the Valley’s ultimate Christmas party

The Arizona Republic, December 11, 2008

At first, it sounds too cool to be true.

Someone mentions that every December there’s a private Christmas party with 500 to 700 guests at a sprawling home in Phoenix.

They say that all the women high-heeling across the lawn wear cocktail dresses and keep warm with fur wraps and elbow gloves. They add that the men must wear suits, pay $60 to get in and bring a bottle of liquor. There’s a live band, a DJ, a red carpet, security guards and shuttles to and from the party.

They insist that although the hosts spend more than $11,000, it isn’t a magazine launch, grand opening, or (typically) some charity event for the moneyed and mature.

But it’s all true, and it’s been happening on one brisk, starry night every December for the last dozen years.

The Legend

Saturday, businessmen and best friends Eddy Moore and Jason Allen, both in their mid-30s, will host the annual Jackrabbit Lounge Soiree at Allen’s house on the back of Camelback Mountain.

The night is tangentially affiliated with the Scottsdale nightclub Jackrabbit Lounge. The man who runs the hotspot, John Dolan, used to throw the Christmas bash with Moore and Allen, and is still an honorary host.

“This is the who’s who of Scottsdale social life royalty,” said Scottsdale’s Melissa Rein, 23, a public-relations director.

Last year, Rein mingled with editors from Arizona Foothills, Desert Living, 944 and other Valley media, all while wearing a black Balenciaga dress and Christian Louboutin heels.

“When people like that bother to show up, you know it’s going to be talked about,” she said. “It’s not just club promoters and college girls; it’s skewed toward people who have status.”

The Old Hollywood-themed party is invitation only, but if at any point you’ve worked or drank with Moore or Allen, or any of their housemates or friends, you’ve probably gotten one of the invitations bearing a photo of the hosts posing Rat Pack-like in suits with skinny ties.

Well-known Valley DJ Mr. P-Body has been playing the party for years and says it’s his favorite gig. He refuses to book any other events in December until he secures this one.

“This is a legendary party,” he said. “Think: party of the year, guys and dolls dressed to the nines, a modern-day, Rat Pack/’Ocean’s Eleven’ extravaganza. The only thing missing is a Hollywood sign.”

The Hosts

Moore is handsome and compact, with close-cropped hair, heavy-lidded eyes and stubble. He runs a tax and insurance consulting company. Allen is fair and muscular, with bright blue eyes and a disarming smile. He’s an expert in urban planning, zoning and development. Both radiate an easy charisma.

They’ve been best friends since meeting in a women’s studies class at Arizona State University as underclassmen in the early ’90s.They were the only men in class, both having signed up to meet women.

After graduating, the two men moved with three others into a five-bedroom house in Paradise Valley with a tennis court, a basketball court, a pool and a well-stocked bar.

They filled the place with swanky lounge furniture from the ’50s and ’60s. (Allen’s taste was influenced by childhood trips to see his step-grandfather play sax at old-school lounges in Los Angeles.)

Then they started going out to Scottsdale clubs. Where they made friends. They organized things to do, such as bus tours of Phoenix cocktail lounges, including Chez Nous, Durant’s and the Copper Queen Cocktail Lounge. They made more friends. They organized more events, such as FBR Open pre-parties and buses to and from the annual golf tournament. They went out more. On some of those nights, 1 a.m. felt too early to stop the party.

“We used to just say, come back to our house, and we started calling it the Jackrabbit Lounge,” Moore said. “It got kind of popular and people started showing up on their own. If we didn’t lock the door, people would come in, turn the stereo on; they’d know where the booze was.”

The Party

Starting in 1996, the first Jackrabbit Lounge Christmas parties were 50- to 60-person events. Invitees were a mix of cocktail waitresses, club owners and scenesters. But after a few years, the number and type of friends grew. Soon, there were politicians, investors, developers, boutique owners, athletes and newscasters.

In fact, when their friend Randy Smith opened the upscale SIX Lounge in Scottsdale in 2001, his first VIP list was the Jackrabbit Lounge’s invite list.

Now the party involves coordination with the local police and signed liability waivers.

The hosts spend about $7,000 hiring Roscoe Taylor’s Motown Mania, DJ Mr. P-Body and 10 security guards, and renting four portable toilets, four shuttle vans and more than a dozen outdoor heaters. They spend roughly $4,000 renting tables, linens and chairs. This year, if there’s any money left over from the cover, it will be donated to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society.

Robert Sentinery is the 40-something editor of Java and has been to about five of the parties, saying they mark the start of his holiday season.

“It’s a party where I’ve stayed until sunrise every year, and I don’t do that often,” he said with a laugh. “The thing about the Jackrabbit is everyone knows that everyone is going to be at this party, so everyone wants to make sure they’re there.”

To get there, guests park cars at a lot on Camelback Road in Phoenix, then shuttles run from roughly 8:30 p.m. to 5 a.m. because there’s no parking at the party.

Up at the house, a red carpet and red velvet ropes mark the line as men and women clutching invitations and bottles of Ketel One wait to get in.

And they wait. Because although well-dressed women can get in pretty easily, men must have an invitation in-hand and must have already paid online. And friends of friends must be vouched for at least two days before the party.

There have only been two fights in 12 years, which Allen and Moore credit to the fact that they monitor the guest list so closely.

“We’re not so hard on the girls, because they don’t generally start fights,” Moore said dryly.

The Allure

Mark Abromovitz is a commercial real-estate investor from Phoenix who helped throw the Jackrabbit party in 1999 and 2000, when he lived in the house, and nearly 1,000 people showed up.

Now 34, he’s been to almost every one and says he loves that all the guests have acquaintances in common, so it’s the perfect occasion to make new friends and connections.

“The people at the party are interesting: that’s why they were invited. At a Scottsdale bar, there are interesting people, but they’re like finding a needle in a haystack. At Jackrabbit, they’re everywhere.”