Night Moves of All Kinds

PRAGUE
If the caffeine doesn't keep you awake, the music will

By STEVEN ERLANGER

town swarming with tourists does its best to cater to their nighttime whims and to make some money besides. But it's still possible to find a few places to drink, sup, listen or dance where not everyone is foreign or wearing a baseball cap backward or tripping out on Ecstasy.

Prague has some nice jazz, and like everything here, the price is reasonable. Downstairs at U Maleho Glena (At Little Glenn's) is a small cellar with tables and an unusually good selection of local groups, including the excellent Robert Balzar Trio; Jan Knop, a pianist who calls himself Najponk; and Yvonne Sanchez, a popular half- Cuban, half-Polish chanteuse. There is a cafe and bar upstairs; the jazz club in the basement has a cover charge of 90 crowns, all of $2.30, at 39 crowns to the dollar.

Little Glenn is an American, Glenn Spicker, who also introduced bagels to Prague at his two Bohemia Bagel restaurants. But his jazz club has a friendly, local feel and it's close to the crowded Charles Bridge, which you'll end up strolling at night even if you vow not to.

Prague's cafes are open late into the evening. The most famous is Cafe Slavia, where President Vaclav Havel and other dissidents often lingered and argued when they weren't in jail. In 1992, it was closed over an ownership dispute (though broken into in an act of liberation for a couple of nights by Mr. Havel and friends, who brought their own coffee).

Slavia reopened in late 1997, refurbished with a green theme. It is rooted in a painting the new owners resurrected, Viktor Oliva's "Absinthe Drinker," featuring a comely bright green female fantasy sitting on a customer's table. Perhaps you'll share the vision in this country where absinthe remains legal and on sale. It's likely to be better than the coffee, which is Dutch and weak, or the service, which is glacial. Granny's cake with walnuts, however, is great.

Another lovely cafe, closed for 10 years in a different post-Communist ownership dispute, the Cafe Imperial, reopened just three months ago. Informal yet spectacular, its original 1914 tiled walls and ceiling are intact. The coffee is Italian and comes with a free kobliha, or jam doughnut. And it isn't too crowded, yet.

Radost FX remains Prague's most famous nightclub cum cafe and lounge, with everything from vegetarian food upstairs to a hazy, smoky dance floor and D.J. in the basement. There is a small gallery above it from which one can watch others dance, kiss or negotiate other forms of intoxication.

It is very loud and very popular. On a recent night, however, the sofas covered with animal prints were occupied by rather glum groups in their early 20's. It got better, presumably, much later.

For a change, try Palac Akropolis, a somewhat quieter and more adult spot in an old movie theater, with a performance hall and two downstairs bars where one might actually hold a conversation. You'll find more Czechs there than tourists, at least most of the time.

U Maleho Glena, Karmelitska 23; (420-2) 535-8115. Jazz club cover, $2.30.
Cafe Slavia, Smetanovo Nabrezi 2; (420- 2) 2421-8493.
Cafe Imperial, Na Porici 15; (420-2) 231- 6012.
Radost FX, Caf Belehradska 120; (420-2) 2425-4776. Cover, $1.30.
Palac Akropolis, Kubelikova 27; (420-2) 2271-2287. No cover at bar; admission to concerts, $2.50 to $10.