Roxy Theatre (West Hollywood)
- See The Roxy for the nightclub in London, and Roxy NYC for the nightclub in New York City.
The Roxy Theatre (often just The Roxy) is a famous nightclub on the Sunset Strip in West Hollywood, California.
It was founded in the early 1970s by Elmer Valentine and Mario Maglieri, who later brought in partner and manager Lou Adler, in a building previously occupied by a strip club owned by Jerry Lewis. (Adler was actually responsible for bringing the stage play Rocky Horror Show to the United States, and it opened its first American run at The Roxy Theatre in 1974, before it was made into the movie Rocky Horror Picture Show the next year.)
Hundreds of famous and yet-to-be-famous acts such as Tori Amos, Foo Fighters, Guns N' Roses, Al Stewart, Jane's Addiction and David Bowie have played this highly prestigious venue.
The small On The Rox bar above the club has hosted a wide variety of debauchery in its history; it was a regular hangout for John Lennon, Harry Nilsson, Alice Cooper and Keith Moon during Lennon's "lost weekend" in 1975, and in the 1980s hosted parties arranged by "Hollywood Madam" Heidi Fleiss.
Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Invention recorded most of their celebrated Roxy and Elsewhere album during December 1973 at The Roxy.