Mark Metcalf

Toga! Toga! Trouble!

Call Dean Wormer : Graduation party at restaurant owned by ’Animal House’ actor gets out of hand in Mequon

Mequon - When the party animals at Delta house were facing the wrath of the Faber College dean and campus ROTC commander Doug Neidermeyer, they decided on a now-classic response: "Toga party."

Mark Metcalf, who played ROTC commander Doug Neidermeyer in Animal House , now owns Libby Montana, where a high school toga party got out of hand

Twenty-eight years later, a group of high school students decided the best way to celebrate graduation would be in togas - with a party at Libby Montana restaurant in Mequon.

It seems the party planners chose Libby Montana because the actor who played Neidermeyer in the movie "Animal House" - Mark Metcalf - owns the place.

The results were pretty much what you would expect when teenagers wrap themselves in bedsheets and consume alcohol.

By the time police restored order inside the restaurant’s Volley Dome, they had given about 75 alcohol breath tests and written 18 tickets for underage drinking.

According to a police report, one officer found what "appeared to be a pair of male feet and a pair of what appeared to be female feet" inside a stall in the women’s restroom.

The male feet were those of an 18-year-old Whitefish Bay man who was sitting on the toilet wearing only "tennis shoes and a bathrobe." He had vomited on himself and did so two or three more times before his parents arrived to pick him up, the report says.

The bathrobe apparently was this man’s version of a toga.

No one got hauled off to jail, but "For almost all of them, it was the first time they were that close to a uniform and a weapon that wasn’t pointed at a deer," Metcalf said.

Metcalf was quick to point out that the party-goers brought their own alcohol and were not served by restaurant staff.

Now, instead of "double-secret probation," from the Faber College dean, they are facing $249 fines. Staff called police

According to the police report, Libby Montana was the site of a graduation party on May 27 that was hosted by the parents of a student at the University School of Milwaukee.

More specifically, the parents rented the Volley Dome, a metal building with three sand volleyball courts just behind the white-tablecloths restaurant.

Several times during the party, police reports say, kids were causing a disturbance in the parking lot. The restaurant staff tried to get the kids back in the Volley Dome and appealed to the handful of parent chaperons for help, but finally called police.

That’s when things began to look a little like "Animal House," the 1978 movie that made the late John Belushi a star.

One officer stopped a 17-year-old Milwaukee boy as he tried to scramble from the parking lot back into the Volley Dome. He denied having been drinking, the police report says, but a breath test showed a blood alcohol level of 0.07. The state considers a level of 0.08 evidence of intoxication for drivers.

Officers rounded up about 75 kids and lined them up on the west wall of the Volley Dome for breath tests, according to the police report.

Underage drinking citations were issued to 18 male and female partygoers between ages 16 and 18. Another was given a ticket for resisting an officer.

Those cited include Mequon and Milwaukee residents as well as teens from places as far away as South Milwaukee and Chenequa.

Ward J. Ghory, the University School’s head of school, said not all of the partygoers who were issued citations were University School students and that many of the University School students had graduated two weeks before the party. A number of students who play sports were disciplined, he said.

At least one University School student plans to take his case to court. In some municipal offense cases in which the offender has no prior record, the offender can admit responsibility but will get the citation dismissed if no violations occur over the next 12 months.

Most of those given citations are due to appear in court July 11.

Mequon police Sgt. Tony Restivo said his department has issued more than 30 underage drinking tickets at a time at parties held at private homes. But he said the 75 breath tests given at Libby Montana might set a record.

Metcalf said that when he was called to the scene and saw a half-dozen squad cars, he initially thought police had overreacted.

"In a state that celebrates its drinking habits as much as this state does, how can you have a graduation party and not expect kids to drink?" he asked.

On the other hand, Metcalf praised the officers for their professionalism and for their efforts to protect the public. He also said he hopes the partygoers who received citations and their parents don’t fret too much.

"The guys who got cited," Metcalf said, "will probably be running for senator someday."

In "Animal House," Belushi’s character did one better. According to an epilogue that preceded the film’s closing credits, he ran for U.S. senator and got elected.