It’s too early to state that Boston’s performance underground is making a comeback after its post-punk ’80s heyday, but there are encouraging signs of renewed life outside the usual spaces like Mobius and the Boston Center for the Arts. It’s no longer uncommon to find theater and film featured at rock venues like the Middle East CafŽ in Central Square and the Milky Way in Jamaica Plain. The Abbey Lounge has just begun hosting a Sunday-night improvising-music series, and the Bromfield Gallery has also begun a series of monthly art-music concerts. But the most encouraging development may be the creation of Central Square’s new Enormous Room, a small but exceptional space above the Central Kitchen.
Gary Strack, chef/owner of the successful restaurant, plans to have the 70-capacity Enormous Room open by this Monday, with little fanfare. "I want to keep things low-key and interesting," he explains. The room — with its black exposed ceiling, raw brick walls, batik-print fabric, and dark-hued Honduran mahogany furniture, stage, and fixtures — has a fine-tuned look that blends old industrial New England and Africa. With cocktail service and a menu that will lean toward North African cuisine (priced between $8 and $15 a plate), Strack wants the space to be interesting on its own terms and have what might be described as a casually artsy vibe. There are no tables, so diners and drinkers can sit on the lush couches or sprawl on the multi-tiered stage when it’s not in use.
"Most of my impetus is a craving for an alternative space, with the Knitting Factory in New York and the Loring CafŽ in Minneapolis being archetypal," he points out. "It’s not specifically a restaurant and not specifically a club or bar. We don’t want to lock ourselves into needing to have entertainment every night and get into a cycle of having to book things that aren’t quality to fill the room. But I see this place as being great for maybe a play reading, a cool trio, performance art, experimental music, or a DJ spinning. I’d like to have a pirate radio station connected with the room. On any night people might come here and there could be some kind of performance going on — or maybe not."
Given the licensing, insurance, and high real-estate and operating costs, opening a club/restaurant in Boston is risky business, as the struggling partnership behind 608 (formerly Lilli’s) in Somerville has learned. So why has Strack gone Enormous? "Downstairs we turn away people, so it would have been easy to just add more tables up here, but I like Central Kitchen. The size and vibe of it is important to me. Some of the real fun in the restaurant business is designing new spaces. It’s a big challenge with thousands of details. So creating another small space was more appealing.
"Also, when we opened Central Kitchen three years ago, it was really about looking at Central Square and doing what I thought was needed — a good medium-priced restaurant with a focus on food quality that was a little hipper. Since we’ve moved in, a lot of corporate interests have come into the Square, and I feel like what the neighborhood needs is a throwback space that’s a little funky, a little cheaper, and has an edge."
The Enormous Room, at 567 Mass Ave in Central Square, above the Central Kitchen, is scheduled to be operational by this Monday, April 1. Call (617) 491-5599.
