Mitchell Brothers O'Farrell Theatre

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Mitchell Brothers O'Farrell Theatre is a striptease club at 895 O'Farrell Street in San Francisco, near that city's skid-row district. Opened as an adult movie theater by Jim and Artie, the Mitchell brothers, on July 4, 1969, the O'Farrell is one of America's oldest and most notorious adult-entertainment establishments; by 1980, the nightspot had become a major force in popularizing close-contact (i.e. the dancer sitting on the customer) lap dancing that would become the norm in strip clubs nationwide.^[1] The late journalist Hunter S. Thompson, a longtime friend of the Mitchells (who was falsely reported to be working as the club's night manager in 1985), once called the O'Farrell "the Carnegie Hall of public sex in America" and Playboy magazine praised it as "the place to go in S.F.!"

1 Operation
2 History
3 Location and murals
4 Notable Dancers
5 External links
6 References

[edit] Operation

The O'Farrell is open six days a week and every evening of the year. Customers are charged a comparatively steep admission price ($15 and up) and no alcoholic beverages are served. The O'Farrell's main showroom is New York Live, a continuous striptease show where one girl dances on stage while the others offer lap dances by asking each customer, "Want some company?" meaning, "Want me to sit on your lap for a few minutes?" Strippers offer these lap dances for a substantial tip ($20 is common) and there are several themed rooms where girls offer different services. These include the Ultra Room, a peep show-type room where patrons stand in private booths watch and tip women who perform using various props or dildos; the Green Door Room, with semiprivate showers with a selected model, heavy petting in the “Kissing Room” (although not all dancers make themselves available for private sessions with customers) and live onstage lesbian simulated-sex performances. The O'Farrell is renowned for featuring the industry's prettiest nude dancers, some of whom have gone on to appear in major pornographic magazines and films. These days, the authorities seem not to mind what happens between dancers and customers in San Francisco's strip clubs as long as it is discreet.^[1]

[edit] History

The theater was opened as an adult cinema by the Mitchell brothers on the site of an old, two-storey Pontiac car dealership. Upstairs they produced and directed the pornographic films they showed downstairs. Later, seeing that the Condor Club in North Beach had been a topless bar since 1964 with legal impunity, the Mitchells refocused their business primarily as a strip club by building the Ultra Room, but sex movies have always been shown at the O'Farrell.

The hit porn film Behind the Green Door premiered at the O'Farrell in 1972, with the Mitchell brothers' parents in the audience.^[2] Since 1986 day the theatre has a "Green Door Room" (which was where much of the Green Door sequel was filmed); it used to feature lesbian shower shows but the shower has since been removed.

In the 1980s, newly elected Mayor Dianne Feinstein walked into the O'Farrell and said, "I want to check this place out." Jim Mitchell, who happened to be in the lobby at that moment, reportedly said, "Sure, if you buy a ticket." Feinstein walked out. Soon after, raids occurred, ostensibly to restore safety and health of exotic dancers and resulted in obscenity charges being filed against the Mitchell brothers. The Mitchells, apparently not lacking a sense of humor, changed their marquee to read, "For showtimes, call..." and put up Feinstein's unlisted phone number. ^[3]

The theater featured live sex shows on stage until the courts ordered them to dicontinue doing so. As well, the dancers in New York Live originally were nude as they sat on men's laps, but a judge instructed the O'Farrell's management to make sure the girls at least wore brassieres and underpants. Lesbian sex acts are still common (many of the dancers are gay or bisexual).

On February 1, 1985, the theatre was raided by a dozen police officers during a performance by Marilyn Chambers (the star of Behind the Green Door); the District Attorney declined to press charges. Police later retaliated against a journalist who had suggested that the raid was carried out to derail an ordinance that would have stripped police from rights to license adult theaters.^[4]

Over the years, the Mitchells had to defend themselves in some 200 court cases involving obscenity or related charges. They were always represented by aggressive counsel (attorneys Michael Kennedy and the late Tom Steel) and won every case.^[5]

In February 1991, the theater was again in the news after the premeditated killing of Artie Mitchell by his brother. Michael Kennedy defended Mitchell and convinced the jury that Jim killed Artie because the younger man was psychotic from drugs and had become dangerous (Artie had recently threatened to throw a Molotov cocktail into the O'Farrell; his brother/murderer, in 1996, established the "Artie Fund" to raise money for drug-abuse prevention). Jim Mitchell was sentenced to six years in prison for voluntary manslaughter and released from San Quentin after having served three years, in 1997. He resumed his position as the O'Farrell's top man; today, his daughter Meta is the nightspot's general manager. (See the article on the Mitchell brothers for details.)

Following the fratricide and its legal aftermath, two Bay Area reporters (David McCumber and John Hubner) wrote books about the Mitchell brothers: X-Rated and Bottom Feeders, respectively. In both books the authors portray the O'Farrell Theatre as a mirrored, velvet-lined house of sleaze where perfumed, bikini-clad whores prowl the aisles, hustling greenbacks from shy, ugly customers who cannot get girls any other way. Upstairs, the offices are a model of inefficiency, staffed by the brothers' childhood friends; bored bosses play billiards and smoke pot all day; the Mitchells' business manager (who sells the brothers' videos to rental outlets nationwide) at one point, is said to be, out of sheer indifference, two months late in processing orders as his frustrated customers leave phone messages by the dozen.

In 1994, Ellen Vickery and Jennifer Bryce, two ex-dancers at the O'Farrell Theatre, filed a class-action suit against the theater in the name of more than 500 ex-dancers, arguing that the theater's classification of dancers as independent contractors was incorrect, and that they were therefore owed back wages as well as a return of the stage fees of $200 per shift. The case was settled in 1998 with the dancers receiving $2.85 million.^[6]^[3]^[7] Similar suits have since been filed against numerous other strip clubs, and both labor commissions and the courts have consistently ruled in favor of dancers and awarded past wages and stage fee reimbursements.^[1] To this day, the theater management aggressively opposes all attempts of the dancers to unionize.

During the celebrations for the O'Farrell's 30-year anniversary in 1999, burlesque star Tempest Storm, by then already in her 70s, stripped on stage. Mayor Willie Brown declared a "Tempest Storm Day" in her honor.^[8] Marilyn Chambers returned to performed in the theatre on July 28, 1999 in what Willie Brown dubbed "Marilyn Chambers Day."^[3]

When San Francisco's Commission on the Status of Women proposed in 2006 to ban private booths and rooms at adult clubs because of concerns about sexual assaults taking place there, several O'Farrell dancers spoke out against the ban.^[9]

As of 2006, Meta Mitchell continues as the O'Farrell's manager; legal representation is provided by former San Francisco Supervisor and two-term District Attorney Terence Hallinan.^[9] A relatively low-paying workplace, the O'Farrell has low turnover; managers have been known to work there for a decade or more.

[edit] Location and murals

The theatre is located in the North-West part of the Tenderloin District, at the corner of Polk and O'Farrell street at 37°47′5.8″N, 122°25′9.5″W, on the same block as the Great American Music Hall. The entire exterior west and south faces of the theater are covered with two large murals. The west wall depicts a rainforest scene, and on the south wall is an underwater scene featuring a pod of whales. These murals were painted in 1976 and 1985 by Lou Silva^[10].

[edit] Notable Dancers

John C. Holmes, porn star, performed sex shows in the Ultra Room
Marilyn Chambers, porn star, danced in early-1980s and returned in 1999
Megan Leigh danced as Eve in the mid-1980s; she later became a porn star and committed suicide in June of 1990
Fallon porn star, danced in mid-1980s
Annette Haven erotic actress
Nina Hartley porn star
Erica Boyer porn star, danced as Super Vixen
Lily Burana was involved in the class action suit and wrote about her experiences as dancer at the O'Farrell in her 2001 book Strip City: A Stripper's Farewell Journey Across America (ISBN 0-7868-6790-6).^[11]