I know David Gordon as my long-time brother-in-law. He has tremendous energy, works hard every day, and at age 71 remains a steadfast and loyal husband to my sister, Tara, and a devoted father to their 15-year-old daughter, Samantha. Quillnews knew there was some vague history about David in Greenwich Village back in the day, but this modern and busy film and video production entrepreneur is a mench and had kept the details sketchy. Until a few weeks ago, that is, when David let me rummage around a box of clippings, articles and memorabilia he had kept of his days as a coffee house owner. It was here Quillnews discovered a story of one of the pioneer producers of modern American culture, whose creative, risk-taking efforts back stage and in the front office in 1959-64 were the essential “enabling” work that gave new artists who would become giants in their day the venue to perform. In this gathering of news clips, and photographs is a story of emerging talent in an emerging age, who combined to articulate and help create tremendous political, social and cultural change that we know as standard in today's Media-ville.
The story goes like this: born in Boston in ‘34, David got a BA from Columbia '55 as an English major. David taught and did graduate studies in Shakespearean literature at Indiana University for a year before, as he told an interviewer from the New York Herald Tribune, “I found out I wasn’t interested in being a scholar.” David went back to New York, drove a cab, worked in legitimate Shakespearean theater for a while before being drafted into the Army. Gordon served with the 8th Division in Germany for 17 months, where, among other duties, he was an assistant to an army shrink, and also an actor and producer of Army-sponsored stage productions of Othello, and other works, which toured the Army circuit in Europe. After his discharge in ‘58, Gordon returned to Manhattan. “I decided in the Army that I couldn’t make it as an actor, but I did have definite possibilities as a producer,” he told the Herald Tribune.
David had spent much of his off-duty time in Germany in the cafes, coffee houses, and espresso bars where music and poetry readings were the favored entertainment. Gordon first foray as a coffee house entrepreneur was a venue near Columbia he started called The First Born located across from the Cathedral of St. John the Divine at W. 111th St., and Amsterdam Ave. The club showed promise but it was too far away for the Barnard College co-eds to walk in that Morningside Heights neighborhood; and, as David explained, if no co-eds, no guys. David shut his joint down after a year and leased more likely first floor space and a backyard garden at 302 Bleecker Street, Greenwich Village in late ’59. David began renovations and signed contracts to set up his new venue, Phase 2, which opened May 20, 1960.
The coffee house David envisioned combined elements of American vaudeville, European political cabaret, and Left Bank hang-out. This was the era of the Beat Generation, of anti-establishment, social critiques combined with, at times, old-fashioned lust, which modern fashion encouraged to be played out in public. Beats followed the creative leads of writers Jack Kerouac, Williams Burroughs, and Allen Ginsburg. In low-end pop culture it was a time of goatees, bongo drums, berets, and audience finger popping to show approval. Despite these comic characterizations in Media-ville, there was very big stuff underway in American pop culture. On the music scene, Elvis has broken the pop music world wide open in ’56 and the rockabilly, rhythm & blues and jazz music scenes were exploding. Greenwich Village, with its leftist Beat edge and Bohemian artistic heritage, became the setting for the resurgence of authentic folk music,led by archivist Alan Lomax, the Weaver’s Pete Seeger and the other Depression-era folk evangelists. This was the pop culture stew cooking in Greenwich Village as David, a natural producer, sought to find a niche that suited New Yorkerss tastes at Phase 2. Other Village clubs near Sheridan Square along Bleecker and MacDougal Streets included Café Wha?, 115 MacDougal St.; Cock & Bull, 147 Bleecker St.; Café Bizarre, 106 W. 3rd Ave.; The Gaslight, 116 MacDougal St; The Bitter End, 147 Bleecker St.; Cafe Figaro, near MacDougal & Bleecker Sts.; Gerte’s Folk City, at 11 W 4th St., on the corner of Mercer St.; and The Village Gate, at the corner of Bleecker & Thompson Sts.
David's club was a hit right off. Patrons flocked to see his musical and theatrical reviews. He promoted Phase 2’s opening in the press. Taking note were the Village Voice, Cue, the New York Daily News, Post, Times, Herald Tribune, and Telegram. One account described Phase 2 as representative of the new coffee house movement. The Village Voice said Phase 2 was in the “European tradition of the cabaret theater, with Edwardian stained glass and velvet appliqué wallpaper.” David Gordon’s coffee house would “showcase young, accredited actors, directors and writers.” Phase 2 would be primarily an espresso coffee bar, with some Armenian cuisine (because his pal, a cook, was Armenian), and also have an art gallery on the premises. Variety reported May 25, that Greenwich Village “is breaking new sound barriers with a new type nitery: Phase 2 is dispensing no booze, but combining the beat with the bourgeois, the hip with the hesitant, and the squared with the rounders.”
Variety said that the cafés are evolving from poetry readings, to espresso “shows offering full-fledged entertainment without liquor license and without the regulation, prices and overhead of the normal nightspot.”
Here was the economic driver any entrepreneur like David looks for and requires. Rising costs of off Broadway shows had priced out experimental entertainment – music, drama, comedy. Novice performers couldn’t get a gig; pricey off Broadway venues became increasingly professional and commercial (and square). Coffee houses like Phase 2 jumped into the breach providing a stage for new actors, comedians, writers, and musical performers, who were given a chance to build their stage acts, get recognition and gain confidence as performing artists.
The problem for the coffee houses were the liquor control laws of that time (remnants of the post-prohibition speak-easy era), which required that any performer in a New York “cabaret” get a license from the Police Department. The NYPD demanded finger prints of applicants and a clean record, free of drug arrests or morals charges. More than 5,000 applicants by performing artists were rejected in those days, including Ray Charles, Chuck Berry, Gerry Mulligan, Stan Getz, Thelonious Monk preventing these world class musicians from (legally) performing in any New York nightclub with a liquor license.
The coffee houses planned a court fight. As David would later tell the Post: “This is not a cabaret. We do not pay our performers; have no liquor, nor a cover charge. Phase 2 is a coffee house trying to bring the best in theater, especially new theater, to the Village.” But like anything news, the coffee houses had their critics, including some neighbors who weren’t sure they liked all these beatniks and their rowdy fans around until all hours.
But complaining neighbors could be handled with a friendly chat over coffee or beer; not so the representatives of the nearby saloons, existing liquor-selling clubs and cabarets, Broadway production houses, and artists unions who all saw the coffee house phenomenon as a genuine economic threat. As the coffee house owners banned together to fight the liquor licensing laws, coffee house opponents called on the cops and firemen to do their duty. In the last part of ’59 and early ’60, the coffee houses were papered with summonses – for fire occupancy violations, overcrowding, loitering, and operations without police cabaret license cards.
In June ‘60, the Gaslight and Bizarre were shut down by the fire department, causing several hundred patrons, neighborhood rabble-rousers and assorted hangers-on to stage a protest that got way out of hand. Pushing, shoving, name calling; it was a mess. One headline in the Red-baiting Mirror read: "Village Riot, Folk Singers battle Cops!" To calm the waters, the coffee house owners who had formed The Coffee House Trade & Civic Association, hired lawyer Maxwell T. Cohen, and set up a meeting with Fire Commissioner Edward Cavanaugh July 11 to, as reported in the Post, “smoke the peace pipe.” Seven owners – including David – attended. Lawyer Cohen told the Fire Commissioner he represented businessman not beatniks and apologized to Cavanaugh for the “completely unjustified” attacks and “offensive statements” directed against his department by “pathological exhibitionists” after the closing of the clubs.
Cavanaugh seemed satisfied with the apology, but the licensing problem was real. The coffee house owners began a PR campaign, calling attention to the unfairness of the situation in the Village Voice, Times, Herald Tribune, Variety, and how the city was being denied its reputation as a center for art, entertainment and music, and young artists might choose to go somewhere else. The Herald Tribune did a flattering profile of Gordon July 24. An editorial in the Times supported the coffee houses. Editors at the Times’ uptown rival, Herald Tribune, wondered whether NY would remain home to show business and the creative artists: “unless we are careful, we will drive them away.”
Look who was performing in those clubs in ’60 and early ’61: Richard Pryor, age 22, Bob Dylan, 23, Bill Cosby, 27, Woody Allen, 27, Joan Rivers, 26. Others performers were singers Peter, Paul & Mary; Simon & Garfunkle, Phil Ochs, Richie Havens, Dave Von Ronk, Tom Paxton, comics Jerry Stiller & Anne Meara, Fred Willard, George Carlin, George Segal, David Frye, Robert Klein and Dick Cavett… The explosion of raw talent in the Village at that time would become the heart and soul of American pop culture – in a few years.
But first was the struggle to set up the stage where these artists could perform. The fire department handed the ax of the law to the Police Department, whose campaign of summons continued. Saloons and “legitimate” theater had legislation introduce in the City Council to declare the coffee houses “cabarets.” Coffee house owners Rich Allmen wrote Mayor Wagner a letter in September ’60 pleading for a better understanding of this new phase of show business. Wrote Allmen: “This bill will snuff out the embryonic beginnings of a new wage of experimental theatre, music, folk singing now taking place in the coffee houses of Greenwich Village.”
In October, David was chosen by the other 14 owners to be the president of The Coffee House Trade Association. He had to walk a fine line between commerce and art; this was the Cold War and the wider population – as reflected in the tabloid press – was wary of reds and political subversives. As reported in the Post: “The new group will devote itself to lifting the general tone of the area and eliminating those elements and practices which brought Greenwich Village into ill repute. Mr. Gordon and his associates will strive to change the popular misconception that all café espressos are ‘beatnik” establishments. Most of the members are dedicated themselves to the furtherance of the arts, i.e. painters, folk singers, actors and authors.”
One Daily News cartoon captured the mood perfectly. An unshaven beatnik, seated at a small bistro table, is talking with a somewhat overweight cop who is writing a ticket. The caption reads:
Beatnik: “Like, this is coffee, daddy-o, not booze.”
Cop: “Yeh, but your poetry is criminal!”
But on October 15, David and fellow owners Manny Roth of Café Wha; Rod MacDonald of Commons; and Sadie Rickoff of Bizarre were convicted in Manhattan Arrest Court of operating a cabaret without a license, and sentenced to five-dollar fines, which were quickly suspended. The group said the fight for artistic freedom would continue and immediately filed an appeal. The conviction was reported with a photo in the Daily News showing the four seated on the court house steps. New York Times reporter Arthur Gelb wrote a story October 20 headlined: “Voice of the beatnik is being stilled in the ‘Village’”. The sub-head read: “…cafés bid for new customers with planned shows; beatnik fad boomeranged.”
David and Manny Roth met with the union, Actor’s Equity, to work a way for Broadway and Off Broadway performers to appear what was becoming known as Off-Off Broadway. As the court case proceeded, David went to countless city council committee hearings, municipal court appearances, meetings with neighborhood politicians, civic groups in addition to running his club. The work began to pay off. Actor’s Equity worked out a special coffee house contract for members.
The year 1961 was the year of the what the press called The Coffee House Wars – which embroiled control of arts, liquor sales and night club business with what turned out to be the struggle for the direction of the Democratic Party. Greenwich Village was the heart of the Tammany Hall political club, whose leader Carmine De Sapio, had become, with Eleanor Roosevelt, a party kingmaker, selecting and supporting Averell Harriman as New York governor and Robert Wagner as mayor. De Sapio represented the traditional ethnic, working class roots of the party. While others, including reformers Ed Koch were eager to seize control. It is here that the fashions of art and culture weighed in on the side of the reformers. Assemblyman Mark Lane (who later became obsessed with JFK’s murder) became the coffee house owners’ lawyer. Ed Koch signed up to represent the Gaslight owner John Mitchell.
Reformer James Lanigan, running against De Sapio for Democratic leader of Greenwich Village, and an advisor to Mayor Wagner, promised coffee house proprietors he’d get the city to ease up its regulations. De Sapio lost his seat to Lanigan, who engineered walking tours of the neighborhood with councilmen Ed Vogel of Brooklyn, Ed Treulich of Queens, along with one of Queens’s district leaders, John Sweek and did the essential coalition building. In June, ’61, legislation was introduced in city council calling the coffee houses “citadels of culture.” In July ’61, the New Yorker magazine published an essay about the importance of these new performance venues, highlighting David's leadership role in their defense.
In October 13, 1961, New York Times published a story with the headline: “Off Off Broadway in orbit in again.” Wrote reporter Milton Esterow: “a tour of the land of Bach, bongos, battles, beatniks, folk singers, flamenco and poetry and plays of the avante guard indicated Off Off Broadway more than ever is “flipping” over political satire. Writers, comedians and actors on some stages not much larger than oversized bathtubs, are taking an increasingly irrelevant look at the world. What is going on? Art D’Lugoff, proprietor of the Village gate: ‘there’s a hip audience, and educated audience of college students, college graduates, that growing. They’re not finding much on Broadway to suit their taste. Down here they’re offered fare that faces the realities of our existence and pokes fun. Also, this kind of material needs a sense of intimacy, which the small placed provide. It’s the one area where you sit a mink coast next to a T shirt and both will feel at east.’”
Mayor Wagner read the pulse. He asked the coffee house association to come in for a chat. Said David: “We pleaded our case. Finally the city council relented – we could operate legit as milk bars.”
The boom in Greenwich Village as ground zero for legitimate new entertainment and later icon of an era was on. (Some Quillnews memories here, here, here.) Phase 2 was successful as a stage for theatrical reviews, but the hot action was at the folk music clubs across Sixth Avenue. David had also begun to branch out as a film producer and wanted to concentrate on his new vocation full time. After a wildly popular New Year’s Eve ’63, Gordon sold Phase 2 to an eager buyer in order to backroll the first of what would turn out to be several film production companies that would sustain an Emmy winning career over more than three decades.
At first, David kept his hand in the coffee house scene through ’63 and ’64 as the Monday night emcee for Manny Roth’s Cape Wha. Regular music talent worked “for peanuts” Tuesday through Sunday. David emceed comedy acts Monday night, introducing Stiller and Meara, Woody Allen, Mel Brooks, Jackie Mason, George Carlin, Robert Klein, George Segal among the many others. It was a time of all night poker games, talk and fun; surrounded by the talented and the young and the future. Some of David’s notable memories:
Joan Rivers: “I knew Joan from Columbia, where we’d worked in Columbia and Barnard theater productions together. Her first four-week gig as a stand-up on stage was at Phase 2 in August ’60.” (Bio)
Stiller & Meara: “A polished act who became regular performers at Phase 2 and my life-long friends.” (Stiller, Meara, son Ben) (Editorial aside: I always wondered how niece Samantha got that personally signed photo of Ben Stiller!)
Richard Pryor: “The best talent of them all; nobody else was even close. The guy was a genius. Everybody knew it."
Bob Dylan: “He came to Phase 2 in early ’61 for an audition; honestly, I thought his singing was awful. But even so, his act wasn’t right for our club. We were doing lots of show reviews. I figured he was right for Gerte’s Folk City and send him over there.” Dylan became a regular at Folk City, on 11 4th St., where he met Peter, Paul and Mary who recorded Dylan’s break out song: “blowin’ in the wind.” (Timeline)
Vaughn Meader: The comic with the heavy Maine accent who used the stage at Phase 2 to develop the mimic voices and material used in the best-selling comedy album LP “The First Family.” This record became the show biz sensation of 1962, selling 7.5 million copies, with President Kennedy purchasing 100 copies to give away as Christmas gifts. Quipped JFK at one party political dinner: “Vaughn Meader was busy tonight, so I came myself.” When Kennedy was murdered Meader’s comedy career ended. Meader died last year at age 68, having recovered from years of itinerant addiction, to perform music back in Maine.
Two coffee house impresarios became legends of their own. Manny Roth of Café Wha, who told of giving Bob Dylan his first gig Jan 24, 1961, was the promoter of great music talent, including Simon & Garfunkle, the Mamma & Papas, and giving Jimi Hendrix a start up gig in the summer of ’66 when the Air Force vet was learning how to make his guitar do what no one else had conceived. Manny was also the uncle of David Lee Roth, the rocker front man for Van Halen, who blamed his affection for stage antics on exposure to the comics at his uncle’s place in the Sixties. The other was Fred Weintraub, owner of the Bitter End, who was master promoter, who commercialized the hootenanny, and who drew fame for producing Enter the Dragon, which introduced Bruce Lee, and his martial arts, to American pop.
David’s film and video production efforts broke ground for television when he joined ABC as an independent producer and delivered more than 40 half-hour features on arts and culture subjects for ARTS, the ABC cable network that eventually became part of A&E. He won Emmy’s. David and Tara adopted Samantha in ’89 and decided to relocate to raise their family. David sold his company, retired and relocated to San Diego where the three make their home amid schools, sports, scouts and music. In addition to their happy and all consuming duties producing a healthy family for themselves and their awesome daughter, David is also helping Tara, an art historian, graphic designer and homemaker combo, develop markets for the beautiful Mata Ortiz pots they fetch in Mexico. A producer never rests.
(Editor's note: this post was orginally published in Quillnews April 26, 2005 and is being reposted in response to reader demand.)
i think your syriana piece is excellent.
so my question is, is there anyway to get
it to him personally?
your sis who loves you more sooooooo much.
xxoo
miss piggy
Posted by: tara gordon | 13 January 2006 at 08:14 PM