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New Orleans Finest Nightlife
After Hours

January 2012

The Return of the Circle Bar

01/25/12

The Return of the Circle Bar

It still feels perfectly normal to walk into the Circle Bar, never mind that it reopened just last weekend after a yearlong hiatus for repairs and renovation. An outpost at the fulcrum of Uptown and downtown, it’s still an alluring, atmospheric watering hole with one of the city’s more eclectic mixes of live music – and, incidentally, it’s still also one of the great spots for that rarefied New Orleans pursuit of streetcar-watching.

But take a seat at the conspicuously larger bar and immediately all the many changes made during that offline time begin to register, and they quickly add up to a big difference. The place still looks like the old Circle Bar, but it feels significantly bigger, a trick pulled off through addition by subtraction.

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Posted at 10:06 AM | Permalink | Comments: 0
Joy, Revisited

01/11/12

Joy, Revisited

I wasn’t around to see the Joy Theatre in its heyday, though I did catch a few movies there during its inglorious slide toward the mothballs of lost New Orleans nostalgia. Watching Spider-Man at the Joy in 2002 was memorable not so much for the film’s superhero thrills, but for the super-sized cups of soda that people in the audience periodically hurled at the battered screen when the villainous Green Goblin appeared, not to mention the gelatinous feel of a floor, its queasy mysteries invisible in the darkened theater but impossible to ignore.

Still, even in such a woebegone state the old place had character, from the marquee stretching around the corner, to the mid-century contours of the interior to, most strikingly, the towering, vertical sign...

Posted at 05:00 AM | Permalink | Comments: 1

About This Blog

Ian McNultyA transplant from his native Rhode Island, Ian McNulty quickly discovered how easy it is to strike up conversations with New Orleans people simply by asking about their favorite clubs and neighborhood joints.

He asked often, listened carefully and has been exploring the nightlife of the Crescent City ever since.

McNulty was the editor and principal contributor to Hungry? Thirsty? New Orleans, a guidebook to nightspots and inexpensive restaurants around town. He is also author of Season of Night, a memoir about life in a devastated part of New Orleans during the first few months after Hurricane Katrina.

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