Daniel Maurer The current location of Lucky Cheng’s on First Avenue.With the annual Drag March set to kick off in Tompkins Square Park at 7 p.m. tonight and the final performance of “Cowboy Mouth” tonight as well, we thought we’d check in with Hayne Suthon, the owner of Lucky Cheng’s, which will soon move to Times Square.
Ms. Suthon hopes to haul her her drag operation to 240 West 52nd Street around Labor Day weekend, and is in negotiations with two “upscale” operators in the same vein as Beauty & Essex.
“All the concepts are nice restaurants. Not clubby kind of stuff,” Ms. Suthon said.
“Sutra has been shopping around for something more high end,” she added, referencing Ariel Palitz’s nightclub on the same blocks as Cheng’s, which is also on the market. “It’s time to be a bit more grown-up around the neighborhood.” Read more…
Daniel Maurer Lucky Cheng’s at 24 First Avenue.The neighborhood’s top drag destination, Lucky Cheng’s, will be moving to a location near Times Square in the next six months, the owner revealed today.
Citing dwindling tourist traffic, Hayne Suthon, who has run the First Avenue cabaret restaurant since 1993, said that the operation would move to a more desirable location on 52nd Street.
“The phone used to ring off the hook, but as Times Square became a magnet for tourists — we just can’t get them down here,” said Ms. Suthon. “We’ve tried back flips, standing on our heads; they want to stay up there now.”
Ms. Suthon would not give an address for the new location because she had yet to sign a lease. But that didn’t keep her from singing the new space’s praises. If all goes as planned, the location will have two tiers of drag performances, an all-you-can-eat buffet, a more high-end menu and seating for around 350 people. (Yesterday, Grub Street reported that the current location was on the market.)
“Walking by the space, and looking at the people, we said, ‘This is our demographic,” Ms. Suthon said, later noting that her clientele is “the kind of customer that wants to go see ‘Jersey Boys,’ and tourists from Missouri.” The bachelorette and birthday partiers will just as easily go to Times Square as the East Village, she added. Read more…
