The Great Gay-Bar Bar-Crawl, Part Six: Blows and Shows

SECOND SUNDAY NIGHT
The second week of The Great Gay-Bar Bar-Crawl ended quietly. I went to two places featuring live music and a third featuring blow jobs. Let's begin there.

19. Manhandler. 1948 N. Halsted. 10.38 PM.
From the outside, the Manhandler (the last of the funny-named gay bars) looks closed. Its faded awning and wooden facade make it appear boarded up and long since abandoned. I was almost surprised when the door pulled open and I found people inside.

I believe the place aims to resemble a saloon from the old West. There are some cowboy pictures, a pair of antlers mounted on the wall near the door, an old fashioned fireplace in the back. This half-hearted decorative motif comes in second, however, to the place's principal purpose: cruising. To this end, the lights are extremely dim, a television mounted above the door plays old pornos, and hardly anyone says a word. The front area has a third purpose as well: it apparently serves as the storage room. Cases of booze and other beverages, stacked knee-high, sit behind the bar, along the walls, and in a nook near the door.

But none of this matters all that much because the Manhandler's main attraction is the back yard. A little path, lined with plastic lawn furniture standing sentry, takes you through a grassy area and into an enclosure, the interior of which has been made to look like an outdoor bar. Here and there stand wooden tables, one of which, in the center, could serve as a bar but it is empty and unmanned. There is no seating and little illumination (not so much as a tiki torch). After your eyes adjust to the darkness, you can see men in their thirties, forties, and beyond, lurking, checking one another out, and, occasionally, trading blow jobs. These interactions are performed without a sound, save for the occasional grunt.

I found it eerie. Like watching ghosts go silently about their sexual business in the ruins of the Wild West. Sometimes the lights from a passing car in the alley behind the place would hit the wooden slats that constitute the walls of the enclosure, throwing dappled light onto thrusting hips, pale and fleshy bellies, faces set in scowls of concentration.

20. Davenport's. 1383 N. Milwaukee. 11.29 PM.
My anxiety about short-changing the Sunday bars proved well-founded when it came time to visit Davenport's. As I understand it, the place is one of the best cabaret bars in the city. On Sunday, it was very quiet and very empty: no one at the piano, very soft music playing on the sound system, a total of maybe four customers. It was so quiet that when I made a call on my cell phone, I had to whisper because I knew the other customers (both of them) would hear every word if I spoke at a normal volume. The friend I called said something like, "Wow, that must be a happenin' place."

Sure ain't happenin' on Sunday, I'll tell you that. I've been in noisier funeral homes.

21. Underground Wonderbar. 10 E. Walton. 11.57 PM.
This is another one that--although included in the nightlife directory of Gay Chicago Magazine, from which I compiled my Crawl itinerary--isn't really a gay bar per se. And because I don't have much to say about it, I have decided to write it in the style of Liz Armstrong, author of the Chicago Reader's answer to the society pages, Chicago Antisocial.

After the Davenport's debacle, I called up my Art Institute friend Lark. She hopped in a Wolley Cab and met me at Walgreen's, where I had stopped to buy some Fiji water from a cute teenaged girl with a wild tangle of black hair. She seemed tired, but she was nice enough to rescue me from the portly Russian dude who was behind me in line and who totally wanted to make out with me.

When Lark arrived, she told me I looked really cute in my too-tight Sevens and too-old CBGB's t-shirt. We made out for a while.

Then we went to Underground Wonderbar, a basement joint with air thick with cigarette smoke. The back wall is adorned with a mural vaguely reminiscent of Van Gogh's "Starry Night," which made Lark and me giggle because we once attended a dance party called "Starry Night" where for some reason you were supposed to come dressed as either an 18th century dandy or a furry woodland creature. It ended with everyone removing their costumes and dancing wildly in one massive, naked, sweaty ball of energy, limbs flailing, primal screams rising to the ceiling, and everyone wanting to make out with me. While this was going on, a pretty Micronesian girl wearing a sari sang old Negro spirituals, accompanying herself on bongos improvised from empty Solo cups.

At Wonderbar, the entertainment is more conventional: a cute redheaded tomboy with a raspy voice sang Otis Redding songs and some compositions of her own, accompanying herself on the piano. I'm pretty sure she wanted to make out with me.

I had my eye on a tall, skinny, mocha-colored guy with one of those just-barely-kept-under-control Afros. He totally would have wanted to make out with me, but I was waylaid by an older guy named Chuck. Chuck had long stringy hair, he was wearing a leather vest that did little to conceal his girth, and he was nursing a Budweiser, which he said was still the best beer around. We talked mostly about how much he wanted to make out with me.

When we got home, Lark suggested we create an Underground Wunderbar. Neither she nor I had any idea what that would be, but I was game. We started by fashioning prom dresses out of toilet paper. Then we slathered ourselves with a soil-and-sauerkraut mixture, all the while reciting Pet Shop Boys lyrics in egregiously bad German accents. We ended the evening by rolling around on the floor, alternately giggling hysterically and making out.

Wunderbar.

NEXT WEEK:
The pièce de résistance: Boystown.

ELSEWHERE:
And speaking of the Reader, my brief review of Bailiwick's production of PINS is in this week's issue. I will also be on the Reader's Pride Parade float tomorrow. I'll be the one looking uncomfortable.

Comments

[Patrick]

I love Davenport's! There's more entertainment in August. I'm definitely going! I can't wait for Patty Elvis. Here's the info:
Elvis has not left the building. Patty Elvis, that is. Catch America's most acclaimed female Elvis impersonator every Saturday at Davenport's. You don't want to miss her electric, three-piece band, Elvis-like voice, jump suit, gyrating hips and curling lip in "Queen of Being the King". She has appeared on WGN-TV, Fox, Channel 11 and Mancow in the Morning. She is called "one of the best Elvis Impersonators around".
8:00 p.m., $12 cover.