Rich and beautiful made Palm Beach's Celebrity Room famous

During the 1960s heyday of the Royal Poinciana Playhouse — which now is under redevelopment after being closed since 2004 — audience members were known to arrive late to a show or leave before the curtain came down.

Seems somewhere else always beckoned.

That destination? The Celebrity Room, where the rich, famous and beautiful dined and danced beyond a gilt-framed sign that read: “Through these portals pass the most glamorous …”

With views of Lake Worth, the waterfront Celebrity Room restaurant and nightclub — an adjunct of the playhouse — was a whirl of Palm Beach social life for a dozen-plus years until it was renamed under new ownership in 1973.

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Both the playhouse and the Celebrity Room debuted on Feb. 3, 1958 with the opening of the theater’s first show: ''Holiday for Lovers,'' starring Robert Cummings, Ann B. Davis, Julie Bishop and Lyle Talbot.

That started what became routine for the opening night of every show: Theater-goers being delivered to the playhouse in their chauffeur-driven Rolls Royces and emerging in black tie and furred gowns and “jewels like you couldn’t believe,” longtime Palm Beacher Arlette Gordon once recalled.

Where did they go before taking their plush-red theater seats? The Celebrity Room for dinner. And after the final act? Back to the Celebrity Room for supper and dancing until 1 or 2 in the morning.

Largely responsible for the success of the playhouse and the Celebrity Room was the head honcho of both: larger-than-life Frank J. Hale, who carried the torch until his death in 1973.

“It’s the most fabulous showplace under the sun,” Hale declared.

The San Francisco native rose to the fore in Palm Beach as a wealthy arts philanthropist and globe-trotting businessman who was president of the National Yeast Corp.

He’d started out as a vaudeville dancer and producer before landing a stint as a prohibition agent in the 1920s.

Hale, who owned a home in Palm Beach, teamed up with producing theater director Paul Crabtree to operate the Royal Poinciana Playhouse, where they also launched a ballet company and youth acting school.

More:Landmarks commission approves renovation plans for Royal Poinciana Playhouse

With the playhouse buoyed by what Crabtree described as Hale’s “globe-circling connections” and “dynamic energy,” the adjoining Celebrity Room was an instant hit.

With a circular bar, lounge banquettes, tables and large windows with vast lake views, the restaurant and nightclub presented nightly entertainment — comedic acts (Jimmy Durante, Joe E. “King of Clubs” Lewis and others); nationally known club singers; and dance orchestras led by popular band-leaders Marshall Grant, Peter Duchin and more.

Ceiling fandom

The Royal Poinciana Playhouse and the Celebrity Room were designed by Palm Beach architect John Volk. He added the Regency-style cultural-center structure in 1958 to the footprint of the neighboring Royal Poinciana Plaza he’d designed in the same style in 1957.

On the Celebrity Room’s ceiling, a tromp l’oeil mural — commissioned by Hale and Volk — featured caricatured portraits of 125 actors and celebrities, including Clark Gable, Joan Crawford, Helen Hayes and Fred Astaire.

A handful of well-known locals — among them, Hale, Volk and Lilly Pulitzer — also were depicted in the mural, which years later was covered by fabric before being “rediscovered” in 1991.

Called “Venetian Festival,” the mural was produced by New York artist Robert Bushnell, who’d also painted murals for the Everglades Club and the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York.

Headliners' grand appearances

Headliners at the playhouse in the 1960s and early 1970s — Rex Harrison, Ray Milland, Ginger Rogers, Vivian Vance, Dina Merrill, Hayes and many more — almost always made grand appearances at the Celebrity Room.

Lavish charity balls also hotfooted for the Celebrity Room, where Hale ensured there was never a dull moment —right down to his inventing a dance for the place that incorporated moves he’d originated during his vaudeville days.

Dinner guests could opt for filet of sole, say, or rack of lamb while late-night supper grazers nibbled on caviar, crepes Suzette or even plates of scrambled eggs.

When two cooks didn’t show up one night during the 1966 season, Hale jumped into the kitchen to help so waiters could deliver meals to the 385 patrons in the dining room.

“I didn't know at first what had happened,” Hale said later. “Then it dawned on me when there were no waiters in the room and people were having to get their own drinks from the bar."

Throughout the mishap, guests evidently didn’t lose their beautiful-people glow.

“It was the most glittering crowd assembled to date in Palm Beach,” a society-columnist gushed. “And, my friend, when Palm Beach glitters, it GLITTERS.”

End of an era

Shortly before his death in 1973, Hale finalized arrangements to sell the Celebrity Room business to a group of investors led by businessman Albin Holder.

It was renamed The Poinciana Club and operated successfully as a membership club until it closed in 1994 after Holder died.

The club was then purchased by restaurateur Peter Beck, who reopened The Poinciana Club in 1995 and then closed it in 1999.

The playhouse continued to operate with a mix of Broadway and other shows, but closed in 2004 — the tenant then, Clear Channel Communications, left — because of economic hardship compounded by a trend for glitzier, larger staging.

A new era

The property now is being redeveloped with plans for it to reopen as a cultural center and new waterfront restaurant.

Work is expected to be completed in 2024.

Interior demolition and abatement are underway on the project, according to a November presentation to the Landmarks Preservation Commission by Alexandra Clark, vice president of Asset Strategy & Experience for WS Development, the project's developer.

The project will include a top-to-bottom renovation of the two-story, 34,517-square-foot landmarked building.

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Daily News: Before and after a show, the Celebrity Room was the place to be