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Limelight

Coverage by Nobuhiro Hosoki

Story : As the owner of legendary hotspots like Limelight, Tunnel, Palladium, and Club USA, Peter Gatien was the undisputed king of the 1980s New York City club scene. The eye-patch-sporting Ontario native built and oversaw a Manhattan empire that counted tens of thousands of patrons per night in its peak years, acting as a conduit for a culture that, for many, defined the image of an era in New York. Then years of legal battles and police pressure spearheaded by Mayor Giuliani's determined crackdown on nightlife in the mid-'90s led to Gatien's eventual deportation to Canada, and the shuttering of his glitzy kingdom.

Opened September 23, 2011

Runtime:1 hr. 41 min.

 

Interview with Peter Gatien, a legendary owner of Limelight, Tunnel, Palladium, and Club USA.

 

(Q) : What do you think of clubs today? They just don’t have the magic that you were able to conjure up.

(Peter Gatien) : I really appreciate you feeling that way. I think that a lot of it is the result of instant gratification of a generation, and also that we used to put in so much effort into drawing a diverse crowd. From everybody that worked there to the music selection or whatever, and the profile of a customer that was really important to us was not what it is today.

Everybody sort of looks like Paris Hilton or the Kardashians or whatever, where in our time you had a much better chance of getting into a club if you were a long-haired person in sequins or interesting or an artist or an inspiring writing or that kind of stuff, or a music driven person, than today where somebody’s value is based on how many bottles they can by. I think that’s depressing.

(Q) : There were people doing drugs, but that wasn’t necessarily because of the Limelight, it was drugs because it was the scene and the drugs were everywhere. I found it to be just pure persecution of you because frankly drugs were everywhere and there were a lot more egregious clubs.
 
(Peter Gatien): That was always my sense of it all. Clubs are a microcosm of society, so if 20% of the adult population was doing drugs, 20% of my clientele would be doing drugs. If 40% of adults are doing drugs then 40% of my clientele is doing drugs. To expect that we are supposed to be an oasis where there’s no criminal activity at all occurring when you could go to any dorm, any park, especially in that period, and it was rampant.

They didn’t indict the dean of NYU, and actually some of the people that were caught in my case were actually dealing out of NYU and out of Limelight. But anyway, nobody ever said life was fair I guess. The other thing also, back to taking down big [scallops] or whatever, let’s face it, “New York Post” was a newsletter for the Giuliani administration.

(Q): When it was proposed to make a film about the Limelight and your experience, how concerned or involved did you want to be and how much did you decide your participation would be or not?

(Peter Gatien): How do I answer this question? Obviously in the beginning everybody loves each other. Everybody’s getting along, this, that, and whatever. I had virtually no say in the final cut. I would have liked people that were truly responsible for our success, every employee that I had in there, or not everybody but a large percentage were just dynamite people that really believed in New York, culture, music, art, and they’re not represented in the movie and I would have liked a little bit more of that.

And I would have liked a little more representation in just the club was much more diverse and we did institutional nights that lasted for years that are nor represented in the movie. So I would have liked more of that.

(Q) : You’ve been portrayed in two films and in a rap song and as a toy so do you think anyone’s gotten it right, and what has nobody been able to pin down about you? How are you different than your portrayals?

(Peter Gatien) : I don’t know what everybody’s perception is of me. Some of it’s been favorable over the years. Prior to ’96 was all very favorable, post ’96 it was not so favorable. What are you asking? What does the public not know about me?

(Q) : In “Party Monster” Dylan McDermott portrayed you as this very monotone, sort of soft-spoken type of guy. Did you see that as accurate at all? Do you think people mis-perceive you?

(Peter Gatien) : I’m in probably three minutes of that movie. There was one statement that I liked in the movie where James St. James says to Michael Alig “How could you do this to Peter?” I was portrayed by Dylan McDermott, which is somewhat flattering; I couldn’t complain there. But it wasn’t like it was positive or negative. The storyline was hardly about me. 

So in answer to if I like the film or not. Like Tony Humphries, I would have loved him to be interviewed. I would have loved Funkmaster Flex to be interviewed, Nicky Camp, who did Sunday. But again, you’re restricted to 90 minutes. The film probably wouldn’t have been that good if we had 10 people saying how wonderful Limelight was, so from a commercial aspect maybe it’s better the way it is, I don’t know. 

It’s this Lord Michael character definitely rubs me the wrong way. He was a real minor player, he was nickel dime dealer, he wasn’t like this big time ecstasy dealer. He was a nickel dime dealer that never had a penny up his pocket, worked for us for a year and a half, was responsible for the front part of the club Friday nights and that was his entire role in the whole 19 nights. It sort of comes across in the film that this was almost my right hand man or whatever. He was a minor player in the whole thing.

(Q) : Were you able to keep anything from the club when they tore it down, and do you know of anybody that got souvenirs?

(Peter Gatien) : From where?

(Q) : From the Limelight when they turned it over.

(Q) : Like some of Giger’s art for example. In the Upstairs room.

(Peter Gatien): I’ve got one Giger piece. I never expected, nor did my lawyers expect that I would be deported. It was a shock, and to say it turned my and my family’s life upside down is an understatement. And at that point your priorities so shift in life, so it wasn’t like a like of thought was dedicated to let’s archive this stuff. 

And quite frankly, one of the biggest mistakes I’ve made in life is that we never archived a whole lot. Maybe you gain this wisdom as you get older, but you don’t really understand how special thing surrounding you are when you’re younger or as you’re doing them or whatever and you think back on it oh god I wish we had archived more.

But it was a little more difficult back then. Not everybody had a camera phone and that sort of stuff. There wasn’t YouTube around and all the electronic, digital messaging that you can get out today. But no, I have very, very little, almost nothing of souvenirs from any of the clubs.

(Q) : If you wanted to get something what would it be? There were a lot of goodies there.

(Peter Gatien) : I guess what would be most representative. If it was like Club USA, I don’t know if you remember those leather, bondage mannequins we have. Anybody been to USA?
You remember they were in two tubes; there was a male and a female. And every detail, those outfits and costumes were all hand tailored, hand stitched and fit perfectly on mannequins. 

So that depicted that period really well. There were photos and that kind of stuff that were reminiscent. But most of my gratification came from standing obscurely in a balcony and watching 1500, 2000 people hands up in the air or watching an incredible live act, like Pearl Jam, or just 1500 people dancing, people exchanging phone numbers at the end of the night where you sort of say to yourself how many people am I responsible for tonight having sex?

Not that I gloated about it or whatever. Nights like the hip hop night at Tunnel I swear to god, everybody left with a prospect or a mate or somebody they’re going to bed with, male, female or whatever; everybody. It was great.

(Q) : If you hadone piece of important advice to a new entrepreneur or club owner, what would it be?

(Peter Gatien) : I go back to the instant gratification generation. In a prior interview somebody asked me sort of the same question. I said listen, you have to pay your dues. I started in 1974 in my hometown, went to Florida, went to Atlanta. The point is by the time I arrived in New York I had paid my dues for 20 years. 

So you have to pay your dues in the industry whether it’s art, fashion, music. Musicians have to pay their dues, artists have to pay their dues, actors have to pay their dues. I mean there are some overnight successes, but for the most part it’s a grind and you just can’t expect to walk in from a totally unrelated industry and put together something that takes years of knowledge and experience to piece together. It’s not hopeless but it takes hard work and paying your dues.

(Q) : To run a club back then, be an owner, wasn’t just a matter of being a businessman, but you were a creative impresario, So what were your most memorable moments? 

(Peter Gatien) : It’s like asking over a 20 year period what nights do you remember the most? I take great pride in the diversity of nights that we did, so on a rock and roll night it would be probably Pearl Jam, but it would also be the night Jimmy Page got up and jammed. On Communion night we broke a lot of bands there also. I remember Smashing Pumpkins playing. On Wednesdays it was more of a music driven night. 

You got people with sequins to traditional surf and gays to Armani suits to artists up in the VIP room. I remember one time Mick Jagger being in the VIP room upstairs and we used to have a little bathroom with a sliding door, and I walked by and it was Jagger asking people for toilet paper. So there were a lot of sort x-rated moments, some involve celebrities, some don’t, that really big a smile to my face. 

We did stuff like Shirley MacLaine’s 50th birthday party and Marvin [Hamlisch] played piano. We had a William Burroughs party, we had a Sting party. If you’ve ever looked at the book “so80s” Limelight literally has probably two thirds of the photos in that book. That was one sort of chapter or decade, and then you get into the ‘90s and there are other nights that are very reminiscent. Scan the whole demographics of New York City from the hard rock to the hip hop to whatever.

(Q) : Do you stay in touch with your celebrity friends or did they desert you?

(Peter Gatien) : I still have very good friends, but keep in mind I was a nightclub operator, and with all due respect to Steve [Rubell, the late owner/founder of Studio 54 and The Palladium], I wasn’t one that basically sat down and partied with everybody. I had my own business to run, and a lot of history shows you that people that do open clubs and want to become part of the party end up alcoholics or even more tragically, off dead.

So I think I was really respected, and I made a point of meeting these people, but I didn’t become part of the party. I think I was respected by a lot of people in a lot of different industries, but it certainly wasn’t, “Let’s go to Limelight and hang out with Peter, we’re going to have a great time.” 

It was “Let’s go to Limelight or to Tunnel or Palladium because they’re so much fun.” And they size of clubs that I was dealing with also, I wasn’t like a host for a small party. Like even on Tuesday nights we often had 1500, 2000 people there. So it was the program that we created that was the draw and the ambiance and the music that made the night institutional.

(Q) : Was there any influence from nightclubs in a foreign country?

(Peter Gatien) : I had a club in London for a view years and I actually found the Londoners better read, definitely more music driven, they had at the time better it wouldn’t have been CDs but tapes or records or whatever, so they were much more music knowledgeable. And I think it was because back then they literally had like three TV channels, and they just I guess were entertained more by music.

The British kids, though they didn’t have the discretionary income that Americans had or New Yorkers had, they were very chic in their style. I drew inspiration everywhere, but for the most part I’ve got to tell you, I always made a point of not going to other people’s clubs, and I’d be more inspired by flipping through a really smart magazine whatever it be, getting inspired by that, than I was going to somebody else’s club and trying to knock it off. 

And knowing my strengths I need to surround myself by the most passionate and knowledgeable, and like I said, given the diversity of nights that we used to do it wasn’t like I could be an authority on everything that’s rock and roll and be an authority on everything that was industrial or everything that was techno or everything that was hip hop. So I think I had a gift of surrounding myself with people that were really passionate and knew what their specialty is, and I think that’s what allowed us to last so many years.

(Q) : What about influencing other clubs and your influence globally?

(Peter Gatien) : When I arrived in New York in ’83 the benchmark for a club was basically Studio 54, and at the time Studio was a theater, so if I had gotten the bigger theater and they had say five miles of neon and I would have had 10 miles of neon and I would have had 80 lights rather than 20 lights in Studio 54.

So I really felt in the ‘80s the chrome, neon, spinning wheels had been done to the death. So my instructions for my real estate person were “Find me a building that is architecturally insignificant. If you can find a church that’s terrific.” 

And I really felt that art and architecture were the way to make an impact in New York, not like neon and spinning wheels. I had made associations with Warhol and the art community and sort of really got into making that an important aspect of it. So as far an inspiration goes, I respect anybody that’s done well in our industry, but I can’t say I walked into Studio 54 and said “Wow, this is what I want it to be.” 

The greatest thing about New York is it’s beyond well represented in overachievers, whether it’s aspiring musicians, artists, fashion people, writers, filmmakers, video artists, it’s just the creative community is second to none in the world. Could I have done Limelight in Cincinnati? Nothing bad about Cincinnati but there’s just not that foundation of creative people.

(Q) : What effect did HIV have back in the ‘80s?

(Peter Gatien) : I’d say ’86 to ’89, especially in New York City, people didn’t even understand how you contracted AIDS. People thought you could get it from a dirty glass, you could get it from kissing a person, etcetera, etcetera. So really it damped the activity of nightlife in those years, plus people that you knew, it wasn’t like the friend of a friend of a friend died, it was like my friend died. So it was a much more intimate impact on just how awful this disease as.

So by the time the early ‘90’s rolled around there was more of an understanding of the disease and that you basically had protected sex you were immune to and it had sort of a joie de vivre back in the ‘90s that was sort of reminiscent to me of the late ‘70s.

(Q) : After seeing the film you now you know why everybody acted crazy because the punch was spiked with ecstasy!

(Peter Gatien): It’s hard to tell a story in 90 minutes, and that’s where I sort of get angry that a lot of the legacy of Limelight is sort of based on the club kid and the drug phenomenon and whatever else. I did a lot of interviews,f ilm festivals, and a lot of interviewers actually had been to the clubs. 

And I’d ask them after the interview was over… “Did you notice a lot of drugs around back then?” and they’d say “We went to party, we went to dance,” and I think it’s like anything else; if you wanted to find it it was there. 

And you’ve also got to keep in mind, and this is where I actually really get almost resentful. Ecstasy was not illegal in New York State until 1998, which meant for all the ballyhoo of Giuliani and this and that and whatever, not one of his police people, not one of his prosecutors every arrested or prosecuted anybody in New York City until 1998 for ecstasy. 

So who is Peter Gatien to have the only oasis in the city where no drugs were meant to be? And people’s mindset back then, it was like ecstasy was less illegal than lighting a cigarette in a non-smoking section of a restaurant. So for us to be expected to curb the use of ecstasy was beyond absurd. 

When you went to Limelight, I don’t know what you noticed or whatever, but I’m sure it wasn’t because oh boy, I can go there and get my drugs and there’s no where else in New York City that I can find them. 

In fact I remember one night David Lee Roth leaving the Limelight because he couldn’t buy drugs, and where did he go? Washington Square Park. In part my defense when Ben Brafman actually had the Manhattan Narcotics captain up on the stand and he asked him “Hey Captain, have you ever made any drug arrests at Madison Square Garden?” 

(Q) : How do you feel about when you first heard that the Limelight was turned into a mini-mall?

(Peter Gatien): On the one hand a media organization as notorious the “New York Post” made out the Limelight to be, for it to be such a landmark in New York City that a retailer would be happy. Most of the city has pretty fond memories of that space and over the years. I think in that way it’s fine. It’s depressing that the corporatization of New York basically, I still have a lot of friends in the creative community that can’t live in Manhattan anymore because it’s unaffordable. In my mind Giuliani destroyed the cultural fabric of New York City.

End.