BEING JOHN MCENROE
Jackson Hole, Wyoming – 2025
The Silver Dollar Saloon at the Wort Hotel in Jackson Hole is a celebrated institution. There are quite a few bars scattered across the US sharing the same name, but I doubt many share the vice like grip that this venue holds over the loc...
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BEING JOHN MCENROE
Jackson Hole, Wyoming – 2025
The Silver Dollar Saloon at the Wort Hotel in Jackson Hole is a celebrated institution. There are quite a few bars scattered across the US sharing the same name, but I doubt many share the vice like grip that this venue holds over the local community.
I sat with the GM over Thanksgiving lunch in 2025 and he told me that they would hope to do 650 covers that day. That is a material operation, not the numbers of a poorly operated dive bar. There are no central archetypes at the Silver Dollar - it seems to play host to anyone living in the zip code and that makes for a rich visual feast. There are, however, more cowboy hats here than in a Parisian cafe.
The lead feature of the saloon is a neon illuminated winding bar which incorporates over 2,000 silver dollar coins into its resin surface - it’s part disco, part Lonesome Dove and it should not work aesthetically and yet it emphatically does. It was clearly the central prop around which to build this carefully staged vignette.
My central character for this set was the unique national treasure that is John McEnroe - musician, tennis legend, commentator, artist and general badass. John cannot really be pigeonholed into a convenient silo but give him a Gibson guitar and a cowboy hat and he looks much more at home here in the heart of the American West than he ever did at Wimbledon.
We had fun with the set dressing; I wanted a few nods to his presence in the bar which all added to the parody. I think an evening unfolding like this is entirely plausible at the Silver Dollar.
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