Frankie J’s: Wet at Last
Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites »
Last time we checked on Frankie Janisch, nearly two years ago, the comic, crooner, and Culinary Institute of America-trained chef was reeling from a badly botched attempt to get the neighborhood around his Uptown restaurant and theater, Frankie J’s and the MethaDome, to go wet. Thanks to a mistake by the city clerk’s office, Janisch had conducted a vigorous campaign for yes votes on a referendum when in fact he needed no votes to reverse the area’s longtime dry spell. After he blanketed the hood with flyers and took to the streets with banners, 65 percent of the voters did exactly what he asked, and the 38th Precinct of the 46th Ward remained alcohol free. To make matters worse, Janisch learned that–the city’s mistake notwithstanding–he’d have to wait four years to get the referendum on the ballot again. But today, after 34 bone-dry years, the area around Frankie J’s is scheduled to go suddenly and quietly wet. All it took was a few hundred more signatures on petitions and a little redistricting magic. Janisch had never really needed the $360-an-hour lawyer or the $1,500 “consulting services” of two guys who promised to “ease the process” when city inspectors came around.
Janisch says this adventure has cost him more than $70,000 in legal and printing fees and salaries. Now he’s got another worry: after running the business for three and a half years without a profit, he’s defaulted on his mortgage. He has a new lawyer and says he’s lining up financing. “But it was very hard on me. . . . The mortgage people were calling me two, three times a day, saying, ‘You know we’re going to take your building.’ I said, ‘Sir, you will not. You would have to drag me out. I’m not going anywhere. I’m gonna make it, and this isn’t how my book ends.’ There’s so many things I want to do with this place; I’ve put everything into it. As close as I am to destruction, I’m that close to brilliance.”
Art accompanying story in printed newspaper (not available in this archive): photo/Bruce Powell.
