apollo with the young Dyonisius. Never have I experienced so much joy for $35 and so much sadness afterward when a few weeks later I received from Mark, my new older gentleman friend, an ever so discreet note to let me know that Alexander was killed, knifed in his room.

 

On my subsequent trips to NY, I notified Mark of my schedule and we set a pattern that we would adhere to up until 1983 when Tom, the boy living with him, called me up in Toronto to let me know of his passing. At that time you could allow them to stamp the back of your hand when you paid your entrance to get re-entry priviledge so you can kind of shuttle back and forth between shows. Mark and Josephine would meet me outside the Gaiety and have an early dinner in a restaurant close by. Proceed to the Follies, take in the show there which customarily included some star from the porn they were currently showing. The most coveted seats of course were along the aisle since the dancers left the stage and moved up and down it and allowed you to literally reach out and touch the stars at their points. After the first show at the Follies we would walk as fast as we could to catch the first finale at the Gaiety which would just then be starting. Josephine by the way is the black guy with the paperbag who appeared like a permanent fixture of the lounge at that time much like Sam, the Thai later on. As it turned out , he worked as a messenger and lived with his mother on very meager resources. Mark treated him kindly and bought him dinner and paid for his entrance for both the Follies and the Gaiety every Saturday. The dancers in turn were kind and open to Mark. Our friendship was purely platonic and as far as I know so was his relationship with Tom, the Gaiety dancer that he “adopted.”

 

The Gaiety attracted quite a cross section of society for its audience, the blue stockinged along with the low-lifes and for its performers, an assortment of beautiful youngmen passing through NY making their way to adulthood. I can accurately claim that I met many of my refined and caring friends there if not certainly my most intensely pleasurable encounters although understandably enough, I remember the colourful characters much more vividly. One very cold winter night, a few of the dancers complained of being hungry to Mark so he handed one of the regulars a twenty to go and fetch some hamburger. He came back half an hour later licking his chaps but empty-handed. He claimed he ate all of the hamburgers on his way back.

 

I moved to live and work in Toronto in 1983 so my NY trips became even more frequent. I usually stayed at the Carter Hotel on 43rd Street which at that time already hovered too close and too long to the bottom of its decline. As my income improved though, I started staying at the Marriott Marquis if just for its proximity to the Gaiety only venturing farther away from that hub of my activities when their rates started unaffordably doubling and trebling almost overnight. As I made more friends at the Gaiety, we invariably ended our evening circuit with a trip to Rounds, specially after the Follies finally closed (must be early 1985.) The unbeatable accessability and convenience of the Gaiety backstage (and the almost unbearable excitement of the chase at Rounds for that matter) alas both ended when they ushered in Giuliani as mayor. A lot of my older cultivated friends will always bemoan the barbaric razing of the old Pennsylvania Station and someother such architectural monuments of NY and will always mourn their loss. But as for me, the Gaiety is a precious vestige of what I now perpetually miss in my heart, Rounds, the Ninth Circle, Haymarket, Show World, Cats, Stella’s, the Adonis and Eros, the New York locale of my youth. Perhaps Proust is right about there being no paradise except paradise lost.

[williewanker2]

I first went to the Gaiety in the early 70's while a student. One day the theatre was not busy and I was the only patron in the lounge area. A cute muscular dancer was laying in shorts on the carpeted platform while his buddy gave him a blow job. I suspect that this was mostly to attract customers for a private. I nervously negotiated a private with him and his buddy for a very reasonable price, probably less than $30. As a student, I could not afford much I am shocked at what the dancers charge now.

 

As others have said, you could go with a dancer behind the stage to a narrow private space between the interior walls of the theatre and the exterior wall with windows overlooking the street. To do so, I went with the two boys through the door that still exists into the dancers' area, walked around the back of the stage where at least one dancer was jacking off while looking at porn in order to go back out for his second number, and into the narrow private space. I would have given anything to stay back there and watch the dancers get ready for their second numbers.

 

In the small dark area, the buddy continued his blow job while I engaged in muscle worship and self abuse. When I was about ready to cum, the dancer told me to point in another direction because he did not want to get his shorts dirty. It was brief but still the highlight of my early sex life.

[+ Lucky]

It was about 1980. My high school teacher had invited me to Fire Island. TWA lost my luggage, but I didn't need many clothes there. We went to one of the bars where a hustler tried to pick him up for $500. The next day we went into the City and made it to the G. There was the same hustler, dancing, and now available for a backroom quickie for thirtie dollars! We turned him down. I never did see the backroom there.

[Guest CTguy]

My first time at the Gaiety was back in 1984. I was just out of college working at my first job in Ohio and my first time living away form home. I hated the job and quit after 6 months. I still had a couple of weeks left on my apt lease so I decided to take a trip out to New York. My first time on a plane and first time to New York. I remember before leaving a friend telling me to check out this strip club where the guys are hot and they take everything off, that definately peaked my interest }( I stayed at the Edison Hotel, not sure if its still there, but lo and behold it was right down the street from the strip club the Gaiety, how convenient. I immediately went there and thought I was in heaven with all the gorgeous guys on stage. At that time it seemed like the majority of the guys dancing were the type I like, young boyish looking with smooth toned bodies but not too muscular and all with huge cocks. I remember during the finale when they all came out with hardons I got so excited I came in my pants right in my seat :+ and I wasn't even touching myself. I had no idea what private shows were at that time and probably would have been too scared to do one but needless to say I still had a great time. A few years later I moved to CT and going to the Gaiety in New York was the first thing I did. By now I was a little more experienced and remember talking to a dancer who was a cute southern boy. He asked me if I was interested in going to the back, I said YES, and he took me through the back door into the locker area where all the dancers were hanging out and then into a small hallway behind the stage. We kissed stroked each other's cocks and he got me off, I gave him $20 and left with a big smile on my face.

[ValleyDwellerNorth]

memories

 

In case people want to continue to share I bumped this thread up. Some really great stories here!

[Cooper]

RE: memories

 

Where else to learn about Gaiety but from the patrons who have supported it over the years. Great stories and wonderful memories.

[mysterymr]

A few years back my best friend called and asked to come over so we could talk which in itself was not unusual but I sensed something was up just by the excitement in his voice. When he arrived I could tell by the look on his face that he was dying to get something off his chest. I could also tell that this was not bad news by any means, his eyes were lit up like a kid on Christmas morning.

 

We sat on the deck and had coffee as he began to tell me about this place in the city that he had secretly been frequenting. You would have thought he won the f'in lottery the way he smiled as he spoke of The Gaiety. This was much more than the usual kid in a candy store analogy, this was more like a coke fiend who just inherited all of Columbia and most of Peru. He told me how there were 12 strippers in one nights act and that they would each do one fast song to tease you a little and then come out all greased up with baby oil, saluting the audience to a slow song that seemed to last all night.

He told me that some of these dancers were porn stars and some were just natural performers. He let me know early on that even though you could not touch any of the dancers while they were on stage it didn't matter because the really good ones were able to seduce you with their eyes and convince you that even though there were 40 some odd people in the audience, he was dancing for you the whole time.

 

Then he began to tell me about the "private" sessions!!! This was unheard of...I was not sheltered by any means but we live in the suburbs where if you're lucky enough you can find a gay bar about every 40 or 50 miles. Hearing about his new stomping ground had me foaming at the mouth. He also let me know that the owner was this adorable, middle-aged Greek woman who sat in her little window collecting your cash and managed to set up a nice variety of hard bodies each and every weekend. He said there was definitely something for everyone on that stage through out the course of the evening.

 

My biggest problem at this point was that it was only Tuesday night and we could not go until the weekend. I savored every detail of his stories hoping it would last me until Friday night. Oh, and I also had to lie to my boyfriend to make it seem like my best friend and I were just goin to the city for a weekend getaway, just to shop and catch a musical or something. My boyfriend was not a prude but I doubt he would have given me the green light to hang out in a strip club all weekend.

 

I never thought strippers would peak my interest at all. The local bars would have the usual go-go boys on the weekend which was nice eye candy but enough to bore you to tears after 3 verses of "Short Dick Man"

 

Anyway, this is How I Heard About the Gaiety. My first weekend there was incredible, as was my first private. I even had a dancer jump off the stage to whisper something in my ear. (this can be verified in NYobserver's review around the beginning of July 2002)....needless to say I was hooked.

 

Although I haven't been to the "G" in awhile I felt like it was the end of an era when I heard of it's closing early last week. So many wonderful memories were born that summer in the city. The Gaiety was a naughty, exciting escape for me. No matter what happened during the week I knew that on the weekend I would be surrounded by gorgeous men and fast paced life of the city. I lived for the weekends because that was when I was truly alive....

 

I cannot thank ValleyDwellerNorth enough for sharing this part of his life with me and inviting me to indulge with him. I had the time of my life every Friday night till Sunday afternoon. Thank you again VDN, I hope to experience half as much fun throughout my life as we would have on our weekend excursions. Now let's find a new stomping ground and start all over !!!!!!!!!

 

Mysterymr

[ValleyDwellerNorth]

Dearest Mystery Mr!

 

> We sat on the deck and had coffee as he began to tell me

>about this place in the city that he had secretly been

>frequenting. You would have thought he won the f'in lottery

 

LORDY did you bring back some memories! I was bursting to share so much with you that night on your deck!

 

>the way he smiled as he spoke of The Gaiety. This was much

>more than the usual kid in a candy store analogy, this was

>more like a coke fiend who just inherited all of Columbia and

>most of Peru. He told me how there were 12 strippers in one

 

LOL LOL - I think I spent Colombia's national debt one of our weekends with privates at the G.

 

>Anyway, this is How I Heard About the Gaiety. My first

>weekend there was incredible, as was my first private. I even

>had a dancer jump off the stage to whisper something in my

>ear. (this can be verified in NYobserver's review around the

>beginning of July 2002)....needless to say I was hooked.

 

And didn't that same dancer cut his toe once and BLED all over the place AND he didn't know he was bleeding until you told him? NASTY!

 

>I cannot thank ValleyDwellerNorth enough for sharing this part

>of his life with me and inviting me to indulge with him. I had

>the time of my life every Friday night till Sunday afternoon.

>Thank you again VDN, I hope to experience half as much fun

>throughout my life as we would have on our weekend excursions.

>Now let's find a new stomping ground and start all over

 

I will ALWAYS hold those weekends we spent in the city acting ridiculously immature (well, I was immature)close to my heart. We were two dilly country girls that took the city for everything it had to offer. More importantly, I am glad you are back in my life.

 

PEACE

:*

V

[Chuck50]

I have lived my life at the Gaiety through the eyes of you guys, Cooper, Lucky, Valley Dweller North, NYObserver and the many others who have posted or guest commentated on here. I have never been there and now I can't. But thanks for all the memories that you guys have provided from a distance. HUGS Chuck