The Rose Room is hidden behind a bar in the Producer's Club on West 44th Street in the Theater District, and it operates more like a variety show than a cocktail bar. The room runs nightly from nine until three in the morning, and most nights there's a live performer on stage: magicians, burlesque, drag, vaudeville acts, live singers, circus performers. The aesthetic is old-world New York underground with a pronounced queer sensibility.

This is not the place to go if you want a quiet drink and a thoughtful cocktail menu. It's the place to go if you want to sit in a candlelit room under the streets of midtown while someone does something unexpected on a small stage a few feet from your table.

Weekend tickets start around $35.