In our latest Dispatch, we take you on a tour of some of our favorite spots in Soho, with a detour to the historic Salisbury Pub. The Salisbury was a well-known gay hangout from the time of Oscar Wilde through the 1980s, and it played a starring role in the groundbreaking 1961 film Victim. That film was the first to use the word “homosexual” on screen and was banned in the US for being too sordid for American audiences. In the UK, it found a respectable audience and helped spark a public dialogue that eventually led to the decriminalization of homosexuality in 1967. It’s regarded as one of the first Western films to portray gay men in a sympathetic light.

From there, we wander through Chinatown and on to The Duke of Wellington on Wardour Street — a bar that remains proudly gay — before finishing at one of our regular haunts, The Old Compton Brasserie, for dinner.

Join us for a bit of queer history, a few belly laughs, an ample dose of Zeke’s cuteness, and even a brief cameo from the Hare Krishnas. What more could you want from an afternoon in Soho?

The song we play in this Dispatch is: “Lucky Day” by George Olsen (1926)

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