If anyone in Chicago knows how to open a great bar, it’s Danny Shapiro. As a co-owner of the group behind Scofflaw, Slippery Slope, Heavy Feather, The Moonlighter, and Outside Voices, Shapiro has been a driving force behind some of Chicago’s best drinking spots for years. That’s why I sat up when I found out that the group was opening a new spot — Drama Club, an agave-focused bar in Humboldt Park that debuted last week.
The Drama Club space has a fascinating back story (at least for this nerd); it was fully built out as a Dungeons & Dragons–themed tavern years ago, but the project fell through and the completed space sat empty. You would never guess the beginnings now; Drama Club has an elegant, dramatic (hence the name) space that’s decked out in orange velvet. “We wanted Drama Club to have a fun nightlife vibe with a grandiose personality and big sweeping curtains,” Shapiro says.
Many of Scofflaw Group’s concepts are focused on a single spirit — Scofflaw is a gin bar, Heavy Feather is a whiskey bar, Outside Voices features natural wine — so they didn’t want to fix what isn’t broken. Drama Club’s focus stems from the group’s love of agave spirits, as well as the current popularity of tequila and mezcal.
If you’re going to open an agave spirits bar, you better have a killer margarita, and the Drama Club signature marg delivers. It uses a split base of tequila, mezcal, and racilla, a Mexican spirit made with wild agave from Jalisco. It’s rimmed with a housemade spice salt made with ancho and guajillo chiles.
In the first few days, one of the most popular items on the menu has been the Offline Crush, an original cocktail from bar manager Jason Basa Nemec. It uses an unlikely sounding but refreshing combination of mezcal and dry vermouth that’s finished with salted cucumber juice, cardamom, mint, and lime. Shapiro describes it as “very crushable.”
One of the ongoing focuses of Scofflaw Group has been affordability, and Drama Club continues a trend I’ve been writing about a ton this year — a return to $12 cocktails. “When we opened Scofflaw, every cocktail and food item was $8,” Shapiro says. “We’re value driven — that’s a nice way of saying stingy. We want it to be grandiose, but the price tag doesn’t have to be high — it’s high design with low prices.”
Drama Club is open Thursday through Sunday starting at 6 p.m. and is located at 819 North California Avenue.
