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After Decades of Drinks and Laughs, Is It Last Call at the Friars Club?
The New York headquarters of the legendary entertainment fraternity is facing the threat of foreclosure as its leaders look for a buyer willing to help keep the party going.
One of the final episodes of “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel,” released this month, captured the bawdy, profanity-laced ritual that was a celebrity roast at New York’s Friars Club — the kind of entertainment that helped make the club the buzzing epicenter of the comedy world.
But these days the landmark home of wisecracks and cigar smoke, and legends like Milton Berle and Jerry Lewis, is trying to fight off extinction.
A loan company has moved to foreclose on the club after it missed payments on a $13 million mortgage. And a federal judge is mulling whether to appoint an outside company to take over the Friars Club’s six-story townhouse on East 55th Street, which has been shuttered for months as the club’s financial problems have deepened.
An inspection in March by the loan company described a building marred by mounds of trash, signs of mice and roaches, mold damage and containers of “unidentifiable liquid waste,” according to court papers. The club said it has “improved the conditions of the property” since that inspection. Still, the Frank Sinatra Room, once a place of fine dining, remained a scene of unfinished renovations with light bulbs hanging from the ceiling during a recent visit.
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