Latest in the Gold Dust Lounge saga

You’ve got to hand it to the Bovises.

They are certainly not taking efforts of Handlery Hotels to close the Gold Dust Lounge lying down.

The latest in the saga to keep the 47-year-old bar from being shut down is that building owner Handlery Hotels is filing a lawsuit against the Bovises for not vacating the premises when their lease said they needed to.

A quick recap: James and Tasios Bovis, owners of the Powell Street bar were informed back in January that they had 90 days to vacate the space, something they had supposedly agreed to in their previous lease signing. The Bovises sued, claiming that Handlery Hotels took advantage of their old age and unlawfully stuck an amendment into the March 2011 lease.

Three months, some 3,200 rally-goers, a couple sing-a-longs and a visit to the Historic Preservation Commission later, ye old watering hole and its band of supporters are standing their ground and not vacating the Union Square location.

Now, Handlery has filed a suit back, with spokesman Sam Singer claiming that the Bovises are not honoring “their word and leave the property as they expressly agreed to in their lease.”

Singer also said that his client, building owner Jon Handlery, “did not want to file this suit, but were left with no choice.”

According to the Gold Dust’s online bulletin, Singer is being paid around $500 an hour to “discredit the Bovis brothers,” so his quote about not wanting to file any kind of suit kinda falls on deaf ears.

Bovis family spokesman, Lee Houskeeper, told BCN that the Gold Dust owners were prepared for today’s suit and “has complete and total confidence in their attorney, who has been preparing for a long and protracted lawsuit.”

Just a hunch: With all this suing and counter-suing, the Gold Dust might not be closing any time soon.