The Sensation of Saturday Night Fever

Two things that the movie “Saturday Night Fever” taught me are that I was never a good disco dancer and the second thing was that you cannot strut down the street like John Travolta having a slice of pizza. I learned the hard way by trying his strut and ending up wearing the slice of pizza.

It is interesting to learn that Robin Gibb of The Bee Gees said in an interview that he watched only the first 30 minutes of the world premiere and never saw the entire movie. “Saturday Night Fever” took 23-year-old John Travolta and made him into a star. To even think that Travolta was once this young made me feel very old. Then I got the good news – I’m younger than he is. The movie also created the disco craze and it made everyone want to listen to The Bee Gees and dance to their music. The premier took place at Mann’s Chinese Theater in Los Angeles, California on December 14, 1977. Wouldn’t you think the premier should have taken place in Brooklyn, New York?

I know quite a lot of people who were ready to go into traction just to be able to dance like Travolta and a lot of girls wound up with sprained ankles just trying to make those disco moves in their high-heels. The movie got good reviews from lots of critics. Most of the action occurred in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, the place I was born and raised, and in the neighborhood of Bensonhurst.. Travolta was strutting to the song “Stayin’ Alive”.

Another popular song from the movie was “Night Fever” and every song that was played in “Saturday Night Fever” had been written, recorded, and even released before the movie ever went into production.

One of the songs that The Bee Gees wrote after hearing about this movie was “If I Can’t Have You”.

The other was “How Deep is Your Love” which became the debut single for the album. “Saturday Night Fever: Original Movie Sound Track” was certified 15x Platinum for shipments of more than 15 million copies. The album stayed on top of the charts for 24 weeks. It has been added to the National Recording Registry in the Library of Congress for being culturally significant.

The interesting thing is that this movie would never have seen the light of day if it hadn’t been for a magazine article. The article was about an Italian-American disco dancer and his entourage in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, New York titled “The Tribal Rites of the New Saturday Night,” written by journalist Nik Cohn. It was published in New York Magazine. So the idea was born and the starring role in “Saturday Night Fever” went to John Travolta.

John Travolta in the role of Tony Manero made everyone want to be part of the disco scene and guys wanted to dance and strut just like him. He was so exciting in the way he dressed, his larger-than-life status at a local disco, and his dreams of finally escaping from the life he was living to something bigger and better. The fashion cry became platform shoes and white three-piece suits. Everything went according to the great imagery that Cohn had provided in his article. What was the problem? The problem was making it all seem so very real because the story was actually almost entirely fabricated.

However, I’ll tell you once you sat in that darkened movie theater and had the awesome music of such Bee Gees hits like “More Than a Woman” blasting in your ears you were caught by the disco fever and you had stars in your eyes. I watched Travolta dancing and I thought to myself pure disco magic. I knew I couldn’t afford to go to a disco night after night but I did know that I would go as often as I could. I was never any good at disco dancing but I sure had a fun time. Anyway, what was actually real was that there was a 2001 Odyssey discotheque in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. That was my neighborhood and that was all I needed to know. So off to the disco, I went. I remember that lighted-up dance floor and the disco ball throwing rainbow colors all about. However, I was sadly disappointed because, without Travolta as Tony out on the dance floor and without all that Hollywood movie magic, it was a bit disappointing.

Walking in the footsteps of Travolta in “Saturday Night Fever”

At the opening of the movie Travolta as Tony casually picks up a double-decker pizza at Lenny’s Pizza on 86th Street at 20th Avenue in the bordering neighborhood of Bensonhurst and swaggers on down the street. Unfortunately, since that time Lenny's has closed its doors.

Bay Ridge Home Center at 7305 Fifth Avenue at 73rd Street was the hardware store Tony in the movie worked at.

Phillips School of Dancing at 1301 West Seventh Street at Bay Parkway, Bensonhurst is where Stephanie Mangano played by Karen Lynn Gorney met Tony Manero and became his dancing partner. This studio is now closed.

Two establishments are long gone. One is the White Castle on 92nd Street between Third and Fourth Avenues in Bay Ridge. This was where Tony and his friends would go. It was also the place I loved to go to as it was open 24 hours. The second is the coffee bar that Tony and Stephanie visit and it’s now a Mazda dealership on Fifth Avenue at 94th Street.

You can still see the house which was the home of Tony Manero and his family. It’s located at 221 79th Street in Bay Ridge. I must have walked past there hundreds of times but Travolta was no longer there.

The 2001 Odyssey was located at 802 64th Street and Eighth Avenue in Bay Ridge. It was just a short distance from where I lived on 70th Street near 3rd Avenue. It has been demolished. I would have liked it to have been left as an icon from the disco days a symbol of “Saturday Night Fever”.

And of course, the fabulous Verrazzano Narrows Bridge can still be seen which was featured in the closing moments of the movie. I still remember that I could see the lights of the bridge in the distance from my window and I dreamt of disco magic.