The Porn Star's Revenge: Formerly Known as Jeff Stryker, Charles Peyton Has Turned His Toxic Feud Over the Folk-Music Club Kulak's Woodshed Into a Real-Life Online Obsession

“We cannot let this terrorist bully have his way,” Kulak says. “We’ve got to fight.”

But Peyton says he is the one being bullied. “He ripped down that wall to the bare studs,” Peyton says of some Woodshed renovations, “with no other reason than to torture me.”

Ted Soqui

Not a folkie: Charles Peyton, a.k.a. Jeff Stryker, is fighting Kulak’s Woodshed.

Ted Soqui

The Studio 54 of the Valley?

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More About

• Paul Kulak
• Charles Peyton
• Jim Britten
• Politics
• Local Politics

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Other times, Peyton sounds almost Zenlike in his acceptance of this war without end: “It’s hard to deal with such a crazy situation, but everything in my life works out. You just have to keep looking for the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.”

And so last August, the belligerents brought their cases before Nicholas Brown, the newest city official to be introduced to their war. Charles Peyton, accompanied only by Jim Britten, sat a few feet away from Paul Kulak and Wendy Greuel aide Dale Thrush — two men whose pictures Peyton had regularly turned into cartoon caricatures, along with a bobble-headed Greuel, on his Web sites. Two years ago, when interviewed for this publication about her efforts to help the Woodshed, City Councilwoman Wendy Greuel sighed, “No good deed ever goes unpunished. You can put that on the record.”

Today she still believes in the ultimate success of Kulak’s Woodshed. “I’ve learned a lot about city processes,” says Greuel, with more than a trace of irony in her voice. “I’ve learned that no case is simple and that there are no easy resolutions when you are dealing with emotions and personalities. There have been projects of bigger magnitude than Kulak’s, but this is a fairly unique case. People do have to follow the rules – things just won’t go away.”

Although Nicholas Brown has yet to issue his ruling on the Woodshed’s request to remain open an extra hour, Greuel says “I think we can expect something shortly.”

For his part, Kulak, buoyed by his club’s 100 supporters, hoped he would, for the cost of 55 cents a square foot, be able to coexist with a man he considers a dangerous bully.

The long hearing remained civil and was videotaped by both sides. Kulak submitted the opinion of a sound engineer that the Woodshed didn’t require a sound wall because the ambient noise from Laurel Canyon Boulevard was actually louder than the music played inside, while Britten alleged that when rehearsals, workshops and special events are figured into the equation, the Woodshed also operates during the day. Peyton, who preferred to stand while addressing Brown — who sat three feet in front of him — claimed that “there’s 340 exhibits showing Mr. Kulak is not everything he claims to be.”

Nicholas Brown announced he would decide on Kulak’s request some time after November 5. That date has come and gone, but even if Brown (now presumably schooled in the war’s numbing minutiae) grants the Woodshed its extra hour of operation, his decision will probably not prove to be a game changer in this debate. Peyton let the cat out of the bag when, after the zoning hearing, he told L.A. Weekly that he will continue to fight the Woodshed’s existence, regardless of how Brown rules.

“It’s not that important,” Peyton says of Brown’s decision. “We’re going to appeal it anyway. There’s a chance the [appeals] panel isn’t corrupt and we’ll win there.”

And if not there, Peyton has other battlegrounds in mind. His $4 million civil suit against Kulak for emotion distress and loss of income goes to trial next week.

Peyton is confident of victory and, as he advises Kulak in one of his Web-site tirades:

“I think now it’s time to start packing your bags and get a movin. Don’t go Far though, Ill [sic] be suing you soon for the years of torture you caused with your proven illegal establishment.”

Kulak is just as unyielding.

“Peyton is the most insidious form of cancer that exists,” Kulak says. “ ... [He]’s like a staph infection — there’s no antibiotic.”

Needless to say, Kulak is countersuing.