At the front of the building you can still see the outline of what was once the ticket booth. A big billboard at the front of the building announced ‘American Repertory Theater’ in huge letters, while a much smaller sign was attached to the door read ‘Spijker’. American playwright Edward Albee officially opened it, in October 1983. The first thing he did was close the restaurant upstairs and put in a stage with 65 seats. Raphael’s dream was to have a ‘real theater’. While the actors sweat it out on the pool table, the audience was sitting on beer crates in the bar. These performances were held downstairs after Sunday Brunch. Raphael Brandow was the artistic director of the American Repertory Theatre and had performed in the Spijker from 1980 onwards with such plays as ‘I’m Working as a Waiter but I’m Really a Star” and ‘Thinking Straight’. The new owner of the Spijker was no stranger to the place. When Peter was hit by arthritis, the couple decided to change gear and sell the Spijker exactly five years after it had opened. With the bar a success and the hotel full most of the time, Avi remembers suffering from an enormous lack of sleep. The most beautiful butt got a 100-guilder note stuck between its cheeks. One of the more bizarre happenings in the Spijker in those days was the ‘most beautiful butt competition.’ Peter hung a curtain with holes in it from the ceiling, and the contestants stuck their arse’s through. White painted tree branches with white doves circling them, covered the ceiling. Avi remembers one Christmas in particular, the décor was magnificent. Crazy parties were held, and the bar became known for its offbeat but tasteful decorations during the holidays. The Spijker was everything Avi and Peter had dreamed of. However, an exception was sometimes made for the restaurant. Tuesday came to be known as “Spijker Day”. Eyewitnesses from that period remember customers queuing up outside the Spijker in lines that stretched as far as the canal. This proved to be such a success that beer for a guilder became a regular feature in Tuesdays. When the Spijker opened on April 15, 1978, beer was sold for one guilder as a promotional stunt. In the back of the restaurant floor there were (and still are) cruise toilets and (for convenience) a tiny dark room. Tom of Finland was spotted here with his close friend Rob, from the shop with the same name. The U.S.-style Sunday brunches were a huge success, the Bloody Mary’s outstanding, served with stalks of celery sticking out. Upstairs, at the front of the building, a small restaurant was hammered in. Down in the cellar the bar looks very much as it did then, pool table in the back, TV in the upper right-hand corner above the bar, and the open fire opposite. Avi claims to know every nail in the bar. While Avi and Peter moved in upstairs at Kerkstraat 4, they completely refurbished the two lower levels. It was a great place to hang out, a great place to have. TVs showing porn, a pool table and hot cruising. The Spike in New York was everything the couple thought a gay bar should be. On one of their many trips to New York, Avi and Peter were very impressed by one particular bar: The Spike. Kerkstraat was the center of gravity in gay Amsterdam in the 1970s, and Avi and Peter decided to buy the property at number 4. A building at the beginning of Kerkstraat had been on the market for years. However, one of Avi’s dreams was to have his own bar. Business flourished and the couple enjoyed a sparkling life filled with travel, fun and hard work. The couple bought Hotel Orfeo near Leidseplein and transformed it into a gay hotel. The story of the Spijker starts in the late 1960s, when two men met in the notorious DOK disco on Koningsplein.Ī blond Dutch hunk, Peter Königshausen, chased Avi Ben-Moshe, a gorgeous Israeli in his early twenties.
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