The Noise and the Hurry

A Penn prof's latest book puts Philly nightlife's stress and swagger under the microscope.

by A.D. Amorosi

When David Grazian started working on his most recent book, he wanted to find the skin and bones of Philly's latest nightlife renaissance. Now that it's finished, On the Make: The Hustle of Urban Nightlife (University of Chicago Press) paints the scene like something out of a Damon Runyon novel, full of schemers and suckers born every minute.

Michael T. Regan BOOK 'EM: David Grazian, whose On the Make made its way to bookshelves last December, embraces Philly's grime-and-glam dichotomy.

Fueled by interviews conducted by Grazian — associate professor and chairman of undergraduate studies for UPenn's Department of Sociology — and his staff, the book dryly and smartly presents Philadelphia's prominence as a funky chic nightlife center; it's Manhattan at half the price.

But the anthropological approach proposes there's some sort of ruse at work on a daily basis, between the proprietors and habitués.

So he asked his mostly anonymous interviewees how long it takes to put on eye shadow; how much a fake ID costs; how many women will guys "on the make" approach in a single night; how low-tipping customers still manage to get the attention of their bartender in crowded clubs; and on and on.

"The book attempts to reveal the downtown nocturnal terrain of Center City, with an emphasis on the nightclub and dining corridors surrounding Old City and Rittenhouse Square," says Grazian, 35, from his office on Locust Walk in West Philly. "Consequently, I sought out the young affluent types who frequent those scenes, along with a diverse smattering of professionals from across the industry food chain, from bar owner Avram Hornik to the busboys at Barclay Prime." As a sociologist, he's always fascinated by the minutiae of everyday life.

Flirty waitresses, winking hostesses and grinning bouncers make appearances in On the Make. So do PR consultants, drinking wing men, snobby DJs, event planners and paid partiers — the mod equivalent of Runyon's bookies and mooches. (No one in On the Make is named "Nathan Detroit" or "Sky Masterson," but a name like "Nicole Cashman" does the trick.) You can't help but expect a chorus of "Luck Be a Lady" to come swinging through the text.

Dealing as it does with Philadelphia nightlife, locals will probably just flip through the book looking for the names and places in bold letters. They're there — usual suspects from the Standard Tap to Stephen Starr, from the staged sleaze of Dirty Frank's to the sober décor of Tangerine. And in a world of blip-filled media, a book that acts as a serious discourse on nightlife without IM slang or Blackberry abbreviation might go (sadly) unnoticed by its denizens because they're too busy on the make.

"I wouldn't underestimate Philly nightclub party-hounds," says Grazian. "They may not be bookworms, but overall, Philly's bar hoppers are a savvy group who take nightlife frighteningly seriously."

So On the Make goes beyond the decidedly lowbrow to discuss the salaciousness of nightlife. It's not a textbook. But its rigidity often reads like one. Which is totally fine by Grazian. And although I might hope for a bit more drugs and drink and nameless sex, that sort of thing ain't happening.

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"Nameless sex — please, I'm a married man," jokes the writer. (He's married to Meredith Broussard, freelance scribe for City Paper, among other pubs.)

"As for the drugs, who can remember?"

Agreed.

Grazian may have made his bones in the Windy City (see also his 2003 book, Blue Chicago: The Search for Authenticity in Urban Blues Clubs). But the Rutgers—New Brunswick grad grew up in Fort Lee, N.J., regularly taking the train down to Philly to visit friends at UPenn. "I was served my first illegal beer at age 17 at the old Palladium on Penn's campus. In '94 my college girlfriend moved to Philly, where I spent summer weekends bopping around South Street and the Gayborhood."

After that romance fizzled, Grazian moved to Chicago and hung out in blues bars for seven years — playing sax, studying how black American music got bastardized by white folk — while earning a Ph.D. in sociology. Seeking a change of scenery, he moved to Philly in 2001 to teach at the college he'd boozed at as a teenager.

"I fell in love again with the density of Center City and its thick pedestrian traffic; its delicate balance of cosmopolitan chic and proletarian grit; and its mix of second-hand record shops, dive bars and hoagie trucks," says Grazian.

As a sociologist of urban culture, writing about Philadelphia was the easiest creative decision he ever made. "The eclecticism of social life here could provide grist for a thousand books about its diverse people and its microzones of city living."

Besides, Grazian personally finds the difference between Philly and ChiTown barely negligible. Philadelphians and Chicagoans are a sociable lot, though the inhabitants of our town hide behind a veneer of toughness. Both cities are bastions of extreme class inequality ("That's evidenced by the ostentatious character of their respective downtown scenes of affluence").

But an academic study of Philadelphia night culture made sense when you consider that the most chronicled scenes — Vegas, Manhattan, L.A. — look nothing like the rest of America. "Vegas is a dreamscape. Philadelphia is a reality," says Grazian. "And sociology is the study of the here-and-now, the nitty-gritty of everyday life as experienced by the 99.9 percent of the country that can't afford to party at the Palms."

Since the world of nightclubs and fine dining wasn't really his scene to begin with, Grazian never needed to pretend to be fabulous or fear that strangers would accuse him of being a made man. That Grazian, too, looks the part of an everyman helped his research into the swankiest spots. "Being a bookish professor with two left feet made my job a lot easier. Besides, can you think up a worse pickup line than 'Hey, I'm a sociologist ... mind if I study you?' As far as I can recall, only one woman has ever fallen for such a gambit, and I married her."

The biggest surprise in On the Make was the discovery of how anxiety-inducing urban nightlife can be, and not just for the wallflowers. "Shrinking violets and 40-year-old virgins, sure, they were scared," says Grazian. "But also the popular kids and the beautiful people — especially the popular kids and the beautiful people. I sometimes think we'd all just be better off dressing down, and stop trying so hard to be hip. Having fun should be way more fun than this."

(a_amorosi@citypaper.net)