PORN, WE HARDLY KNEW YE
The Herald & News
Published: 08/11/2000

These are sad, sad times for anybody who really enjoys gay porn. A week ago today, the Montauk Theater in Passaic, a premier showcase of erotica for 25 years, could not get its entertainment license renewed by the city council. This could mean the end of the Montauk. No more might we measure time by the falling snows and the parade of movies starring Hungarian midgets.

Why did it all have to end? A bunch of people from town merely spent 25 years trying to close it down, and one day it did. So it’s nobody’s fault, really. One thing we do know for certain, though: The town sure didn’t violate the First Amendment rights of a despised minority. No sirree. That sure didn’t happen.

The problem is, crimes were committed. Police focused on the place for several years and — as almost never happens when authorities look at a place long enough — lo and behold found violations. Apparently, patrons were forming certain kinds of social circles. One customer even tried to pick up an undercover police officer — though if only he’d known the guy was a cop, he certainly would have made him put on the uniform first.

A victimless crime? Imagine if you never, ever thought about sex, but had a purely academic interest in gay porn — if you were a graduate student, say. Yeah, that’s it. You walked into the Montauk because you’re a graduate student, and you’re innocently watching a movie about three plumbers — sort of like the one with the Three Stooges, except that when Moe conks heads with Larry, the script goes in a really unexpected direction. Then while all this is going on, you are shocked — shocked, I say! — when someone in the theater leans over and invites you back to his place for Fritos and lemonade.

Being propositioned in a theater, you see, is completely different from being propositioned in, say, a bar or disco.

Oddly, the city had once not been able to prove that crimes were being committed, back when it tried to close the Montauk in 1993. So they must have had other reasons for not liking the place. People have mentioned a few:

  • Women had complained of being hit on in front of the theater. Considering the kind of pornography showing inside, though, and considering the kind of street scene outside, probably the only people not bothering women out front were theater patrons.

  • It creates a public health hazard. Apparently the public holds picnics in the lobby, and doctors have been performing tonsillectomies near the popcorn stand. Yet the health hazards must be even worse than at, say, Club Casino, a downtown club in Passaic that’s had years of legal troubles, including a barroom brawl. Club Casino nonetheless had its entertainment license returned to it last June. What could the Montauk have that’s even worse than physical violence? The city health officer says he found … traces of manhood on the theater’s walls and floors. It is of no concern that the substance was never tested or proven to be actual … traces of manhood, and for all I know it was also purple and vaguely resembled a jujube. The point is that, whatever it is, we get to put someone out of business. Wheeeeeee!

  • The theater should show films that families want to see. Of course, six other theaters in Passaic went out of business doing just that. But is it our fault that guys who like gay porn are the only people who go out to a movie anymore?

    The point is that opponents of the theater did not spit on the rights of free expression. They simply found a clever way to make it useless. And the city of Passaic — which has had five murders so far this year, and in 1999 had 52 crimes per 1,000 people — has used its police resources for something it really wanted. It closed its last movie theater.