In the 1980s and early 1990s, Club Heaven was the underground after-hours spot where people in the Black LGBTQ community came to feel like they belonged.
Located on Woodward and Seven Mile, across the street from the historically gay neighborhood of Palmer Park, the club was a place where people could forget about their worries, dance and find community.
And as house and techno music were talking over Detroit nightlife, Club Heaven was the place to catch DJ Ken Collier on the turntables, his unique sets leading him to be known as the “Godfather of House.”
More than 30 years after the club closed its doors, Chris “Inpaq” Sutton, a filmmaker and broadcast studio manager for nonprofit LGBT Detroit, directed and co-wrote the short film, “Heaven in Detroit: A Sanctuary of Sound.” The movie follows Marcus Love, a young, Black gay man dealing with the recent loss of his mother. Looking to have a fun night in Detroit, Marcus goes out to Club Heaven on its final night and finds his new chosen family.
Sutton and producer/co-writer Miles Reuben are hosting a film premiere at 6 p.m. Friday at event space The Riverside, 8711 Grand River. The event will include a screening of the film, a panel discussion with the cast, crew and people from the Club Heaven community, a vogue performance honoring Detroit ballroom culture and a dance party celebrating the music and legacy of Club Heaven and Detroit house music.
Tickets can be purchased on Eventbrite for $17.
Next, “Heaven in Detroit” can be seen at Moondog Cafe on June 27 at the Pride Month event Drop: The Drama-Silent Film Soundtracks. Beginning at 6 p.m., attendees can watch four short films, with DJ sets in between each screening. Tickets begin at $10.
BridgeDetroit spoke with Sutton about his research for the film, finding the right cast to tell the story and the lack of queer spaces in Detroit.
BridgeDetroit: When did you first learn about Club Heaven?
Sutton: I first heard about Club Heaven when I started to enter the LGBT Detroit space, and at that time, LGBT Detroit was KICK. This was around 2011. Being someone who was born and raised in Detroit and being someone who identifies as Black and gay, I was searching for community. I was in my 20s, I was trying to find a space where I could belong. I literally stumbled into the KICK offices when they were located in Midtown, and one of the most immediate things that caught my attention was it was a very intergenerational, Black LGBT collective that was from the city and really honored a lot of the safe spaces that we had in the city. They would really talk about just how, in the late 80s and 90s, there were so many spaces, so many clubs, just places where our community could come together, find chosen family, find good music, dance and it was just so fascinating to me. One of those main spaces was Club Heaven, and they would talk about how it was an after-hours club and they would be there from 2 a.m. to 6 a.m. I just wanted to know more, and what I found out soon after is that KICK started off as a magazine in 1994 and executive director A. Nzere Kwabena showed me the first issue of the magazine. The cover photo is photographed in Club Heaven by Chris Cushman, and it’s one of the members of the (Detroit Black and LGBTQ ballroom house) the House of Charles. That started my obsession with Club Heaven, which has now led into a film.
BridgeDetroit: What was your research process like?
Sutton: Being in that KICK space, a lot of the staff, board members and even folks who were just guests in the space were familiar or were a part of Club Heaven. One of the pivotal people was Damon Percy, who is the archival producer on “Heaven in Detroit.” I met Damon through KICK around that same time, and he was a member of the House of Charles. He would tell me his experiences being at Club Heaven, being a part of House of Charles and how it was this iconic moment in the Black LGBT community. That also led into sharing stories around Ken Collier, who was the resident DJ (at Club Heaven) and the “godfather” of Detroit house music.
BridgeDetroit: When did you get the idea to turn all that you learned about Club Heaven into a film?
Sutton: It was around 2017, 2018 and it’s something where the stars aligned. I just finished working as a cinematographer and editor on a web series for (Detroit musician and filmmaker) Ahya Simone called “Femme Queen Chronicles.” So, after that project wrapped and we did the film festival circuit, just the bug of being motivated to tell more stories was in me. Like, “What’s the next thing I want to work on?” At that time, I was further diving into the Detroit queer club scene and I knew that there were some important stories to tell.
And also, I felt like Detroit was transitioning at that moment. A lot of the folks who left the city were coming back, downtown was coming back and we were out of bankruptcy. But I always felt like we can’t forget the rich history of this city. That made me feel like there was a powerful story to be told, and it really drew me to a story about Club Heaven. The location where Club Heaven used to exist, on the corner of Seven Mile and Woodward, is the Winans megachurch that’s been sitting vacant for like 20 years. There’s a message in that because I believe the Black church is an important cornerstone of our community. There is such an investment in the Black church, but I also feel that there are other places that are spaces of worship. I feel like spaces where we dance and celebrate one another and love one another, those are also sanctuaries. Those shouldn’t be pushed aside or forgotten.
The first person I talked about doing the film with was Damon Percy, who’s on the board of Detroit Sound Conservancy, which has been doing incredible work of continuing the legacy of Club Heaven and the history of Detroit music. At that time, Detroit Sound Conservatory was restoring the original Club Heaven speakers. I was figuring out how to piece things together, and right when I thought I had everything ready to go, COVID happened in 2020. That ignited this understanding that, “life is short. You never know what tomorrow’s going to bring, you got to make the most out of it now.” I was like, “OK, this is the time to do it, so that pushed me to apply for the Detroit Narrative Agency fellowship. I was selected, and here we are now.
BridgeDetroit: How did you find your cast?
Sutton: We did a casting call and we had a ton of people who submitted. My producer, Miles Reuben, was an integral part of connecting me to so much talent in front of and behind the camera, and that helped me get through the casting process. Me, Miles and our team have worked on several other projects, so we had people that we knew who were hungry and ready to be in this film. What’s beautiful about this film is that this is truly a film that’s led predominantly by Black, queer Detroiters.
We have DJ Tone who stars as DJ Mix and really embracing the role of (the late) Ken Collier in the film, because we really wanted to recognize the people who were a part of building Club Heaven for what it was. To have DJ Tone in that role, that’s really powerful because he’s been a pioneer in the DJ scene locally.
Our leading character in the film is Marcus, who’s played by Jalen (White). The lead character is just coming back to Detroit after losing his mother and he’s staying with his best friend/roommate. He’s a 20-year-old who basically lost the only person that was an anchor in his life. I knew I wanted someone who had the vulnerability to play those two dualities like, “I’m gonna go out and party,” but also have the opportunity to connect to the sensitivity of dealing with grief and dealing with losing a parental figure. Our lead, Jalen, was the perfect example of that. He had this vulnerability about himself that really connected with me because the lead character is inspired by my own journey. I lost my mom in 2022. I knew what helped me get through a lot of my grief was finding community in these safe spaces, and one of those safe spaces was going out to the club.
BridgeDetroit: How did working on this film help you through the grieving process?
Sutton: I don’t deal with grief really well. I’m very much like, “OK, this happened. I need to just push through it.” And sometimes, you can’t push through grief. Doing this film gave me space to look the grief in the eyes and say, “I’m gonna try to make something beautiful out of it.” And another thing that’s actually kind of interesting is the anniversary of my mom’s passing (was on Wednesday), and I have this premiere on Friday. I think the universe works in a lot of wild ways. Some of this was planned, some of it wasn’t planned, but it just reminds me how important the story is to me personally and how important the story is to the community.
BridgeDetroit: With Club Heaven closing back in the 1990s and Spot Lite closing at the end of this month, why do you think there aren’t many queer spaces in Detroit?
Sutton: That’s a conversation I have quite often professionally and personally. For a lot of, especially intentional Black queer movements, so often they don’t have the physical space to provide the programming, to provide opportunities to build community in-person. We’re really lucky here at LGBT Detroit to have three buildings, but even that is an ongoing thing for us because, as any institution, it takes a lot of hard work to keep these spaces open. We lost the Woodward (Bar and Grill), which was a Black, LGBT staple in our community. That was kind of like my Club Heaven coming into the scene, and we lost that in 2022 to a fire. LGBT Detroit hosted a community conversation around what does that mean for our community to lose one of the only spaces that was predominantly a Black, queer safe space, and I think some people just thought, “Well, somebody will open something else,” or “We’ll just go into spaces that are not intentionally Black and queer and we’ll just try to make room.” For me personally, it’s not the same after we lost the Woodward and Club Heaven. To be honest, losing Spot Lite, that’s gonna leave a big void as well.
Sometimes, these are the only spaces where so much of our community can just feel seen and be free. And when we lose those spaces, where do the people go? So, with this film, I want to continue this conversation around how we protect our safe spaces.