They were. And though they've been through a bit of a rough patch lately, they still stand outside, holding their...lightbulbs.
Luke's is just that kind of place. Random, eclectic, colorful...with monkeys watching the door and a nudie portrait of Helena Cassadine above the mantelpiece. The club is my favorite set on the show, and not just because of its owner. Rather, I love it because it's so visually stimulating; I still see something new in there every so often, something different. But it's not just that. Sure, the club is serviceable as a place for group scenes and musical numbers, and it also offers smaller rooms for scenes of pairs and trios. It's part business, part home, part office. It's versatile. But aside from the practical issues of what it looks like on camera and what it offers as a stage, Luke's club is the most metaphorical space on the show, a character study in and of itself.
I first saw the exterior of Luke's, I believe, in a flashback to Lily's death. I truly can't remember if I saw the club at all before then, since at the time the Spencers were spending most of their time at the hospital with an ailing Lulu. I'll start on the outside and work my way through the club, the office, and the back room. I'll take a look at it in terms of both set and character study; I'll consider the décor, remember some of the great scenes that took place here, and theorize about what happens--and what doesn't, or perhaps even shouldn't happen--at Luke's. And through it all, I'll connect Luke's the club to Luke the character. They're inseparable, after all, and one definitely explains the other.
Outside:
Luke: "So what are you saying, that being a memoirist for the rich and famous is safer?"
In the center of a plain, dark brick wall and dimly-lit, black-topped parking lot, there appears a corrugated tin roof with a bright white neon sign on top of it that reads, simply, "Luke's." It's a name, a claim of ownership, an announcement of presence. Luke Spencer is rarely subtle, after all.
The sign overlooks the exterior of Luke's (even though the sign itself is rarely seen), which has been the site of lots of action over the years--much of it bad. Lily Rivera Corinthos died in a car bomb explosion in 1996 at Luke's, and Nikolas Cassadine almost died in December of 1997. The club itself has been bombed, shot at, and set on fire. And yet this same lot offers valet parking on the weekends.
It's that contrast that characterizes the whole of Luke's club--and its owner. Luke's club lies on the border between the legitimate business world and the mob scene in Port Charles. And in that particularly in-between space outside of Luke's--the parking lot and walls that lie between the inside and outside of the club itself--shit, as they say ("them that says things") happens.
The co-owners have always combined the legitimate and illegitimate worlds of business. It's been Luke and Sonny, most of the time: the mob boss and the family man--who was once himself a Family man, and who knows you can never really get out. But there have been other part-owners. Jason, who was, at the time, mob boss himself, and Lucy Coe. Lucy was legitimate, but not so straight and narrow herself.
The club itself was once the Paradise Lounge, a seedy strip club Sonny owned when he first came to town. That set was placed closer to the sidewalk and street, if you remember the scenes in which Officer Rick arrests Tiffany Hill outside. It's notable that Luke's club--even though it's the same building--is set further back, removed, from the human traffic passing in front of it. And it's not the only club Luke's ever managed. Back in the early 80s he ran the Campus Disco, also owned by the mob, where Laura Baldwin worked as a waitress even after Luke raped her on the disco floor. The yacht given to him by the city of Port Charles after he stopped the weather machine also served as a club or bar at one point too, I believe, which Luke used to pay the harbor dues, etc. Laura suggested that Luke open the current club when he was itching for a project of his own about the time she was working on the anti-Incinerator campaign.
So this club is haunted by history. Appropriate, given that both Sonny and Luke are facing a lot of their own history in recent months. They both carry their past with them more than other characters on the show, and the reputation of the club precedes it as well. The building's history has been mixed--both good times and bad--for all of its owners. The current club continues to house both good and bad, both happiness and trouble, both life and death, both legal transactions and illegal connections.
But I don't want to go inside until I notice the details on the façade. The front of Luke's is a great combination of Luke and Laura, and of the competing and yet complementary elements of their marriage. Across the front, there's a porch, complete with a picket fence. And like the porch at the Spencer house, this one's seen a lot of action, from Luke, Laura and Sonny confronting Stefan when Nikolas was missing to the latest scenes with Laura, both leaving after she sees Luke and Tammy together and when she stops Katherine from bothering Nikolas. All of these porch scenes are about protection, defense, guarding the castle wall, as it were. Even when it keeps Laura away from Luke.
But the porch was also once a source of protection for Sonny, and we've found out recently that he resents its safety. Mike, Luke, and Sonny stood on the porch when Lily died in the explosion, and Sonny resents Mike's keeping him from dying with Lily. And that's the other element of the façade: it's both domestic and dangerous. The monkeys stand guard; the walls take bullets. In addition, there's a signpost with arrows pointing every which way and indicating the mileage to far off destinations. I think of M.A.S.H.'s signpost when I see it, but while those arrows pointed home, Luke's point away from home, representing the wandering side of Luke and Laura's marriage, as well as Luke's own desire to break out of the domesticity of the Spencer house and get into trouble, into danger.
The bridge between outside and inside comes with the front door. Decorated with buttons and white painted trim, it matches the interior walls of the club's bar area. And with that, we'll step inside.
Inside: The Bar
I used the word "façade" quite consciously in the section above because of the connotations associated with the word. In its simplest definition, a façade is the front face of a building. But the term implies a false front, a surface appearance, or, as Webster once put it, "an imposing appearance concealing something inferior." I don't think that what's inside Luke's is inferior (though the idea that Luke's own gruff exterior hides his sense of inferiority in various ways is convincing), but the idea of interiority v. exteriority is one I think is very present in the club set. To go inside the bar doesn't mean you've really gone inside. To go really inside is to go into the office, or into the back room. Like Luke, the club only allows certain people past the front door, and even most of them don't get much farther than that.
The club's décor is defensive. It assaults your eyes with its vibrant colors and patterns, distracting you, perhaps, from noticing what the owner might not want you to notice. The lamps at the bar are hung with padlocks, for Pete's sake. How's that for a statement? And yet scattered throughout you'll find sunflowers.
The bar itself can serve as barrier; Luke chooses carefully when he's behind and in front of the bar, keeping people at a distance or moving close to sit with only a table between--a lesser barrier or a point of focus, alternately--or with someone on the bar stools. Interestingly enough, I can't say that I remember Luke ever sitting on the sofas. Too comfortable? Not a good enough view of the door? But they offer a space apart from the main floor--another space within a space.
Meanwhile, the walls rarely show themselves from behind all the paintings and hangings on them. Art decorates the bar, mostly African prints that reflect the roots of blues music. And then there's that painting of Helena. It's sexual, in that bizarre way that Helena and Luke have about them, but it's also a move to engulf an enemy, to keep her always on his home court advantage. Above the bar hangs a huge mirror. Typically, it lets bar staff keep an eye on people even when their back is turned. At least, that's why I imagine mirrors hang over bars, and it fits Luke to always want to watch his back. At one point, of course, Luke shattered that mirror because it showed him too much of himself--but I'll come back to that in a minute. Above the mirror, there used to hang the shoe from Lucy's nurses' ball striptease. It was the positive, flirty version of Helena's portrait, I think; it was connection, sexiness, friendship, loyalty. I was grumpy when Luke lost the shoe to Felicia; that he even offered it seemed disloyal, since he had told an ailing Lucy that it would hang over the bar until she was well enough to come wear it and dance with him. But since Lucy's on the other show now, it was rather like the passing of the torch to Felicia, or torch song, as it were.
Sight isn't the only sense Luke's affects. The front room addresses all five senses (all six, if Lucy's there). Taste and smell are covered by the food and drink. And Luke's don't serve no sissy food. Cheese fries are the order of the day, and Luke goes through coffee like a madman. Sound, of course, is covered by the music, which is another of Luke's points of control. His recent battles to get back to blues music have paralleled his attempts to find himself without Laura, as at were, to get back to his own foundations. Touch? Well, that comes with the dancing.
And then there's the staff. Luke handpicks 'em, I think, because of their attitude. From Claude's copasetic cool to Babe's, well, babeness (where is Babe, anyway?), each staff member has had a uniqueness about them--down to Jason parking cars. Luke's latest hire is Hannah, and while he would have given her the job just at Sonny's say so, it's the pincushion that won him over.
For though it's defensive, this room is the heart of the place. While Luke retreats into other, smaller rooms, we've been told time and again (usually by Mike) that business just isn't as good without Luke. And the front room is where Luke goes to be seen by the public and to stir up business. The front room is a chance to interact with Luke. The front room is also a chance for Luke to make a statement to the world, to show what he wants to show and do what he wants to do. The cops are always out of their realm when they step inside, from Hannah dumping drink trays on Taggert to the general cold reception any member of the law receives there. Well, except for Bubba. And the front room is where Luke makes most of his pronouncements about the club--and, by extension, himself. For when Luke talks about the club, especially in the front room, he's talking about himself. (And, most likely, Geary's talking about himself, while Guza's talking about himself.)
Big scenes have happened in this front room: Robin's going-away-to-college party, Georgie's birth under one of the tables. The room is also, typically, an area of performance. There's the stage where B.B. King played, and Luke can put on quite a show himself. He's danced many times; he and Lucky staged an outburst over Laura's "death" at the hands of Stefan; he and Laura pretended to fight (and imagined a dance) on their anniversary when they were supposed to be estranged.
Yet when the club is closed, the bar itself has been the site of many a private moment. Some of those moments were happy. Luke and Laura have made love on that bar, and Sonny, Mike, and Luke have enjoyed Lucy coming in before opening time to brighten up--or at least liven up--their day. But Luke has also faced demons there, from Lucky's torture with "Rise" and Luke's subsequent baseball-bat expressed rage to his conversation about the rape with Laura. Sonny and Mike came face to face there, after Mike stole L&B's speakers from The Outback and brought them back to the club. And there also Sonny told Mike that he loved him when he thought he was leaving forever.
Tammy: "Luke, it's a bar."
Those scenes are the most intriguing to me, in terms of space, because of the line that's crossed between private and public space. The club has served as living room for Luke many times, as the sofa in the office or the apartment upstairs has served as home. It's both home and not-home; it's not-quite-domestic. More specifically, it's not Laura's home. And lately, it's not even been Laura. Luke substitutes the club for his home, but there at the bar, he's also substituted Tammy and Felicia for Laura. In past years, he chatted Lucy up many times at the bar, but beginning with the storm scenes, Laura has been displaced, most notably when Luke and Tammy had sex on the bar where he and Laura had once made love (during a musical montage a few years ago).
Inside: The Office
Mike once said that Luke's is Luke, but that it's also Laura and everybody else who comes there. I don't think he's got that right. At least not anymore. While the outside décor shows the blend of Luke and Laura, there's less of her the further you go in. But the office is still not really a private space, even though it serves as Luke's sanctum sanctorum. The décor is still for show, in some sense, from the poster of the statue of liberty smoking a cigar to the myriad of crap on the shelves. Most of it's useful crap, like Luke's very own box of hair...er, disguises, but then there's that star-shaped lamp, or the Mexican ceramic something or other he displayed for Felicia recently.
Things in the office aren't aesthetic, they're utilitarian, for the most part. All that crap on the shelves is useful, I'd be willing to bet, or was at one time. And the other walls are lined with filing cabinets and a safe. The decorations aren't art; they're industrial signs, advertising, and the like. For somebody who's never seemed to be swayed by images or brandnames, the irony's amusing, I suppose. From the big Goodrich sign over the desk to the fan blade by the door, the stuff in the office is harder, less delicate, less showy than the stuff in the front room. The office is for business, for confrontations, but also for retreat. There's a path to the front room, but there's also a door that closes, and that door has both a peep-hole and a lock on it. The wall behind the desk is brick, and the walls...well, I have to admit that the walls are suspiciously like a certain magenta color. I guess times and tastes have changed.
The desk can serve as a barrier. Luke typically sits behind it in a rather imposing chair, yelling at people who come in. In several scenes with Laura in recent months, Luke's remained behind the desk. But when he really gets into something, he walks out in front, taking the giant desk out of the way of the conversation. I don't think, however, that I've ever seen him sit in that other chair. He's hunkered down in the desk chair under a blanket or coat, weeping about the rape. And he's stood at the window, wondering what he should do without Laura in his life. But the chair seems reserved for guests. Laura's sat there many times; Lucky sat there talking about poker debts and refusing to go to Switzerland. Luke has imagined Robert there recently, and Tammy and Felicia have both sat there. Sonny seems most often there, but I noticed recently that in Sonny scenes, it's a different chair. I suspect that the set people have a bit of fun, when it comes to Luke's club, and I swear that chair has more than once changed to a light tan leather number with brads around its high headrest when Sonny's come to visit. Usually it's a wooden piece lined with worn rust-colored fabric. You keep an eye out. The other thing I've always wanted to believe was a signal of something was the elevator buttons behind the desk chair. They go side to side, rather than up and down, which seems fitting--but I've always wanted them to be an indicator of the boss's mood or something. Sometimes one or the other is on, sometimes both, sometimes neither. When Luke and Sonny had their conversation about moving on, they were both off. Most recently, they were both on as Bobbie entered to tell Luke about her engagement, and were both off as she left him, stunned.
Luke is not a clean desk kind of guy. And while the desk takes up most of the room and offers some kind of protection against the outside world, it's also utilitarian in nature. It holds the liquor, sometimes, and the paperwork, and, more recently, the candy dish. And yet it's also a very personal space. Almost never do you see somebody cross the line and go behind the desk. Jerry invaded the safe once, and Lucky's raided the drawers. Bobbie's looked over Luke's shoulder at the computer screen, and, most recently, Felicia's hidden under the desk with the skulls. It's also where Luke spends a lot of time alone, either in thought or in bookkeeping (when Sonny's not around--and notice, when Sonny does the books he does them in the front room, while Jason tends to take them to the penthouses). And while the club is not-home, Luke still has photos on his desk. Whenever I remember to notice them, they're the same three: a photo of Luke, Lucky, and Laura (and maybe baby Lulu), a photo of Lucky, and a photo of Laura. I keep watching to see when the photo of Laura disappears, perhaps to be replaced by one of Lu. But it's still there, though sometimes it's in the back and sometimes it's in the front.
The desk is also where Luke does most of his smoking and drinking. Or used to do his smoking. Now the bigwigs have declared no more cigars, so we're left without one of the most amazing props of all. The cigars let people know Luke was around (even if it was breaking into Stefan's house), kept them at a distance, gave him something to do with his nervous energy, showed us his mood, and gave him an easy way to piss people off. The irony when Faison showed up smoking the same cigars was fantastic, and now Faison's eating out of the candy dish instead--a little short hand, perhaps, or a way to draw attention to the replacement/absence.
I've always been interested in what happens where in the club, and especially in the office. Luke's scenes with Laura alternate between the club office and their living room, it seems. One of their biggest fights came in the office, when Laura found Luke listening into Wyndemere and when he revealed he'd found her Cassadine medallion and was wearing it at the time. This was the same night as Robin's going away party, and the sense of celebration v. family fight was the epitome of the distinct spaces in the club for me. I was therefore very interested to see Luke and Sonny break their partnership not in the club or office, but on the docks. When Sonny had brought the papers to Luke in April, Luke said he didn't want to lose anybody else. But the final split was removed from the club they've shared between them for so long.
Inside: The Back Room
The fact that we almost never see the back room makes my point for me. This is a place only few have seen, we're told. You have to have an "in" to get in, and my biggest complaint is that Miranda once chatted in the back room with Sonny. That's up there with the boy band transgression, in my book. Hung with art, it serves as private gambling parlor, billiards room, and, sometimes, escape. I believe Luke, Sonny, and Lucy once set up a poker game for Joe Scully back there. With a party raging above, Luke hid out in the back room (to no avail, what with the steady stream of traffic) before his departure one winter. But mostly, we hear about the backroom without seeing it. Luke lets in a few chosen people, just as he lets few people see what's really at his heart.
In November of 1997, there was a great conversation between Jason and Luke about the club. I don't have the transcription; it's fallen through the cracks in my past review project. It happens when Sonny is gone and Jason is covering his part of Luke's. Luke asks Jason why he wants to remain a partner in the club. Luke smiled as Jason gave, not the business reasons, but the sentimental reason: Sonny would want him to. And that smile said that Luke remembered this feeling, that maybe he missed it, and that maybe he held it up for scrutiny. Most definitely it said that he connected with Jason in a way he might not have found in the past, and was pleasantly surprised.
Luke's is Luke's. And it's Luke. He judges people by their appreciation for his music and his bar, and he's designed it so that it reflects his personality, even if he doesn't realize the depths of that reflection. Laura may have made that rickety old house a home, but Luke's has made the club his.