A bar for anybody & nobody
Beloved B’klyn pub is star of film
Brooklyn’s venerable Farrell’s Bar and Grill endured for the past 86 years as the anti-“Cheers” — the place where nobody wants to know your name.
At first, anyway. “Farrell’s has a reputation, but it likes having that reputation,” explains Rob Martin, producer of a new documentary on the popular tavern. “People go there for that. When you hear about Farrell’s, you want to be a regular. You ask yourself, ‘How do I win these guys over and be part of the cool kids?’ ”
The film “Why Farrell’s?” celebrates the storied Windsor Terrace watering hole where police, poets and pipe fitters have all peacefully sipped ice cold beers side by side since FDR’s first term in the White House.
Farrell’s — aptly described by one patron as the “Nathan’s of bars” — is neither the oldest pour house in the borough nor the friendliest. Show your face enough times, and somebody will finally learn your name.
While New York City bars come and go, Farrell’s somehow survived. With equal dashes of Irish luck and Irish pluck, the bar managed to have a lasting effect on the surrounding neighborhood, director Jay Cusato told the Daily News.
“Farrell’s has a certain mystique to it,” Cusato explained. “It reached out to the surrounding area. It’s different from every other bar in the city and without its owner, Windsor Terrace wouldn’t be the neighborhood it is today.”
The place is much the same as it was when founder Eddie Farrell opened his doors in 1933, on the heels of the repeal of Prohibition.
“The place has not changed,” said Cusato, who also directed “When Broomsticks Were King” — an award-winning 2001 documentary about the city’s love of stickball.
“The theme [of the bar] has always been the same,” he continued. “Even the bathrooms are the same. So is its desire to help people who really need it.”
In the days before the internet, help came in the form of a bartender who used his trusty collection of encyclopedias to settle barstool disagreements on anything from sports to politics.
Bulletin boards showcased upcoming Civil Service exams, so wannabe city workers could see what was coming down the pike. And, friendly regulars already on the job were ready and willing to dole out career advice.
“If you’ve been there more than once, you know there’s a warmth to this bar,” said Cusato.
That warmth is a direct reflection of its longtime owner, Cusato said. Eddie Farrell reigned as a gregarious, big-hearted soul known to give money to down-on-their luck patrons. Farrell, considered a surrogate father by many, ran the bar until his death in 1995.
Yet his easygoing attitude hid a personal tragedy: His uncle died saving children on the Titanic from the depths of the Atlantic Ocean.
The tavern, now run by a handful of bartenders who worked under the tap master, have lived on without him and remained a neighborhood staple and benefactor.
When the nearby Holy Name School couldn’t afford to get its classrooms painted, Farrell’s patrons banded together to handle the job in a single weekend, Cusato said.
“Many people who live in Windsor Terrace are born there, get married at Holy Name Church, go to work and end up in Green-Wood [Cemetery],” said producer Martin. “That was the journey for so many people in this community and that journey passed through Farrell’s.”
Cusato and Martin have been working on the documentary for about two years, interviewing a host of customers, as well as borough historians and legendary
Brooklynite/one-time News columnist Pete Hamill.
The two have also launched a crowd-sourcing campaign to raise the $24,000 needed to finish the project.
Martin began going to Farrell’s in the late 1990s and was immediately needled about his long hair, goth look and painted nails. But beneath the gruff exteriors, he recalled, there were welcoming hearts. That feeling, resonating far beyond the barroom in Brooklyn, is the emotional core of the documentary.
“It’s a story about New York, but people living in England and France will know exactly what we’re talking about,” said Martin.
“It’ll remind them of their own favorite bar or club down their street. It’s a universal story.”