Review: Frankenstein’s Mad Scientist Cocktail Lab jolts Halloween to life

Frankenstein-themed Halloween Popup bar experiments with strange chemical combinations that will have you screaming “It’s Alive!”

Frankenstein’s Mad Scientist Cocktail Lab, presented by Bucketlisters.com, has been haunting Hollywood for the past two Halloweens. This season, the self-described 90-minute interactive cocktail experience is back on a slightly sketchy section of Yucca Street, five nights a week, offering live entertainment, photo ops, fortune telling, and strange elixirs worthy of a mad scientist’s laboratory. It’s loud, boisterous, slightly naughty fun for Halloween fans looking for something to do in between the big weekend events.

Set within the Remix Room (formerly The Oaks Hollywood), Frankenstein’s Mad Scientist Cocktail Lab is a bit like the doctor’s famous castle: there is little outside to indicate the experiments within, but crossing the threshold reveals a heaping helping of Halloween decorations, drag queens, strippers, and all the cocktails you can drink. The vibe varies from loud to quiet as the crowd ebbs and flows: it’s a bit like the old joke about California weather: if you don’t like it, wait five minutes. Seating, at least on weeknights, is easy to find; although you may end up at the far end from the small stage area, you can squeeze through for a glimpse of the ghoulish action. Or you can simply nurse your drink at a safe distance from the mayhem.

Frankenstein’s Hollywood Popup Bar Review: Location & Entertainment

The mad scientist theme is only fitfully portrayed. Instead of electrodes and other apparatus, most of the decor is generic Halloween stuff: spiderwebs, skulls, and black candelabra. Explanatory cards on the tables relate Frankenstein’s backstory, and bagged bodies hanging from the ceiling could charitably be taken as a source material for the doctor’s experiments. The event truly lives up to its name only with a figure of Frankenstein’s monster chained to a laboratory table beneath a neon sign announcing, “It’s Alive!” (The famous line and the look of the monster are taken from the 1931 film adaptation starring Boris Karloff.) We would have preferred a little more Frankenstein in Frankenstein’s Mad Scientist Cocktail Lab, but this is a pretty cool photo op.

Although tickets are sold in ninety-minute intervals, timing is not closely enforced, nor is the entertainment synchronized with your entry time. Just show up at approximately the right hour and enjoy whatever is happening onstage. We saw a juggler using glow sticks to simulate fire (although this seems like a bit of a cheat, it is much appreciated considering the potential fire hazard in the location).

There was also a burlesque style strip show including one or two drag performers (tassels and garters rather than the Full Monty). Our favorite performer was dressed in a Bride of Frankenstein wig and kabuki makeup that almost passed for the look of an old-fashioned monster from the days of black-and-white horror films.

Frankenstein’s Cocktail Lab Review: Liquid Experiments

Your ticket includes one complimentary cocktail, which you pick from two choices: Electric Jolt (tequila, sweet & sour, pineapple, triple sec, sparkle) and It’s Alive (gin, orgeat, passion fruit, butterfly pea tincture, lemon). Other cocktails include Divination (rum, orgeat, blue curacao, lime), Igor (vodka, lime, ginger, prosecco, hibiscus), Monstrosity (mezcal or spiced rum, Demerara, orange oil, bitters, cherry smoke), and Bride of Frankenstein (whiskey, ginger beer, lime, berry puree).

The great taste of the drinks is almost exceeded by great presentation, which evokes the mad scientist theme more fully than the venue’s decorations. Electric Jolt bubbles and boils with toil and trouble like an experiment gone bad. The Monstrosity gets its smoky flavor from being torched by the bartender (as the villagers torch the monster in the movies). In some cases, you complete the experiment yourself by pouring the contents of a test tube or a beaker into your glass, thus changing the flavor profile and the color from something ordinary into something else.

It’s a little bit like meddling in things man was meant to leave alone, but unlike Frankenstein’s Monster, these results will not throw you off the top of a burning windmill – though you may feel that way after imbibing a few of them.

Frankenstein’s Mad Scientist Lab Review: Conclusion

More of a Halloween overlay than an immersive experience, Frankenstein’s Mad Scientist Cocktail Lab offers a casual good time for those seeking a little seasonally themed entertainment. Though not as elaborate as The Set’s annual Halloween Speakeasy, it is a damn sight better than some past Halloween popup bars, which provided little more than plastic skulls and familiar drinks disguised behind Halloween names. You may not feel as if you have trespassed into Dr. Frankenstein laboratory, but Halloween vibes will electrify your seasonal spirits, and the cocktails will jolt you with all the energy of “the great ray that first brought life into the world.”

Frankenstein’s Mad Scientist Cocktail Lab Photo Gallery