East Village Residents Losing All Street Cred

via DNA Info

There are those who complain that New York City has lost its edge, and then there are those who throw hissy fits over red drapes hanging in a window of an upcoming comedy club because it looks too "bordello"-y. No, this is not a story about Park Slope, where there are actual things to worry about, like kindergartners getting waitlisted! This is in one of the "edgiest" of Manhattan nabes, the gritty, take-no-prisoners, don't-fuck-with-us East Village.

As we wrote earlier this month, East Village residents were none to happy to see a sign that said "Hot Chicks Room" (in neon pink, oh my!), nearly adjacent to the family-friendly Two Boots pizza establishment! They protested this nastiness (which was a nod to a sketch by the Upright Citizens Brigade, who are due to inhabit the location shortly), and eventually wore down the group enough to get them to say they'd take down the sign.

Power has gone to their heads, apparently, because neighbors are now pissed that there are red drapes hanging in the windows of the venue, reports DNA Info.

"They look like red velvet, like you would see in a bordello," said Felicia Caggiano, 66, whose window looks out onto the theater and who previously planned to start a petition against the "repulsive" Chicks sign.

"What's next, red lamps on the outside?" she said. "I wasn't expecting white lace, that's for sure. But I wasn't expecting red. It really looks like a bordello."

The response, from Upright Citizens Brigade managing director Alex Sidtis:

"This is my only comment," he wrote in an email, adding a link to a Google Images search of "theatre curtains" showing a page full of red drapes similar to the ones in his windows.

In fairness, this is not all East Village residents being annoying pains in asses, but a select few. If it's not the bridge and tunnelers clogging our streets on the weekends, it's the elderly ladies offended by curtains. Just another way in which the neighborhood is gentrifying, we guess. We can mobilize to fight draperies but not to save historic buildings. Sigh.

Comedy Club's Red Curtains the Latest Irritant in East Village [DNA Info]

Previously: 'Hot Chicks Room' Sign Will Be Pulled So as Not to Offend East Village Residents