Marvin Allen is working behind the Carousel Bar at the Hotel Monteleone in New Orleans. Like a bad dream for bartenders, the bartop rotates around him every 15 minutes, creating a Sorcerer’s Apprentice scenario of multiplying customers. By the time Allen makes a drink, his guests have moved a few feet away, to be replaced by a new set. To maintain a conversation, Allen has to keep scanning and shuffling, putting on mileage as the guests remain comfortably seated.
But watch him and you’ll see that Allen moves economically, just as he does when he makes drinks—there’s little wasted movement or effort. It’s a survival skill he’s honed, and one shared by many long-time bartenders, the best of whom do little with magic or razzle-dazzle. “I make sure I have good shoes with good support,” Allen says.
Allen has been tending bar for 25 years, for the past dozen at the Carousel. He started behind the bar after burning out in restaurant management, and initially figured he’d spend six months or so pouring drinks while figuring out his next move. “But then I discovered I was making a decent living,” he says. Plus, he liked being in a social profession. “Why mess with
anything?”
Allen’s among a long line of career bartenders—from anonymous 18th- and 19th-century publicans, to industry pioneers like Jerry Thomas and Ada Coleman, and down to the unsmiling guy who’s been serving shots, cold beers and one-liners at neighborhood bars since Nixon was President. In recent years, a new wave of career bartenders has emerged, and they’re riding a cultural shift: with the cocktail renaissance has come better pay, more respect and more avenues to advancement in other parts of the spirits industry. These bartenders have found a place to flourish professionally, economically, socially and personally. “In the first generation, we saw career hospitality people who decided to stay behind the bar,” says Jackson Cannon, the 48-year-old bar director of three Boston establishments: Eastern Standard, Island Creek Oyster Bar and The Hawthorne (where he’s also a partner). “They realized they didn’t have to become general manager, but they saw themselves having the same sort of trajectory as a chef.”
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