ORLANDO, Fla. — As Central Florida celebrates Pride Month in June, the owners of Anthem in downtown Orlando say they created the spot as a gathering place for the local LGBTQ community — beyond drinking and dancing.
Anthem opened less than a year ago, and on a Friday or Saturday night, visitors will find it in full nightclub mode — with loud music, a packed house and lots of dancing.
But co-owner Michael Vacirca said the venue also hosts daytime and community-centered events, including spin classes, birthday parties, drag shows, bingo, advocacy nights and educational programs.
“We’re trying to utilize and let everybody have a moment at Anthem,” Vacirca said.
The goal is to make the space available for a range of community needs, Vacirca added.
“Whether we’re having birthday parties, doing drag shows or we’re doing bingo, or we’re having a community campaign advocacy night, sex education, mental health education — whatever the community needs, we want to bring here and make sure the community can get what they can out of this space,” Vacirca said.
During Pride Month, Anthem hosted a bingo night at which attendees could also connect with mental health services. Beacon Health in Orlando sponsored the event.
Joseph Sivoli, Beacon Health’s founder and executive director, said the organization specializes in trauma, anxiety and depression.
“We really want to be a beacon for others,” Sivoli said.
Events at Anthem help Beacon Health reach people who may not otherwise know the organization’s services are available, Sivoli said.
“They were the ones who were the most receptive and willing to work with us, and, like, yeah, ‘Come and use our space.’ They were really welcoming,” he said.
For Anthem patron Joemar Torres, the bingo night offered a familiar connection to his own past.
“I used to play bingo with my grandma. Every Friday we would go to different kinds of houses,” Torres said. “And bringing bingo here makes me feel like I have my grandma here, too.”
Anthem’s programming is also intended to bring people together across different parts of the community, Vacirca said. Even on nights centered around dancing, he said the venue focuses on types of music, rather than inviting only one segment of the community.
“Because our community is already really fragmented and really small, and if we continue to fragment ourselves into smaller groups, we’re not going to survive,” Vacirca said.
Anthem also recently hosted an event for The Dru Project, a nonprofit that provided scholarships in honor of a victim of the Pulse nightclub terror attack, on the weekend of the 10-year mark since the tragedy on June 12, 2016.