Missie B’s is the place to go in KCMO

by Sara Ritsch
Staff Writer

Older than even some of its regulars, the 22-year-old-and-growing Missie B’s has more things going on than the average gay bar. With time and effort, the venue has gone from a little piano bar to a club for dancing, karaoke, drag shows, late night theatre performances and several million dollar fundraisers for the community.

But who is this elusive Missie B? Actually, the bar is named after the owner and creator himself: Mike Burnes. “I’m over 70 now,” he begins. “The guys all used to have names for each other. I’d go out drinking and get tired and leave my keys with whoever, and I wouldn’t tell I was leaving. I’d go missing. ‘That guy’s missing again!’

“My name changed to Missie’s Missing, Missie B’s, Mike’s missing, Burnes. It stuck and ended up being our trademark. Sometimes I’d go to big venues and just disappear. I’d went home to rest.”

Burnes says they came up with a phrase to support the meaning behind the name. “We say sometimes that we’re the bee’s knees, but we all say, ‘You can be anything you wanna be at Missie B’s, but you gotta behave.’”

For the victims of the Orlando shooting, Missie B’s helped to raise $54,000 this past summer. They blocked off the street and performed drag shows, sold t-shirts and miscellaneous merchandise, gay flags and bracelets, did a silent auction out of various donated products – even the bartenders who worked the event donated their tips to the cause.

Missie B’s sold about 700 to 800 shirts at $20 apiece and about 6,000 people came through. “AIDS Walk people, health clinic people, softball teams, men’s choruses, bar owners and bartenders donated money. It was a community effort all the way around,” says Burnes.

Burnes also says that every year all the staff and some customers get together for the “Bartender Review”, where bartenders do drag numbers, sing and raise money for kids and veterans for Christmas. They also host a Thanksgiving and Christmas each year at the bar for anybody who has nowhere to go. Missie B’s hosts special weddings for people without a venue, providing a minister, candles, a chandelier, appetizers and hors d’oeuvres. “We make it happen,” he says.

“Wow is right. Sometimes it’s overwhelming for us, kid. There’s not a bar in this town that doesn’t know Missie B’s,” Burnes says. “This is the place you go.” The straight community on weekends is about 50/50 – they get the nurses, doctors, servers, football and baseball fans – “A lot of people come here and see where it’s cool. It’s a mixed bag of people.”

The amenities featured at the bar are many. It includes a Jägermeister pool table, a heated tiki lounge, shot boys, a leather shop, an elite security team, palm trees, a full bar, exquisite scenery, surprise celebrities and fabulous live acts. These performances feature drag and theatre artists who are well known around town – Dirty Dorothy, Daisy Bucket, Flo, Genewa Stanwyck, Regina La-Rae, Moltyn Decadence and Sandy Kaye and Loretta Martin, who have been at Missie B’s from the beginning.

Every Monday is the Monday Funday Show with Moltyn Decadence and “The Whore of ‘84”, Genewa Stanwyck. Tuesdays and Thursdays feature karaoke. Wednesdays hold the Chit-Chat Show with Dirty Dorothy, Daisy Bucket and Genewa Stanwyk. Fridays are the Fab Friday Show with Daisy Bucket, Saturdays are the Dirty Dorothy Show and Sundays are the Flo Show.

Their hours are Monday to Sunday from 12 p.m. to 3 a.m., respectively. The daily happy hour is from 12 p.m. to 8 p.m. and they offer nightly drink specials from Sunday to Thursday – you can get a dollar off everything!

Upstairs, the bar features the same great drink specials, but opens at 7:30 p.m. on Tuesday through Sunday. They offer a DJ five nights a week, spinning everything from Top 40 hits to club favorites. At Missie B’s, you can also look forward to playing darts, trivia and poker. “There’s always something happening at the place to ‘B’ for fun!” their Facebook reads.

For this month of September, Late Night Theatre will be performing “BeatlesJuice”. The show opens September 23 and runs through Halloween. Shows start at 8 p.m., and you can visit www.latenighttheatre.com for tickets and more information.

To learn more about this eclectic destination, check them out online at www.missiebs.com or Facebook on their page called Missie B’s.

The Gayly – September 9, 2016 @ 11:30 a.m.