An Oasis From the Plague
The Zuni Cafe in San Francisco has been one of my havens from the heartless world ever since it was opened by the irrepressible Billy West in 1979. Even after Billy succumbed to AIDS, and the restaurant was taken over by my friend Vincent Calcagno, and then by Gilbert Pilgram — who runs it today — Zuni continued to attract the city’s best and brightest. Back in the day, you’d bump into Mick Jagger and Rudolf Nureyev — along with fellow ink-stained wretches spending their last dollars on a gourmet hamburger and glass of nice French red. After my unforgettable book party for Season of the Witch in 2012 at the McRoskey Mattress Factory, a group of us straggled across Market Street for a late dinner at Zuni, including my friend Oliver Stone. As we sat in the balcony section, hunched over Zuni’s famous roast chicken, a troupe of half-naked new-generation Cockettes followed us into the restaurant from the party and performed one of their bawdy drag numbers. The restaurant staff didn’t flinch during the impromptu performance, going about their business with typical professional aplomb. Later, waiting for an empty bathroom, a gentleman from Texas marveled at the spontaneous floor show and wondered aloud if it happened every night there.
Well, not every night. But the Zuni has been my magic place for over four decades. And it has recently reopened, after surviving the lockdown. One of the restaurant’s long-time waiters (there are still a good number of them) told me that he burst into tears on the day when the heavy wooden boards were finally taken off the restaurant’s iconic plate-glass windows.
But doing business as Covid-19 again surges in the form of the Delta variant is not easy. Even for durable city institutions like the Zuni Cafe. Certainly you have your own such sacred places in your city. If they disappear, your city will be tangibly diminished. The Zuni, City Lights Books, Green Arcade Books (just down the street from Zuni), the Castro Theatre, Swan’s Oyster Depot, Yank Sing’s dim sum heaven… if these businesses ever fold, I want to also disappear. To me, they are San Francisco.
Now, for survival, Zuni is asking patrons to show proof of Covid-19 vaccination, in order to sit inside. (Those who can’t provide proof of vaccination are seated outside.) Zuni hosts are also seating people inside at every other table, and their waiters are masked, giving diners further sense of security.
This new health policy relies on a compliant customer base. My friend and I were only too happy to show proof of vaccination on our phones when we arrived at Zuni yesterday. We then enjoyed a lunch of gourmet (tuna) fish sticks and a buttery pasta dish with fresh summer corn niblets and filigreed spinach leaves. (The post-lockdown food is better than ever at Zuni.)
But all it takes is one angry, vaccine-resistant customer to cause an unpleasant scene at the restaurant door. All restaurants and stores that implement new vax rules are girding themselves for customer explosions.
It would greatly relieve the pressure on frontline workers like restaurant hosts if city governments would mandate in-door vaccination policies. Then the proprietors of Zuni and other establishments could simply inform customers that showing proof of vaccination is the law, and not simply wise restaurant policy.
New York Mayor Bill de Blasio has already issued such an edict. It’s time for Mayor London Breed and city supervisors to implement a similar law in San Francisco. Let’s protect our frontline workers — and ourselves. And let’s keep open the urban sanctuaries that make our cities worth living in.
The magical Zuni Cafe