A Portrait of Bouncers
Hanna Teglasy, petersplatz.eins (Vienna)

The club petersplatz.eins is a young establishment in the heart of Vienna, not far from St Stephen’s Cathedral. Our interview partner Hanna Teglasy has been working at the club for over a year.

By Sascha Ehlert

Sascha Ehlert: How did you end up as a door supervisor and what do you actually do there?

Hanna Teglasy: The club I’m working for opened on New Year’s Eve in 2022, and I do more than just work on the doors there. I also help with the bookings and do social media. But in the evenings, I usually work at the front desk, so I let people in and do admissions. Because of the fact that I’m involved in many different ways and therefore have a certain position of power, I made a conscious decision to work on the front desk too. Just sitting at a computer writing emails and making phone calls is somehow not my thing. Besides, on the doors I find out what’s going on, I get to know our patrons and see for myself how they’re feeling.

So you treat them as equals. Are you a club-goer – would you be going to these parties yourself if you weren’t working on the door, collecting money?

Yes, definitely. Even if I do this less frequently now that I work in the club. But I’ve always had friends who organise parties, make music or are DJs, so I’ve always been pretty heavily involved and interested in the clubbing scene.

What made you decide to work in the club? 

The team. They’re a bit like family for me. We talk very openly to each other. I can tell the others if I’m not feeling great – someone will always step in for me. I don’t have to explain myself; it’s quite normal for us to help each other. I really value this close kind of partnership. I feel very comfortable with the others.

What do you do to make the people who come to the club feel comfortable?

The main thing I do is try and communicate very openly. If I have someone in front of me who I think has had a bit too much, then I try to engage with that person. I ask them why they’re here, invite them to sit down and give them a drink of water. And people I don’t think are a good fit, I’m just very honest. I say, “Don’t expect to come back in five minutes and ask for your money back”. I feel if I’m honest with them, they are also honest with me – for better or for worse. Obviously, there are also situations where you have to throw someone out – and few people, especially men, react positively to that.

Clubs are traditionally places that give people the chance to abandon themselves for a few hours. They are spaces of dissociation where social norms seem less important for a while. Is this an idea that still holds true for you personally?

I’d like that to be possible, but too much sexualised violence still goes on in our society in the context of parties. That’s why we, the club, need a good control system in place so that everyone in the club still feels comfortable at the end of the night.

Now that you work at a club yourself, do you still go out clubbing in other cities and countries?

I don’t go out privately in Vienna much, as I said, but I love to in Budapest. That’s actually where I’m from and why I go back there once a month. Obviously, there’s some ambivalence about it all, when you look at what’s going on in Hungary politically at the moment. But the reality is, when the state controls people too much, a strong underground culture emerges that offers people an alternative scene. While Vienna Pride feels like it’s become just another event where straight men go to get pissed, the queer parties in Budapest are organised by a strong community. You can sense the love and urgency behind it all, and the whole thing is often financed exclusively by donations. I think we’ve become quite hypocritical here in Vienna when it comes to partying. There’ll be a climate rave, but at the end there are tin cans everywhere.

I wanted my last question to lead to a follow-up question. I’d like to know if you can explain what defines Viennese club culture? Is it different from other, especially German-speaking, cities?

One thing that really is special about Vienna is that there are so many outdoor events, for example on the Donauinsel. In the summer, you can party everywhere – I haven’t seen that in any other city.

Even if, in that respect, more seems possible in Budapest, do you think Vienna could still create night spots that are quasi-utopian places of escape that distance themselves from what is prevalent in “mainstream society”?

Well, places like that do already exist here. On the other hand, though, there are also events where you might think, okay, everyone treats everyone else respectfully here, but then something unpleasant still happens. It’s a completely different matter again in mainstream clubs. My problem with nightlife in Vienna is that there are safe spaces, but as soon as you leave these and go out in the public sphere, you’re automatically exposed to certain dangers if you’re not heterosexual or cisgender. I believe everything is political, including partying.

You might not have been working in a nightclub for very long, but I would still like to ask you if you can imagine staying in this line of work in the next phase of your life – or do you see it more as a temporary job?

I think it’s more the latter. This job does take a lot out of you. I mean, no matter how great the parties and the people are, I’m talking to 300 or 400 people every night. And then there’s the fact that I soon realised that ultimately, nightclubs are really only about money. But there are lots of positive things too, of course. I’ve met loads of amazing people. But every so often, I have to drag myself away from this lifestyle and simply recharge my social battery. I’m sure I’ll continue to have something to do with club life. But maybe more behind the scenes. That’s where I can see myself in the long term.