'Mad Monk' Complex Approved for Cody's Space on Telegraph

A proposal by Rasputin Music founder Ken Sarachan to install a "Mad Monk" eating and performance complex in the long-closed former home of Cody's bookstore on Telegraph Avenue in Berkeley has been approved by the city's Zoning Adjustments Board.

The full-service restaurant will be called "Commisar," serving "upscale peasant's and worker's food ... that would suit a discriminating Soviet Official’s culinary tastes," according to Sarachan.

The performance space will feature music, readings, talks, comedy and other events, he told the board in a supplemental statement.

The board's 8-1 vote Thursday night represents the final approval needed for the use permit, barring any appeals, said Berkeley planner Greg Powell.

Sarachan and Berkeley-based Avila Design applied for the use permit to fill the prominently located space at Telegraph and Haste Street.

The proposal has appeared under various names that include "Mad Monk," a nickname for the Russian mystic/political intriguer Rasputin. It was approved Thursday night under the name, “Mad Monk Center for Anachronistic Media.”

The staff report offered this description: "The proposed project calls for creation of a 'multi-concept venue' combining retail sales of old records, tapes and books (“anachronistic media”) with a restaurant and full bar, a coffee counter with a take-out window, a performance stage, and a small flower shop."

A supplemental statement submitted by Sarachan for the Thursday meeting added new information:

On the Haste side of the building will be a vinyl record store with LPs; Rasputin’s will move all of its vinyl records to this location. 

There will also be a specialty book store; with a medium sized collection of politics, poetry, small press, ecology, history, and current events.

The other half of the building will mainly accommodate a restaurant called the COMMISSAR. This will consist of upscale peasant’s and worker’s food as was prepared in a book that I located several years ago. The recipes are primarily vegetarian/ world vegetarian prepared in a manner that would suit a discriminating Soviet Official’s culinary tastes. 

There will be a stage that has different events on different nights of the week:

Monday Open Mike or Author Readings

• Tuesday  Politics; Local or International 
• Wednesday  Poetry Readings or Poetry Slam 
• Thursday  Indie Rock or Folk Rock Bands 
• Friday  Reggae or Jazz Bands 
• Saturday  Comedy Club 
• Sunday  TBD

The zoning board added a condition Thursday to bar renting out the performance space to third-party producers, Powell said.

"No Clear Channel or Bill Graham Presents events will be held at the Mad Monk," he said.

Sarachan told the board that partners in the food and beverage components of the Mad Monk include Craig Becker of the 56-year-old Caffe Mediterraneum on Telegraph and Scott Cameron, founder of Guest Chef on College Avenue, according to Powell.

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