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In 1985, New York City Mayor Ed Koch backed the New York City Health Department's decision to shut down the city's gay bathhouses, in response to concerns over the spread of HIV/AIDS. In 1980, Plato's relocated to 509 West 34th Street. In 1979, Levinson opened Plato's West, on Yvar Avenue in Los Angeles, but the venture, "a failed attempt at franchising", was not successful and lasted only six months. The clientele was described as "an assortment of kinky types from the suburbs: dry cleaners and their wives, or fat men in toupees with their heavily made-up girlfriends." Owner Levenson often partook in sexual activity on the premises, once winning a bet against Al Goldstein and 'Butch' Katz, owner of 42nd Street's Roxy Burlesk theater, that he could ejaculate fifteen times within a twenty-four-hour day. Fameĭuring its heyday, Plato's Retreat was considered the world's most infamous sex club, popular with celebrities, porn stars, and well-to-do couples.
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Drugs (at the time alcohol was not considered a drug) and paid sexual services were also forbidden, and there was "rampant" use of drugs (most often quaaludes) by patrons.Īccording to a 1979 advertisement in SCREW magazine, the club offered, besides a heated swimming pool, a steam sauna, whirlpool baths, disco dancing, free bar and buffet, "cozy living rooms and lounging areas", a "variety of swing areas", and a backgammon lounge. This rule was intended to control the male–female ratio. Once a woman left a room after a sexual encounter, her male companion had to accompany her within two minutes. Unaccompanied women were welcome, often at a discounted rate, or free. Woman on woman sex, however, he encouraged. This of course blocked male homosexuals, and he also prohibited male-male sexual activity between the men that did get in. Levenson did not allow men unaccompanied by a female to enter. This meant that members had to follow the club's rules. Plato's Retreat was a "members-only" establishment that was legally not a public business. The hotel used to house the Continental Baths, a gay bathhouse where singer Bette Midler, often accompanied by Barry Manilow on a baby grand piano, first became a national figure. in the basement of the Kenmore Hotel on East 23rd Street between Lexington and Third Avenue, and called it "Plato's Retreat." The same year, he moved it to the basement of the Ansonia Hotel, an early 20th-century building on 2109 Broadway between West 73rd and West 74th Streets on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. In 1976, Larry Levenson, a high school friend of Al Goldstein and a former fast-food manager who was selling ice cream at Coney Island, was introduced to the swinging lifestyle by a woman he met at a bar. The first was the former location of the Continental Baths, a gay sex club that was briefly in fashion with the chic and culturally adventurous, such as Bette Midler. From 1977 until 1985 it operated in two locations in Manhattan, New York City, United States. Plato's Retreat was a swingers' club catering to heterosexual couples and bisexual women.