Jacko’s the DJ, Bowie’s in the corner and Travolta rocks up with Stallone... Welcome to the unseen world of Studio 54
JOHN Travolta swaggers through the door in true Saturday Night Fever style, Michael Jackson turns DJ and Cher wears suspenders and a straw hat for a night on the tiles.
At any other club this might cause a sensation. But not here, at Studio 54.
For in this playground of sex, drugs and disco, where cocaine was pumped through the air con and mass orgies were commonplace, it seemed anything could happen.
Now, to mark 40 years since the club first opened, unseen photos have been released giving an intriguing peek into the hedonistic New York nightspot.
The likes of Debbie Harry, David Bowie and Sly Stallone were all captured by the late Richard P. Manning – whose family are selling the pictures. Snapper Manning was a close pal of the club’s creators, Steve Rubell and Ian Schrager.
They turned an old TV studio in Manhattan into a hangout for the rich and beautiful. From the doors opening on April 26, 1977, their clientele made Studio 54 an overnight sensation. Schrager recalls: “Next day, there was a picture of Cher at the opening on the front page of the New York Post. She was wearing a T-shirt with suspenders, jeans and a straw hat. The front page. The whole page. No nightclub up to then had done that.”
Cher took her daughter Chastity – who became Chaz after gender reassignment – to the club. Other guests included Sir Elton John, Sir Rod Stewart, Farrah Fawcett, Brooke Shields and Liz Taylor. Madonna went too, as well as the arthouse crowd including Andy Warhol, fashion designer Calvin Klein, singer and model Grace Jones and moviemaker Woody Allen.
Rubell’s formula was simple. “The key to a good party is filling a room with guests more e interesting than you,” he said. The public got in – if attractive. Rubell picked out all sexualities andnd races, dubbing it “mixing“ii theth salad”.l d”
The theatre- like venue could be constantly adapted for different events.
Like the Halloween party, described by ex-male model and Studio 54 regular Kevin Haley: “You looked through windows into booths with midgets doing things – a midget family eating a formal dinner.”
And the Dolly Parton party – “with bales of hay, pigs, goats and sheep”.
Mick Jagger, with first wife Bianca, was a regularre and he met future spo spouse Jerry Hall there.
A At Bianca’s 30th birthday bash she rode a whitehit horse,h lik like L Ladyd G Godiva,d on to the dancefloor.
Bianca, who became a major animal rights activist, said: “I made the foolish decision to get on it for a few minutes.”
Grace Jones wasn’t that impressed, saying: “I did that years ago on a Bengal tiger, now where’s my damn cocktail?”
On Andy Warhol’s birthday the owners gave him a metal bin filled with dollar bills.
But money – or unpaid taxes – was to be the club’s downfall. It raked in over £6million a year and Rubell boasted: “Only the Mafia made more.”
When Revenue agents raided the club in 1979 they discovered bags of hidden cash. Studio 54 would close the next year.
But it went out with a star-studded bang, with Diana Ross and Liza Minnelli singing at a closing party to an audience which included Richard Gere and Jack Nicholson.