Since THE LAST DAYS OF DISCO's inception as a title and a few scripted scenes in March 1994, a lot has been written about disco, the seventies and even the early eighties, the period of the film. The accounts have tended to the wild side, often making for very good reading or watching but not always matching the memories of nightclub civilians who rarely wandered into an amazing anecdote or celebrity-packed VIP lounge.

THE LAST DAYS OF DISCO is a Pilgrim's Progress of a particular subgroup of not-quite-innocents from the era, recent college graduates who were -- maybe -- smart academically but merely no dumber than everyone else when it comes to their own lives.

It is the final of writer-director Whit Stillman’s three nightlife comedies, lightly linking the earlier "Metropolitan" (1990) with the chronologically later "Barcelona" (1994). Here the debate is between the virtues of group social life vs. "ferocious pairing off."

"We get obsessed with those things we feel are in too short supply," Stillman says. "As an adolescent moving between Washington, Manhattan, and several underpopulated Hudson Valley towns, there seemed far too little 'group social life.' The three films are about times I know about when group social life really operated."

The Void
While there's been a lot about Disco, what's less discussed is what came before Disco -- the dancing wasteland of the early 70s and late 60s when people were no longer dancing in bars, Peppermint Lounges or even Whiskey-a-go-gos.

Charlotte: "Did people ever really dance in bars? I thought that was a myth."

The Woodstock Era had Jimi Hendrix, the Beatles' Abbey Road album and aspirations to peace, love & understanding -- but where were the dance places?

Josh: "I was just starting law school when the first up-tempo Philadelphia International hits broke. Some people don't consider that 'disco' -- because it's good -- but I remember feeling absolutely electrified and thinking, finally, dance music's back -- dance places can't be far behind.”

The very early 1980’s…
In the last months of the disco era, a popular dance club becomes the center of nightlife for a group of young people who recently arrived in Manhattan.

ALICE (Chloë Sevigny) and CHARLOTTE (Kate Beckinsale) are recent Hampshire College graduates who, living on meager book publishing pay, are forced to room together with a third roommate (Tara Subkoff as HOLLY) in a cramped railroad
apartment in Manhattan's Yorkville section.

Charlotte consoles Alice for having been a boyfriendless social failure in college -- but things are looking up for her since she met two interesting Harvard guys at a party in Sag Harbor.

The first night, intimidated by the throng outside the club, Alice and Charlotte take a cab around the block to try to improve their chances.

Charlotte: "We look really good tonight. I'm sure we're going to get in."

Later, inside, they run into both objects of Alice's affection: JIMMY STEINWAY (Mackenzie Astin), the "dancing ad man" who's hanging onto his agency job by getting clients into the club, and TOM (Robert Sean Leonard), a handsome corporate lawyer with an interest in the environment and Scrooge McDuck.

Both were college friends of the club's underboss, DES (Chris Eigeman), a seemingly bisexual lothario who lets friends in the back way if they have any trouble with the front door-nazi, VAN (Burr Steers). There's also JOSH (Matt Keeslar), a neophyte prosecutor in the Manhattan D.A.'s office with an inordinate enthusiasm for disco and dance places.

All have been out of college long enough to have gone on to law or graduate school and then come back to get jobs in the city -- in fact, they're at about that point many people lose their first jobs.

It becomes apparent that the club is not being run according to conventionally accepted accounting principles. BERNIE RAFFERTY (David Thornton), the oddball club owner, pockets cash from the till and has an odd vendetta against people who work in advertising: they're "too nice," he says -- he doesn't want "that element" in the club.

Meanwhile, at their publishing day jobs Charlotte and Alice study formulas for finding bestsellers while fending off the critical interest of anti-disco DAN (Matt Ross) who then shows up in their night lives, too.