Cabaret supper club Damsel closed at The Works after just six months in business at the Underwood Hills development, home to Chattahoochee Food Works.
A handful of sources reached out to Rough Draft earlier this week to report the closure, which we worked to confirm. That confirmation finally came Friday afternoon when owner Dave Green announced the closure of Damsel on social media. While Green doesn’t go into specifics in the announcement, he acknowledged that Damsel “encountered many challenges” and ultimately proved “unsustainable.”
Green, who also owns The Select in Sandy Springs, envisioned offering people multiple experiences at Damsel throughout the night, starting with drinks at the bar, before moving to dinner and a cabaret show in the dining room.
The $100+ price tag per person included up to a dozen dishes shared with the table. Dishes ranged from crab canapes, crepe cones stuffed with lobster topped with caviar, and foie gras benedicts dressed with a sunny quail egg to mini beef wellingtons, tenderloin sliders, and tuna spring rolls. Drinks were extra.
Once their reservation ended, or the night’s performances were over, people could move upstairs to the rooftop bar and patio for more food and drinks. Green recently added weekend brunch.
Related story: Cabaret and supper club Damsel brings a let-us-entertain-you approach to dinner theater at The Works
Reviews on Yelp and Google may hold clues into the closure of Damsel. Some reviewers complained of “overpriced” drinks and food, a lack of value for money when it came to portion sizes, and uneven or confusing service. Food and drink service stopped during performances, which typically lasted between 10 to 15 minutes per set.
Most reviews, however, offered high praise for Damsel’s dance troupe and entertainers, like chanteuse Loren Rosko.
Green tapped renowned choreographer Otis Sallid to create the numbers for the cabaret shows at Damsel. Sallid has worked with artists like Spike Lee and Patti Labelle, and co-created the Broadway show “Smokey Joe’s Cafe.” He auditioned dancers and singers in Atlanta, Los Angeles, and New York to create the troupe of six dancers and Rosko as Damsel’s headliner and MC. In a recent interview with Atlanta magazine, Rosko called working at Damsel “her dream job.”
“Dave, I just want to personally thank you for the best 8 months of my life. It was always my dream to be Atlanta’s very own Jessica Rabbit and lead a burlesque,” Rosko state in the comments on the closure announcement. “You followed YOUR dream and you should be very proud of what you created. Wherever the Damsel concept goes in the future, you can count on me to be a part of it!”
Rough Draft reached out to Dave Green for more details on the closure.
