Mars Bar is having one of its periodic rises in popularity. A bar typically known for the local barflies who show up early to drink deep into the night has been playing host to celebrities looking for some city cred.

Drew Barrymore recently had a photo shoot for Nylon inside the grungy dive. Some rather odd photo outtakes appeared on the Internet, where regulars are sitting stoically in the background to be cut out of pictures entirely with blank-white backgrounds. One regular commented on the event saying, "I was there for the Barrymore shoot and the weird thing is they used white backdrops for the photos. If they wanted to block out all the graffiti, why go in there in the first place?”[EVGrieve] Like the last vestige of an ancient East Village, the sordid side of this city is easily blocked out with the razor edge of gentrification.

Last week, another entry in the 2nd Avenue bar’s long history, Penn Badgley from the TV show Gossip Girl, was interviewed by the New York Times writer David Itzkoff. Funny, Itzkoff chose John Varvatos and Other Music for the series of stops on the downtown tour, any other parodies of their former selves to exploit on the trip? Even young Badgley can see the irony, saying of the former CBGB, “At least they didn’t turn it into a bank.”

Mars Bar in a response of sorts has recently declared the East Village dead on the blood-red paint-splattered wall, written between twin images of prototypical yuppies, an investment banker and sweater-draped prep student.

Announcing the East Village dead now is really just pointless. Yes, the neighborhood is not the East Village of times gone by, but that’s probably a good thing. Pedestrians can walk around at night, in a miniskirt even, with little more than an occasional catcall. Uniformity will protect the masses as it sterilizes them. I say progress.

Images via [NYTimes] and [EVGrieve]