An eavesdropper apparently heard leadership at the Brooklyn Mirage’s parent company venting at Per Se about looking to sell the business.
Photo: Kevin Mazur/Getty Images
The parent company of the Brooklyn Mirage, the East Williamsburg music venue that’s been stuck in permitting limbo and reportedly hemorrhaging cash, might be up for sale. How do we know this? A dinner at Per Se.
Per Brooklyn Magazine, someone dining out at Thomas Keller’s splurgy Columbus Circle restaurant overheard Gary Richards, the nonexecutive board chairman for the Brooklyn Mirage’s parent company, Avant Gardner, talking about trying to unload the business after more than two months of delays in opening the venue’s doors. “I was looking at them the whole night, talking about how they want to sell Avant Gardner because it’s bleeding money, that they’re looking to get a buyer, but it’s impossible right now,” the eavesdropping source told the magazine. An anonymous operations team member at Avant Gardner also told the mag there has been internal talk of selling the company, adding that some employees haven’t received months’ worth of back pay and no one is getting holiday incentive wages. “As far as speculation goes from me, this summer is a wash,” the source said.
It’s been a rough go for the Brooklyn Mirage. (And that’s not including all of this.) The venue was closed earlier this year for renovations that would revamp the complex with a larger dance floor and beefed-up sound system, but its May 1 opening date came and went while the space remained closed.
At issue: failed safety inspections and other issues stemming from paperwork filed with the Department of Buildings. (Reportedly, there’s some disagreement between the two parties about what counts as a “temporary” structure.)
So far, ten weeks’ worth of shows have been canceled and rescheduled elsewhere, mostly recently a pair of sold-out shows by the Canadian DJ Excision, frustrating fans and leaving the venue’s owners scrambling. (Radio silence from the venue since the Memorial Day weekend cancellations hasn’t helped.) Then its leadership went and made the rookie mistake of venting about their fiasco in public. Remember that people are always listening, Gary.
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