Studio E House Concert

My husband and I went with five other friends to the New Year's Eve party at Studio E.  It was our first experience there.  The staff was very friendly and had set up and reserved a table for our party, as requested, since we had a woman with us in a wheelchair.  We each paid $50 for dinner and music.  Dinner was to include chicken marinated with a shitake-mushroom-white-wine sauce, organic salads, desserrts, brown rice, etc.  We were seated at the back - it's a very small venue - which was fine except that the floor dropped off so that the two of us on the far side of the table were sitting in a hole, the table up to their chests.  The two seated on the opposite side were in the aisle, which was tight and had a lot of traffic throughout the night.  Every time someone passed by,  they brushed our knees and squeezed through.  It was very difficult to enjoy the show from this perspective.  The house had been oversold so that there were MANY people who had no seats....probably about 75.  The MC said he'd oversold so as to avoid turning anyone away!  He also said there would be food served throughout the night and plenty of it!  "Eat as much as you want!"  

The reality couldn't have been farther from the truth.  Four of us arrived among the first and managed to get small salads, a muffin each, a piece of black licorice, and the last of the shredded chicken/ turkey?  in a pan in the kitchen - which was were you had to wind your way to periodically throughout the night to see if any other food had emerged!  The kitchen was quite undersized for the crowd and full of people standing - ostensibly those with no seat!  Occasionally one of our party would squeeze out of their spot, through the crowd, and into the kitchen to check for food.  Generally there was a large pan of white rice - never did see the brown - on the table. I never saw more salad or chicken, though some guests were carving scraps off a turkey over by the sink.  Peeking out the back door, I saw that people were preparing and cooking outside over a wok.  The food I scored that time was delicious:  a vegetable tempura!  I took seven of those little gems back to our table.  The young man in our party tried to refuse one, saying, " I'd love one, but maybe I should let someone else eat!"

Although we enjoyed the music, we felt over-run and hungry.  Comfortable we weren't....and we paid for this!  The stage was quite large, but we still couldn't see the performer we  mainly came to watch and there was no way to re-orient or move to get a glimpse.  We tried to be good sports and enter into the spirit as much as possible, but we were quite disappointed and felt cheated by being promised food when, in fact, there was really very little available,  That, combined with our uncomfortable seating and the looks we got from those having NO seating really compromised our evening.  We would be reluctant to return.