Indianapolis LGBTQ bar Zonie’s Closet to have final night Saturday – IndyStar
Lori Clubs and Denice Benefiel have been preparing for the closing of their bar, Zonie’s Closet, for months.
They’ve limited their hours, collected photos from customers to display and tried to buy just the right amount of alcohol.
However, Clubs, 56, still tears up and Benefiel, 53, chokes slightly on her words when they describe what the final night means to them.
“It feels like the end of my youth,” Benefiel said.
“It’s the end of an era,” Clubs said.
Since it was established in 2008, Zonie’s Closet has been a safe gathering place on the east side of Indianapolis for LGBTQ+ community members and allies. It is a drag bar that has featured many queens and kings in their early years, as professionals or both.
On Saturday, August 6, the bar will have its final night — the final drag performance and final drinks for the 14-and-a-half-year-old gay bar.
Recent history at Zonie’s Closet
When Benefiel and Clubs were growing up, one of the only spaces they could be themselves was in gay bars.
“There didn’t use to be gay churches and gay restaurants and things like that,” Benefiel said. “We met at bars.”
She and Clubs wanted to create a business like the ones where they made their friends. Clubs said she wanted to not only be a part of the scene, but also make it better.
When the two business and life partners purchased the space at 1446 E. Washington St., it was Illusions, a karaoke and drag spot that had been in business since the late 1990s. Although Benefiel had never imagined herself owning a drag bar, she and her partner decided to retain the tradition. Since then, professional drag shows and open stages, which are nights when amateur drag performers try out their acts, have remained a core part of what is now known as Zonie’s Closet.
Over the years they have worked make sure the bar was a safe space and brighten it up. They named the bar after a bartender who had worked in the location under seven different owners. They built a patio, made a new stage and took the boards off the windows. Most nights, Clubs greets the regulars with a smile and a hug.
Indianapolis gay bars:7 spaces made for the LGBTQ+ community
Brandon Owen, whose stage name is Onya Knees, lives a block over and a block down from the bar. He said the location is like his “Cheers,” referencing the famously welcoming bar from the ’80s sitcom.
“I enjoy the other gay bars in the city, absolutely. I love a good dance floor,” Owen said. “But sometimes it’s nice to have that more hometown feel and still know that you’re in a safe place.”
In addition to performing, Owen has worked as a bartender, barback, server and cook at the business. It is his way of trying to pay Clubs and Benefiel back for the sense of acceptance they gave him. In 2020, he started a GoFundMe for Zonie’s Closet which raised over $18,000 and helped the bar as it was struggling during the COVID-19 pandemic.
After Zonie’s closes, Owen said he is going to miss the performance space, the money from performing, the friendships and just having another safe space.
“I’m going to miss a place that really allowed me to discover my queer identity,” he said. “My neighborhood gay bar isn’t going to be there anymore.”
‘You have to compete with Grindr and Tinder’
Zonie’s is just one of multiple Indianapolis gay bars to close in the past seven years. Among those lost are drag bar Talbott Street, leather bar the 501 Eagle and Varsity Lounge, the city’s longest-running gay bar that dates back to the 1940s.
For Clubs and Benefiel, gay bars were one of the only places to meet queer people, make friends in the LGBTQ+ community and date. Now, businesses that are not queer-centered still welcome the community with flags in their windows and online dating apps and social media provide another avenue for dating, said Hunter Vale, general manager for the hospitality group Patachou Inc.
Outside of his day job, Vale examines and analyzes archives involving Indianapolis’ queer history and shares his findings online.
“You have to compete with Grindr and Tinder,” Vale said. “That’s not an easy thing to compete with.”
Additionally, as acceptance of the queer community has become more widespread, gay bars themselves have changed. Many now welcome allies and some have defined themselves using different terms.
Vale said he believes gay bars will continue to exist. How they will continue, though, he can’t predict.
‘Safe Haven for LGBTQ community
Clubs and Benefiel sold the bar to the Damien Center, an AIDS service organization in Indianapolis, in the fall of 2021.
Benefiel said selling to the center, an organization serving mainly queer populations, seemed like a good endpoint. Alan Witchey, Damien Center president and CEO, said the organization hasn’t finalized plans for the space, but some of the ideas include offering job development programming and a queer-friendly coffee shop.
“We want to acknowledge and honor how this has been a building that has been a safe haven for part of the LGBTQ community,” Witchey said.
One of the reasons why Clubs and Benefiel sold the bar is fairly simple: they are getting older.
“Three o’clock in the morning is getting rough on us,” Benefiel said. “We love the bar but it’s just not something we feel like we can keep up with.”
Not only is it hard to manage the weird hours, it’s also difficult to continuously track trends and develop ideas to attract customers. When Zonie’s Closet opened, it and Talbott Street were the main bars with drag shows. Now, drag is not only performed at every gay bar, but also at brunch spots.
“Drag is everywhere now,” Benefiel said. “It’s hard to keep up with all that and keep it fresh.”
Benefiel said it’s also been hard for her and Clubs to watch their grandkids grow up as they have spent their weekends running their bar.
“We have missed out on so much with our own families while we were giving back to our gay family,” she said. “It’s time for us to live our lives.”
‘Erased out of the conversation’:Transgender, nonbinary Hoosiers frustrated by abortion bill
Importance of the open stage
Over the past few years, due in part to “RuPaul’s Drag Race,” drag has become more mainstream. However, with the “RuPaulization” of drag, as Vale calls it, certain aspects of drag are being lost or reduced. One of those is the open stage.
Open stages are mainly for practice and exposure, Owen said.
During open stage performances at Zonie’s and other spots, Owen brought friends for support, shook off the nerves, learned about stage presence and, most importantly, listened to critiques. Through that process, he learned that Onya Knees is not a character queen or a dancing queen that will drop into the splits.
“I have stage presence and sex appeal,” Owen said. “That’s where my strength is and I think I learned that by just doing every opportunity that I was given.
Zonie’s Closet is one of the last gay bars in Indianapolis to offer open stage nights, which used to take place every Wednesday until a few weeks ago when Clubs and Benefiel reduced their hours.
There are some establishments that host open stage nights, such as Almost Famous which conducts a monthly open stage competition. However, losing Zonie’s means there is one less place for drag performers to develop their craft, Owen said.
Zonie’s last night
The Zonie’s Closet owners don’t have an objective for their last night. They already accomplished their goal of creating a place where their friends and community are welcome ― a place where, “when you’re in, you’re out!,” as their T-shirts advertise.
“We believe that we have done a good job and we have accomplished what we wanted to,” Clubs said.
Clubs and Benefiel don’t have anything out of the ordinary planned for Saturday, just the usual drag performances – though with a few more kings and queens – alongside good company, strong drinks and a few giveaways. But they are expecting a few hundred people to come through after they open the doors at 4 p.m. They want a big blowout party to “really rock that last night out,” Clubs said.
Owen, who will perform on the last night, said he hopes that those who haven’t visited Zonie’s in the past will give it a chance, to go out once more to experience a piece of Indianapolis’ queer history.
“I know the joy that it’s brought me,” Owen said. “I hope they can experience that before it’s no longer available.”
Contact IndyStar reporter Madison Smalstig at MSmalstig@gannett.com.