Crazy Country Club (aka "Warm Beer and Lousy Food")

By Ken Thompson

“A Rabbi, a priest and a midget with a parrot on his shoulder walk into a bar…”

“I heard it.”, I tell him.

“I didn’t get even near the punch-line and already you can tell me you heard it?”

“The punch line is `… and the angel says to the parrot `Okay cutie, take off the boa and I‘ll show you what I can do?’’” “Dennis, you just can’t tell jokes funny. Give it up.” Dennis was a nice guy but like a Spaldeen plucked from the sewer, the High-Bounce wasn’t there.

I always liked jokes and funny stores. Even when I was very young and didn’t understand the joke I watched the others and if they laughed, I laughed louder. I always said I should write them down to remember them but never got around to it. One think I absolutely do know is that jokes and story telling was the best in Brooklyn and the city than in anywhere else in the world; even the Bronks.

As a kid, say twelve or so, I used to sit with my Dad as he watched evening television. He really liked the variety shows, Ed Sullivan, Jackie Gleason, Milton Berle; particularly those with the female singer and the male comedian acts. He would always say that the comedians were better in night clubs in Manhattan than on TV ‘cause on TV they had to be more careful of what they said and did or the censors wouldn’t allow them back and they wouldn’t get paid.

The comics were always very funny (using their “A” material) but I knew I had friends that were even funnier and who would get us all rolling on the floor with stories and jokes that were often vulgar, obscene, sexist, racist, and generally grossly offensive. But to a Brooklyn kid, at least me and at that point in time and not knowing about political correctness or any better, they were funny, terribly, if not wonderfully, funny. Not funny like to tell at the Thanksgiving Day dinner table but funny like to cause a super-surprised, wide-eyed look and announcement “Oh my God, I can’t believe he said that?” This partially explains why my friends and I didn’t get many second dates or even first ones.

After I turned drinking age and could go to bars and into clubs legally, we would go to different places and catch comedy acts to see what they could really do. Some were atrocious and some good. Even VERY GOOD! Even the ones that weren’t famous. They could put anyone in their place and they had a million lines and come-backs. The material was always almost new though each comedian had a particular approach or target area. Once in a while we’d hear a joke that some other comedian had used but we’d attribute it to flattery rather than stealing.

Anyway, one of the guys in our group, Dennis, who couldn’t tell jokes good, told us about a place his uncle had recommended called the “Crazy Country Club”. It was supposed to be a riot not only in terms of the comedians but also in terms of everything about it. Since it was Dennis’ suggestion, we didn’t rush to go. After he kept telling us how great his uncle said the place was we decided to give it a shot.

The place was out in Bay Ridge, across from Dyker Golf Course on Seventh Avenue, I think. When we drove up the first thing we saw was the sign saying “Warm Beer, Lousy Food”. We all laughed about the place as at least being honest. It had evidently gotten its name in the late 40’s when it put out a sign with serious mis-spellings and the neighborhood people came to see who the jokers were that couldn’t spell.

Getting into the Club wasn’t easy not because of a “captain” or such controlling entrants but because the front door didn’t work and you had to in a back way. The inside of the club was very eclectic. It had signs for air-raid shelters, subways and busses, traffic directions, beers and liquors, Coney Island, military souvenirs, Brooklyn Dodgers, and just about anything else you could hang on a wall or ceiling including toilet seats, clown stuff, Bikini tops, briefs, rubber toys, pictures of old-time bathing beauties, and golf stuff. Lotsa neon and electric signs. There was almost too much to look at.

It definitely wasn’t the Club Eleganté on Ocean Parkway or even Ben Maksik's Town and Country.

We got to the place about 9:30 and a few of the tables near the front were taken. Since we were four guys alone, they put us near the back and off to the side. A waiter took our order for beers, 7 & 7’s, and peanuts in the shell, and we kept looking, watching, and listening. I remember the cigarette smoke haze beginning to form over the entire club. The place was really outlandish except for the three bouncers who looked like “you-better-not-piss-me-off” pea-brained giants.

The emcee, chief waiter, and center piece for the Club was a bald headed guy who went by the name Uncle Fester and he was a walking riot. His mouth never stopped and he was so adept at putting down any customer who tried to come back at him. There were a couple of musicians and the drummer was able to accent everything Uncle Fester said, usually with a rim-shot. Other acts would come out and perform but the star of the Crazy Country Club was definitely Uncle Fester.

By ten o’clock the place was full and the tempo had picked up. The smoke haze had gotten thicker. Uncle Fester’s tongue was getting sharper, faster and definitely more cutting. Nothing was sacred including sex, size, attractiveness, race, clothes, ancestry, and anything about you. By 10:30 some of the up-front tables which were already picked on and offended were being vacated and other customers were taking their place.

Paulie, one of our group, whispered to us that the secret was not to engage Uncle Fester in any dialogue where he could use his lines on you. If you didn’t come back at him two times in a row, no matter what he said, he would avoid you ‘cause there wasn’t any entertainment for the rest of the audience. It became obvious that unless you could take major league abuse you shouldn’t engage the Uncle.

We did get caught once when we asked for napkins and they threw us a roll of toilet tissue and he reamed us about why REAL men would ever need NAPKINS.

Uncle Fester was seemingly merciless on girls who looked like they would go along with the schtick. He mimicked their mannerisms, the way they spoke, and the way they walked. Everything.

When they went to the powder room he would turn up a microphone and speaker so you could hear what they were saying. When they came out he would ask them knowingly about their conversation. Also, in the ladies room, evidently, there was a picture of a man with a fig leaf over his privates and it one of the visitors lifted it to take a peak there would be a loud whistle and when you came back out he would ask you about the fig leaf. The last element of the routine was to send a long blast of air up the girls’ skirts, a la Steeplechase, as they returned to their table.

A couple of times we saw the bouncers escort a table out, usually when the repartee with the Uncle got really foul or when the fellow realized his date was a truly offended lady on the verge of tears, and he came to her rescue. Usually the glassware was picked up along with the larger items from the table and the rest swept with a towel to the floor making the table immediately ready for the next party of paying targets.

At about 12:30 the cigarette haze was dense and we had had one beyond our drink limit and Dennis began getting a little loud. Uncle Fester gave it another shot saying in our specific direction “How’s date night for the four queers in the corner? Are you only holding hands (making quote marks with his hands) under the table?” It took a minute for Dennis to have it sink in and then he yelled out “We’re only here ‘cause your sister had the rag on otherwise she’d be doing us.”

Uncle Fester, without missing a beat and in a low voice, replied “My sister died last month.” No rim-shot and a deep silent pause. “She committed suicide ‘cause she couldn’t face the thought of seeing you again.” There was an immediate rim-shot, a roar from the audience and Uncle Fester had won. As Dennis aggressively stood up, the bouncers were right by his side and pushed him back into his seat. Paulie told him to shut up or he’d probably get beaten to a bloody pulp.

Dennis was seething and the bouncers could see it. Without fear or his brain engaged, Dennis came back “Yeah? Oh yeah? Well at least I’m not going bald!”

The worst audience come-back of all time. I was so embarrassed for Dennis. I shifted to the side a little to avoid the fragmentation when the Uncle exploded him. Dennis had absolutely set up Uncle Fester for a far too easy kill.

The Uncle came back, “You’re right I am balding. I had a choice to go bald or to look like a hemorrhoid. I see which option you took with that greased rats-nest on your head.”

Dennis started to babble and start a litany of expletives. We were escorted out to marching music from the band.

Our first night at the “Crazy Country Club” came to an end and it was time to get some real food.

As we were leaving, Uncle Fester was challenging a young woman about the authenticity of her above her waist – below her neck appendages.

The place was fantastic, crude, raunchy, and a riot; and we had memories that would last a lifetime. We went back one or two other times but once was really enough.

I believe that as time passed, the Club continued to change to meet the tastes of the audiences. I had heard that it relocated to a bigger building at 7th Ave and 64th Street for awhile and that the house comedian was Andrew Dice Clay. Later on the building catered to head-banger music aficionados.

The "Crazy Country Club" continued to change as did Brooklyn.

A new rendition of the "Crazy Country Club" with a different name has opened in Staten Island and is still touting “Warm Beer, Lousy Food”.