Local
Eagle seeks to move to Benning Road
Plans to add cafe, summer rooftop garden
The D.C. Eagle is leaving its New York Avenue location and moving to a warehouse building at 3701 Benning Road, N.E.
The D.C. Eagle, a gay bar since 1971, filed papers with the city on Dec. 13 to move into a three-story warehouse building at 3701 Benning Rd., N.E., where it proposes to operate as a tavern and restaurant and offer live entertainment, dancing, a rooftop “summer garden” and a small retail gift shop.
Co-owners Theodore “Ted” Clements and Peter Lloyd filed the papers with the D.C. Alcoholic Beverage Regulation Administration as an application to transfer the Eagle’s liquor license from its current location at 639 New York Ave., N.W.
The popular bar, which caters to a leather-Levi clientele, must leave the New York Avenue location by Jan. 31 to make way for the construction of a new office building. Clements told the Blade in an interview last year that the Eagle has been in the New York Avenue building for more than 25 years and operated in two other downtown D.C. locations since first opening on 9th Street, N.W. in 1971.
Clements and Lloyd couldn’t immediately be reached this week to discuss the application to move to the Benning Road location.
The 18-page application submitted to ABRA asks for an entertainment endorsement, a feature that the Alcoholic Beverage Control Board, which is an arm of ABRA, must approve for taverns to offer certain types of entertainment.
“Types of entertainment include dancing, four piece bands, open mic, contests and fundraisers for charity,” the application says. “Dance floor will approximate 800 square feet and a small retail gift shop will be included on the premises,” it says,
The application says the new Eagle building would also feature a rooftop summer garden with 100 seats and a sidewalk café with 36 seats.
In a space on the application form that asks if “any other business” would be conducted on the premises, Clements and Lloyd replied that a tavern called Terminal Alley LLC and a catering service called “Eagle Eye Catering LLC” would operate “adjacent” to the D.C. Eagle but in the same building.
A spokesperson for the D.C. Office of Tax and Revenue said records show the building at 3701 Benning Rd., N.E. consists of 16,984 square feet of “gross building area.”
Evie Washington, a member Advisory Neighborhood Commission 7F, which has jurisdiction over the area where the building is located, said she met earlier this month with the two principals of the Eagle and their attorney at their request to discuss their plans for the building.
“They want to be good neighbors,” she said.
Washington noted that the building is located two and a half blocks from the Minnesota Ave., Metro station and a short distance from access to Interstate Rt. 295, which feeds into Maryland and Virginia. She said the area surrounding the intersection of Benning Rd. and Minnesota Ave., where the Eagle is seeking to move, is experiencing new residential and commercial development.
Photos
PHOTOS: Helen Hayes Awards
Gay Men’s Chorus, local drag artists have featured performance at ceremony
The 41st Helen Hayes Awards were held at The Anthem on Monday, May 19. Felicia Curry and Mike Millan served as the hosts.
A performance featuring members of the Gay Men’s Chorus of Washington and local drag artists was held at the end of the first act of the program to celebrate WorldPride 2025.
The annual awards ceremony honors achievement in D.C.-area theater productions and is produced by Theatre Washington.
(Washington Blade photos by Michael Key)
District of Columbia
Laverne Cox, Reneé Rapp, Deacon Maccubbin named WorldPride grand marshals
Three LGBTQ icons to lead parade
WorldPride organizers announced Thursday that actress and trans activist Laverne Cox, powerhouse performer Reneé Rapp, and LGBTQ trailblazer Deacon Maccubbin will serve as grand marshals for this year’s WorldPride parade.
The Capital Pride Alliance, which is organizing WorldPride 2025 in Washington, D.C., revealed the honorees in a press release, noting that each has made a unique contribution to the fabric of the LGBTQ community.
Cox made history in 2014 as the first openly transgender person nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award in an acting category for her role in Netflix’s “Orange Is the New Black.” She went on to win a Daytime Emmy in 2015 for her documentary “Laverne Cox Presents: The T Word,” which followed seven young trans people as they navigated coming out.
Rapp, a singer and actress who identifies as a lesbian, rose to prominence as Regina George in the Broadway musical “Mean Girls.” She reprised the role in the 2024 film adaptation and also stars in Max’s “The Sex Lives of College Girls,” portraying a character coming to terms with her sexuality. Rapp has released an EP, “Everything to Everyone,” and an album, “Snow Angel.” She announced her sophomore album, “Bite Me,” on May 21 and is slated to perform at the WorldPride Music Festival at the RFK Festival Grounds.
Deacon Maccubbin, widely regarded as a cornerstone of Washington’s LGBTQ+ history, helped organize D.C.’s first Gay Pride Party in 1975. The event took place outside Lambda Rising, one of the first LGBTQ bookstores in the nation, which Maccubbin founded. For his decades of advocacy and activism, he is often referred to as “the patriarch of D.C. Pride.”
“I am so honored to serve as one of the grand marshals for WorldPride this year. This has been one of the most difficult times in recent history for queer and trans people globally,” Cox said. “But in the face of all the rhetorical, legislative and physical attacks, we continue to have the courage to embrace who we truly are, to celebrate our beauty, resilience and bravery as a community. We refuse to allow fear to keep us from ourselves and each other. We remain out loud and proud.”
“Pride is everything. It is protection, it is visibility, it is intersectional. But most importantly, it is a celebration of existence and protest,” Rapp said.
The three will march down 14th Street for the WorldPride Parade in Washington on June 7.
2025 D.C. Trans Pride was held at Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial Library on Saturday, May 17. The day was filled with panel discussions, art, social events, speakers, a resource fair and the Engendered Spirit Awards. Awardees included Lyra McMillan, Pip Baitinger, Steph Niaupari and Hayden Gise. The keynote address was delivered by athlete and advocate Schuyler Bailar.
(Washington Blade photos by Michael Key)
PHOTOS: Helen Hayes Awards
Laverne Cox, Reneé Rapp, Deacon Maccubbin named WorldPride grand marshals
House passes reconciliation with gender-affirming care funding ban
PHOTOS: D.C. Trans Pride
Men convicted of murdering two men in NYC gay bar drugging scheme sentenced
Looking back at 50 years of Pride in D.C
WorldPride events round-up
Pope Leo XIV: Family based on ‘stable union between a man and a woman’
Wes Moore signs HIV decriminalization bill
