Nine years ago, Casa Diablo, the world's only vegan strip club, opened in—you guessed it—Portland, Oregon, with a veggie-based menu and a ban on fur and leather onstage. It was years before Portlandia started spoofing the city's first-class weirdness, and at the time the idea seemed normal enough to locals, who have long bragged about having more nude bars and vegans per capita than any city in America.
Advertisement
But now the founder of Casa Diablo, Johnny "Diablo" Zukle, finds himself in a turf war. The vegan flesh peddler—who says he "puts the meat on the pole, not the plate"—recently opened a second branch of the club, Dusk 'Til Dawn: Casa Diablo 2, just feet from The Acropolis, a 35-year-old strip club-cum-steakhouse. The move angered Acropolis owner Bob Polizos, a proud carnivore who famously serves $7 ribeyes, and claims to raise some of the cattle himself on a nearby farm.From there, things got stranger. A literal wall has been erected to keep a lid on any customer defections; hired security has been ratcheted up; and the clubs have been rocked by gun-toting drunks, family values protestors, and strippers quietly ordering food from the enemy. The proprietors of Acropolis are particularly unwilling to get along, saying that Casa Diablo is "a whorehouse" with "a bad reputation." (In 2015, Casa Diablo was sued by two strippers, who alleged they had been sexually harassed and denied back wages.)How did it get this bad? It all started with "a good conspiracy theory." (Interviews have been edited and condensed for clarity.)Johnny Diablo Zukle, 52, founder of Casa Diablo and Dusk 'Til Dawn: Casa Diablo 2: It was 1985, and I was 21 years old. I see this guy on TV named Dr. John McDougall. He's talking about how animal products can basically kill you. He's saying government is part of a big conspiracy, that we're all being scammed, that if you look at the food pyramid it's all about meat and dairy, but it's printed by the National Dairy Council. I like a good conspiracy theory, so I started doing research. And I realized that if I don't eat animal products, wear clothes made from animals, or use products tested on animals, I can eliminate so much suffering in the world. So I went from flesh eater to vegan. When I told my mom, she goes, "Oh son, don't become a fanatic." Well, too late!Bob Polizos, 76, founder of Acropolis Steakhouse Strip Club: I grew up in Greece in a small village up north. My parents raised pigs, so we had a pig every Christmas and a lamb every Easter. I used to do a lot of cooking before I got to America. I worked on a cargo ship, and on the ship I would cook for a crew of 40. I loved it.
Planting the seed
Advertisement
Zukle: So I'm thinking, How can I enlighten people to veganism? And you know the old saying: "The way to a man's heart is through his stomach"? I thought, Well, maybe the way to a human soul is through his stomach. So I decided to open a vegan restaurant. But we were in this blue-collar industrial area, and every day a couple of guys would come in and look at our menu, and say, "There's no meat?" And I'd say, "No, man, it's vegan." And they'd look at me and go, "Uhhh, we'll come back." And they'd get up and leave! This happened at least once every day. And I'm thinking, You big muscular pussies! This is supposed to be Portland—the vegan capital of the United States—and you guys are too chicken to try the vegan chicken! No offense to chickens.Polizos: After I moved to America, I opened Athens West, a Greek restaurant in Portland. I ran it with my brother, but it closed because we couldn't get along. When I found the [Acropolis] building, the old owners had gone broke, so it was a cheap place to buy. I paid $40,000 for it in November 1976. We put $20,000 down. At first, we opened it as a restaurant. We tried dinner and live music, but nobody came. Nothing worked, and we were losing money. What could we do? So I brought [strippers] in.Zukle: The recession hit in 2007, and sales went way down. I watched restaurants go out of business, some that had been here for 20 years. So I tell my girlfriend at the time, "I think the only thing that's gonna work in this industrial area is a strip club, because it's 90 percent men." Her response was, "Oh, hell no."I went from flesh eater to vegan. When I told my mom, she goes, "Oh son, don't become a fanatic." Well, too late!
Advertisement
She said, "It's either me or the strip club." So I said, "Bye!"
Get some boobs up there!
Advertisement
Zukle: When we first opened, I was the manager, the cook, bouncer, and the janitor. And for about two months, I was the DJ, too, after the DJ got his foot cut off. I would announce the girls, say, "Give her a big round of applause!" And then I'd run back and make a veggie burger for somebody. Oh, man, I was sweating bullets, working a lot of hours. I got really thin. Slowly, as we grew, I delegated things out. Now, we're the number one club in the Northwest with a line out the door and an hour wait to get in on weekends. I have to thank the vegan gods.Andreas Polizos, Acropolis manager and owner's son: We do 50 to 100 orders from our to-go window a day. We hand-cut all the beef ourselves. And we go through about a pound of sauce a day. We are not a normal strip club.Bob Polizos: And we have a $2 salad bar with any kind of salad you like: macaroni, potato, lettuce for $2. Take a picture of my salad bar!Tori, stripper, at Casa Diablo and Dusk 'Til Dawn: Casa Diablo 2: We were the first club in town to take advantage of new contact laws [Oregon allows "two-way" contact between customers and fully-nude dancers along with hard liquor sales] and live sex shows. We give better private dances than anyone else in town. People come from all over to try the food, too. They say, "It's so Portland."I was the manager, the cook, bouncer, and the janitor. And for about two months, I was the DJ, too, after the DJ got his foot cut off.
Advertisement
Tit for tat
Advertisement
Bob Polizos: Their customers come and go and make trouble. The liquor commission doesn't like them, either. They don't cut off customers when they're too drunk.
Andreas Polizos: A lot of people stumble out of there and make trouble here. That's the main reason we put up the fence. It cost us $3000 or $4000. We did it to irritate them.Fey: There's been some trouble with motorcycle gangs. But at our club we don't allow any signifying colors. You'll see condoms and hypodermic needles and people peeing up and down the street.Zukle: I just thought it was so funny that they put up a fence. Like, That's a beautiful fence. Thank you. They paid for it. Maybe they didn't want to see our customers' smiling faces.Fey: The fence hasn't done anything. It has only made it more of a pain in the ass. People are just walking around the fence. It hasn't stopped the foot traffic or club hopping.Andreas Polizos: We had to hire a security guard to watch the parking lot on weekends. That's another bill—a couple hundred dollars each week. After [some legal trouble Polizos says was caused by a Casa Diablo 2 customer], the city gave a list of seven or eight things they want us to do, like stop serving shots after midnight. We're not going to stop doing that. We spend $8000 on lawyer fees. And cops keep stopping by to check on us. They're coming in and just eating our steak bites.Wanna hear our chant? "Vixens not veal, sizzle not steak!" And there's more, but I forget.
Advertisement
Fey: Girls here sometimes smoke outside topless. Maybe that's why Acrop doesn't like us?Andreas Polizos: Culturally, it's two different worlds. It really is. They're vegan, and we're all about meat. That has to have something to do with the conflict.
Meet the ladies
Advertisement
Broadly: So… women are the poodles in this analogy?Zukle: Look, I don't cut up women. I don't eat women, either.Blake Rauch, 33, customer: Acropolis is a destination spot. They're famously farm-to-strip-club-table. Their strippers are a little more… seasoned.Molly Torbert, 31, customer: The strippers at Casa Diablo are punk rock and grunge, which I like. It's cool and different. I can appreciate a beautiful woman—but their shows with dildos and sex acts are too raunchy for me.Nate, 33, customer: Casa dancers have a higher level of skill and freakiness and the chicks have a wide knowledge of art. But Acrop is, like, historical. Plus there's a weed dispensary across the street. Only thing is, I'm nervous I'll run into my dad there someday.Zukle: The plan was never to run a strip club forever. I'm really into real estate; that's my main thing now. I want to build a vegan housing complex. I'd like to build a whole vegan city, maybe somewhere out in Willamette Valley. But I'm the founder of the club, so I'll always be around. It's kind of like KFC and Colonel Sanders: They'll just use me as a mascot. I'll be the vegan Colonel Sanders of the strip club world.Tori: Casa Diablo is only going to grow and get better from here.Jordan: We're well established. Nothing has changed in 35 years. We're not going to start now.Bob Polizos: We're not going anywhere.Andres Polizos: If I do take over, I'll modernize things a little. We'll see if [Casa Diablo is] still open in 20 years. Maybe we'll talk then.Zukle: Can't we all just get along?