When word went out that the Plush Room might close permanently because its home, the York Hotel on Sutter Street, had been sold, luminaries from the cabaret world -- including Andrea Marcovicci, Rita Moreno, Sally Kellerman, and Mike Greensill -- huddled privately at the St. Francis Hotel with "high-powered business types" to discuss buying the Plush Room to keep it from disappearing. But the York's new owners, Personality Hotels, who also own the Diva & the Kensington Park, say the Plush Room will stay put, unmolested -- for now. It's booked for the next several months. It amazes me how many natives have never heard of the elegantly cozy Plush Room with the red velvet banquettes. In New York, it's considered the finest nightclub on the West Coast. The York Hotel will soon be renamed the Vertigo, perhaps inspired by the great Hitchcock movie poster that hangs in the lobby.
Jerry Brown, local philanthropist/inventor Maurice Kanbar, and Bruce Holaday, the superintendent of the Oakland Military Institute -- which was started by Jerry Brown seven years ago when he was mayor of Oakland -- lunched at the Balboa Cafe last month to discuss fundraising, and celebrate a personal victory. "Two kids who were once running wild on the streets of Oakland just graduated from the school and are on their way to West Point," Kanbar kvelled. "Kvell" means to show pride, but some lefties kvetched -- that means complained -- that a military academy in Oakland was too, well, militaristic. Brown also started a school for the arts but there's no kvetching about that project.
Russian Hill's Za Pizza on Hyde Street remains a hot property these days, and it's all by word-of-mouth. "We don't advertise, we don't have a website, we're not even listed in the phone book," says co-owner Brooks Bernstein. He and partner Buzzy Campasano are amused that "the kids downtown can't order a pizza from Za on the Internet."
Across Hyde St., Louella's is a celebrity magnet, and is likely where you'd find Mick Jagger when the Stones are in town.
Rock & roll expert Vise Grip has returned to his old gig, running the Tiki Lounge at the 19 Broadway Club in Fairfax. Vise had a shaved head long before it was fashionable. He celebrates his 60th birthday at the Tiki on May 9
Thousands of people from around the world have signed a petition to save the John Barleycorn saloon on Larkin & Calif. Thor Ivar Ekle is leading the charge to convince the new owner of the building, which also houses Front Room Pizza, to keep the Barleycorn intact. "We're hoping that the 'chardonnay track' will work," whispers Ekle. Chardonnay track? That's getting Supervisor Aaron Peskin to get Willie Brown, also a Nob Hill neighbor, to get the new property owner & restaurateur Luisa Hansen into a nice little tete-a-tete-a-tete at a nice little place, like the Big 4, and make the case for anxious Barleycorn supporters.
Sascha Stolz wandered into Cala Foods on Nob Hill. "I was doing a little shoplifting early for Christmas," she joked. But far more serious, says Sascha, is the hot pickup scene going on in the chilly produce section. Love among the prunes.
Two more indie book stores are going away. Brenda Joyce is closing her Rejoyce Books on Hyde & Calif. The lease is up. Joyce will have a farewell open house Sat., April 28 from 12-to-5 p.m.
Lifetime Books on Polk & Pine has come to the end of the road. The shop lost its luster after the sudden death of owner Tracy Hubrich last year at the age of 50.
Robert Hemphill, owner of the Dreaming Room Tribal Art Gallery on Columbus in North Beach, and the Monkey on Chestnut jewelry store in the Marina, is dismayed that the passing of Charles Harrelson, the hitman who killed a federal judge in 1979, and father of Woody Harrelson, went largely unnoticed. He died in prison. The late columnist Jack Anderson claimed Harrelson one of the storied three hobos observed on the infamous Grassy Knoll when JFK was assassinated. "The Three Hobos," snickered Hemphill. "That sounds like something KQED might air during one of their endless pledge drives."
It's terrific that Zodiac author Robert Graysmith, who was also a talented editorial cartoonist for the old Examiner, is finally getting his just due with the success of the movie. After four decades, he's an overnight success. Gray, as his friends call him, is played by Jake Gyllenhaal. Robert Downey Jr. plays Paul Avery, the Chronicle crime reporter who covered the Zodiac killings. That's a good cast. I met Paul in the City Room of the old Examiner when I did a story for NPR about Zodiac. Paul told me how the cops gave him a .38 to carry around for his own protection after Zodiac put Paul on his hit list. Can you imagine the police giving someone a gun today? Unthinkable. Years later Paul would travel with an oxygen tank in tow, and a cigarette hanging out of his mouth. He married the unsinkable Margo St. James, founder of COYOTE, the prostitute's collective. Paul was the best crime reporter I ever knew, a grand guy, a sweetheart. All those years ago I found Robert Graysmith where he always was -- writing furiously in the long-vanished Owl & Money Cafe on Ninth Avenue and Judah.
More nostalgia: Anna Nicole Smith lived briefly in the Marina during the 1990s. I ran into her -- literally -- outside the old Pierce Street Annex, very tall, very blonde, very drunk. She listed to port, right into me. Startled, I could only say, Hello." She slurred, back, "Helllo," then joined her friends -- a dozen Hell's Angels -- in the bar. That's likely the first & last time anyone will see the Hell's Angels in the Marina. Gavin Newsom told me that Anna Nicole frequented the Balboa in those days, and, to his astonishment, drank 12 bottles of beer at a time. She swore that she'd "get him" in the most lascivious way, so Gavin used to hide from her. It seems her unruly behavior got her tossed out on occasion. She was a wee bit lost, poor lass, even back then.
The mayor seems to be rebounding. At the party that the Gettys had for Bob Woodruff – the ABC anchor who barely survived a bomb blast in Baghdad – Gavin was smooth, poised, & eloquent, at ease quoting Oliver Wendell Holmes. Not since Joe Alioto has an SF mayor had such command of the language. He sparred with the Chronicle editorial board the other day, shrugging off a question about his political future. “I could always go back to delivering wine,” he said blithely. At this point, Gavin certainly knows where the grapes of wrath are stored.
