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Arts & Entertainment

Frank's Cocktail Lounge and Write Night

When 11 performers riff on the theme of "looks" next Thursday, they will do so at a beloved Fort Greene bar—where looks can be deceiving.

Paul Boocock was surprised to see himself naked a few years back.

He says he caught himself in a full-length mirror by accident and thought, “Oh my god, I now have my father’s body.” It was a moment that made him think about looks—his looks, the way he looks at things, the way others look at him.

Boocock is one of 11 theater artists and writers who will be riffing on the theme of “Looks” next Thursday as part of Write Night @ Frank’s, the eighth Write Night since the series began in 2009—each with a different theme, and all of them at in Fort Greene.

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Allotted 10 minutes apiece, the performers plan to offer original monologues, songs, scenes, book excerpts or poems connected in some way to looks.

Cindy Hanson, one of the two founders of Write Night, suspects she is starting to look older: “People have been offering me their seats on subways lately and I'm perplexed by it.” Stephanie Bok, the other founder, finds it annoying that people are always telling her she looks as if she is in a bad mood, and doubly annoying that even strangers urge her to smile. Janice Lowe, a composer and poet, has a phobia about being photographed. Playwright and actress Julia Susman plans to play various characters to demonstrate what it means to judge or be judged based on appearance. Journalist and occasional wrestler Mike Edison is set to read from his forthcoming book, “Dirty! Dirty! Dirty!” an excerpt that lays out his theory about how technology has introduced “a new wave of cheap smut” that looks terrible. He promises to bring along a bongo-player to accompany him.

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The theme this time seems especially apt for the site of the performances, Frank’s Cocktail Lounge. First-time visitors may see only the circa-1974 décor, the white plaster spikes sticking down from the ceiling or the dark narrow bar. As Boocock puts it, “It looks pre-gentrification; it hasn’t been retrofitted.”

But looks aren’t everything. Janice Lowe knows it as the place where she met her boyfriend on New Year’s Eve 2007; where she attended her best friend’s wedding reception; where she began going 20 years ago.

“It’s been my spot,” Bok said. “I love that it’s not overrun by hipsters.”

“It’s home,” says Cain Perkins. “My earliest memory of the place: When I first was starting to walk, I walked in here.”

Since Frank’s may be the last place you'd expect to see a toddler—that last comment might require a little explanation: Cain is the grandson of Frank Perkins, the Frank of Frank’s, who started the bar in 1974.

“My wife and I ran the place,” says Frank Perkins, who is now 82 years old. “She passed two years ago. My son’s running it now.”

Tyrone Perkins—Frank’s son and Cain’s father—understands the appeal of the place: “It’s been here a long time. It’s a friendly atmosphere.” He explains why it is one of the only such places still in existence: “We own the building, so we don’t have to pay an exorbitant amount of rent.”

That it is old and unwavering appeals to Frank’s loungers and neighbors, perhaps sometimes to excess. When the Perkins family changed the bar’s sign eight years ago—putting up a tasteful maroon awning in place of the loud white sign with the two red martini glasses—there was an uproar. The Perkins kept the new awning, but responding to the outcry put the old sign up on the side of the building, where it remains.

Write Night is not the only regular arts-related event the Perkins family has invited into their establishment. Every Wednesday, Frank’s serves as host to Grown and Sexy Karaoke. Once a month, there is a Nu-Soul Saturday, a concert of independent musicians. “Usually it’s the third Saturday of the month, but this month it’s the last Saturday,” Tyrone says.

People may be attracted to Frank’s Cocktail Lounge for the same reasons that drew Boocock to Write Night.

An established writer and performer who has had one-man shows in several Manhattan theaters, Boocock joined Write Night in what looks to be a miniature act of personal rebellion. “When you do a full production, it has to be very polished. I find that stifling. Everything these days is structured, polished, a ‘deliverable.’”

Frank Perkins explains its appeal more simply. “We run a clean, quiet place.”

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