Studio 54 Opened

From the moment the Nightclub opened, it was the see and be seen place epitomizing the disco era especially after the photograph of Bianca Jagger riding in on a white horse was widely published.  Everybody who was already anybody or who aspired to be somebody stood in line to be one of the 2000 people admitted nightly.  Often the famous never made it past the security guards.  There are stories about the President of Cypress, Princes of Saudi Arabia and other luminaries being refused admission. The setting in the former theater changed frequently, drugs were rampant and sex readily available.  

Evidently they had trouble securing a liquor license for the first year and resorted to reapplying daily for caterers license. That was not their only offense.  Unfortunately the proprietors appeared to be more than a little lax with their financial reporting and ran afoul of the IRS for skimming 60% of their profits (hiding the money above ceiling tiles) and ended up spending several years in jail despite efforts from Roy Cohn their lawyer to extricate them.  By August 1981 the club was sold to new owners.