The entertainment at Smalls Paradise was not limited to the stage; waiters danced the Charleston or roller-skated as they delivered orders to customers.

Unlike most of the Harlem clubs which closed between 3 and 4 am, Smalls was open all night, offering a breakfast dance which featured a full floor show beginning at 6 am.

[4] Opening Day music was provided by Charlie Johnson and his musicians, who remained as the "house band" for ten years.

Glenn Miller, Tommy Dorsey and Buddy Rich often came to Smalls Paradise to jam with the house band for the joy of it.

[4] Smalls previously had some success in attracting a racially mixed clientele at his Sugar Cane Club with the quality entertainment and waiters who danced while balancing trays of drinks and sang during floor shows.

[18] While most of the night spots shut their doors between 3 and 4 am, Smalls Paradise began breakfast dances at 6 am with a floor show of up to 30 dancers and a full jazz band.

[21] Smalls Paradise celebrated its fourth anniversary in 1929 and by 1930, it began an arrangement with WMCA Radio to have twice weekly broadcasts from the club.

The banquet, sponsored by Albert Einstein, Mary McLeod Bethune, Paul Robeson and others, was originally to be held at New York's Essex House.

This was during the era of McCarthyism; a pro-McCarthy group circulated a newsletter labeling Du Bois, Einstein and others connected with the dinner as being pro-Communist.

Like his contemporary, Alan Freed, Smalls also organized rock 'n' roll shows held at New York area theaters.

Basketball star Wilt Chamberlain, who had wanted to own a night club, was able to purchase Smalls Paradise with business partner Pete McDougall in 1961.

[40] He renamed the venue Big Wilt's Smalls Paradise and changed the club's style of music from jazz to rhythm and blues for economic reasons.

[42][43] Chamberlain also began booking African-American comedians; Redd Foxx played at Big Wilt's in December 1961.

[48][49] Since Tuesday nights were exceptionally slow at Big Wilt's Smalls Paradise, the club looked for a way to bring in more business.

[50] A hostess for the Paris night club, the Blue Note, visited Big Wilt's Smalls Paradise shortly after the contest began; she was there to learn the Twist and take the dance back to the Paris club,[51] By the beginning of 1962, BBC-TV came with a crew to film the twisting at the night spot for broadcast in the UK and journalists from many foreign newspapers visited to take photos and file news stories.

[50][52] The Tuesday night twist contest brought patrons in limousines from downtown just as the entertainment at Smalls Paradise had done years before.

They auditioned at Big Wilt's Smalls Paradise but were turned down by one of the owners who believed the music genre funk was on the way out.

A few days later, the group received a call from Big Wilt's, asking if they would be able to fill in for a last-minute performance cancellation at the club.

[57] The engagement was extended substantially, with the group winning praise from the club's talent manager, along with an invitation to play at Big Wilt's anytime.

[58][59] Singer Millie Jackson, a guest at Big Wilt's Smalls Paradise, began heckling a female vocalist onstage.

Changes in the entertainment policy brought in acts like Jerry Butler and The Dells and the Vilmac Room was built for those who preferred to dance to a disco beat.

The nonprofit corporation, affiliated with the Abyssinian Baptist Church, planned to completely renovate the building and add three floors to it.

[68] Van Vechten's 1926 novel, Nigger Heaven, was based on some of his observations of Harlem's night life; he referred to Smalls Paradise as The Black Venus in the novel.

In 1932, Elmer Snowden with his Smalls Paradise band and some of the club's entertainers, were hired by Warner Brothers to star in a film short called Smash Your Baggage.