Bukowski Readings At the Frolic Room
The Frolic Room occupies a sliver of the ground floor in the landmark Pantages Theater where the starred pavement of Hollywood Boulevard begins. The theater opened in 1930, the bar sometime after and hasn’t closed a day since, remaining the oldest gin mill in Hollywood.* The Frolic is adorned with autographed glossies of its celebrity habitués, ones that hung around after the neighborhood spiraled into shit, like Silvester Stallone and John Belushi. But above them all hangs a linocut profile portrait of the poet Charles Bukowski who was a regular before his death in 1994, and fans of the poet will gather here come Monday to discuss the literary works they share a common interest in. With neither stage nor microphone, they will casually recite their favorite poetry in the quiet time before the joint fills up around six. The bar maintains a small library of volumes “but anyone can bring stuff they downloaded from the internet” says Reece, a photographer who on a recent evening took up the authors favorite stool, at the end of the bar by the cigarette machine.
