A Night at the Adonis

I Remember Hanging Out On The Large Wooden Bar With The Blue Velvet Decorations When It Was In The Balcony Lobby (By The "Oval") At The Adonis Theater. The Bar Played A Big Part In The Movie, Where Many Scenes Were Centered Around It. In The Early 90's I Saw A Box Office On The Lower East Side That Was For Sale. Turns Out It Was From The Adonis Theater. I Brought It, Took It Apart & Brought It Home Piece By Piece In My Old Cadillac To Staten Island Where I Rebuilt It In My Art Deco Apartment At The Ambassador. I Also Was Told About This "Bar" That Came Out Of A "Movie Theater". When I Saw It, I Loved The Look Of The Thing & Brought It (Weigh's A TON!) It Wasn't Until Days Later That I Realized It Was THE Bar From The Adonis & The One In That Movie.

There used to be a large wooden bar at the old Adonis.

This was brought to full life in the film.

Drinks were served to the guys and "Moonlight Serenade" was played in the background so they could sashay around in a low-blase and nonchalant-cool low-slung way.

This was indeed a lush treatment and was probably Glenn Miller.

Eventually this bar was removed, although before and after the film it was used as a private relationship-development location.

A number of beautiful organisms could occasionally be found there...

It might have been Benny Goodman, but I think Rosemary Clooney and Doris Day did versions, too. In any case, this was big band sound and Jack and his buddies seemed to luxuriate in the chorus that starts with "Glam-uh..."

The African-American known in the film only as "Bertha" who sold tickets at the "box office" had held the actual job before the film was made.

She continued to work there in the same capacity for several years after the film's release...

By carefully building the story around a real-life location, this vintage Gay Adult Film succeeds both as a narrative film and a piece of history. Just as the many soft-core porn films of the 1960s preserve the look and feel of New York City in that era, this provides a mini-time capsule snapshot of the Gay subculture a decade later.

The methods and logistics of cruising are encapsulated by guys standing around in the movie house, scouting and arranging assignations, or even having sex on the premises. It's more about atmosphere than characterizations, which in this particular genre is a good thing, given that actual acting talent is not really part of the job description (though Jack Wrangler proved to be a capable thesp in both hetero and Gay cinema).

Released by Hand in Hand films, it was part of the Romantic Porn tradition that seems remote nowadays, following the gonzo revolution of the '90s. But these narrative films hold up rather well decades later, compared to the hundreds of thousands of ephemeral all-sex videos made since and still being cranked out by today's generation of johnny-come- lately pornographers.

Does anyone know why the original soundtrack from the film that was shown in theaters was not the same soundtrack that was on the VHS tape release in 1983? The song Moonlight Serenade was in the film and now I understand the reference, but it was not on the VHS tape. Nor was any of the other music, that worked so well on the screen in the theater, on the VHS release. It's always a disappointment when you purchase a title of a movie you enjoyed seeing in a theater (in this case, the theater IS the movie) only to find it's been changed (without any warning) when viewing at home. After hearing the version of Moonlight Serenade in the movie, I hunted record stores for this song. I lucked out and was given a demo copy of the album "Tuxedo Junction" at the offices of Butterfly Records, on yellow vinyl. It remains one of my most played records to this day.

PMullins totally confused me with all that. What was all that rambling about? Roommates, Koreans, peanut oil, getting slapped in the face with a handbag, etc. What did all that have to do with this movie?

I have been in that theatre and I saw this movie. It was well-publicized when it came out and some of the actors, I used to see on the streets of New York. I've met Jack Wrangler too, we chatted for a while.

The movie is about the "adult games" that went on at the Adonis Theatre. You can guess what activity I mean. I do agree, it was rather odd to be in the exact theatre that was being depicted on the screen, sort of a movie coming to life all around you. What was happening on the screen was also happening in real life as you were watching the film.