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SCHENECTADY -- Marc Renson, the owner of Ambition Coffee & Eatery on Jay Street, has kept the faith for downtown Schenectady for over 24 years.

So it struck a chord when a cast member of "MJ," the national touring musical about Michael Jackson that just ran last week at Proctors, paid the city a compliment during a recent visit to Ambition.

"[A] cast member from The Michael Jackson Show just said, 'It was nice being in a town with no major chain restaurants, supporting unique family-owned,'" Renson posted on Facebook.

"What he said sparked that imagination in me and the pride," Renson said.

Ambition Coffee & Eatery has long been an anchor of Jay Street. The eccentric cafe opened in 2000, serving breakfast, lunch and dinner. The menu is packed with pop culture references -- Bluffin with My Muffin and Baba Wawa -- and the decor features posters of Hollywood stars and musicals, along with Betty Boop and Mr. Luigi statues.

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Renson thinks of it as "Schenectady's wild card," and it has a way of attracting stars, including Bradley Cooper, Ben Folds, Kelsey Grammer, Ryan Gosling and Barbara Eden.

"I love food, music and Hollywood, and that's who I am. And I invite all that into Ambition," Renson said.

Cast and crew members from national shows that tour at Proctors often stop into Ambition. Renson noted that the "MJ" cast member, who he did not identify by name, came in for breakfast shortly before leaving town on Monday.

"[He said] he did not miss Starbucks at all, which says a lot for Schenectady, not just Ambition, but all of Schenectady," Renson said. "We are all little, small independent restaurants, boutiques, whatever we do. We're all small, independent owners, and we all look for customers every day to support us."

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Renson added that the cast member ordered a blueberry bourbon bread pudding muffin, one of the cafe's more popular pastries, which helped bring the eatery through the pandemic.

"When COVID hit, when everybody was shut down and locked in their houses, we were shipping them all over the country because people were buying them for their families all over," Renson recalled.

He decided to post about the interaction on Facebook "because what he said hit me," Renson noted.

"It's just the pride that I feel for Ambition and for downtown Schenectady, that when a blind eye, shall I say, comes to downtown Schenectady and has that type of experience and they feel they need to have to tell somebody . . . that's very prideful for me," Renson said.

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This comes in the wake of recent challenges to downtown on the heels of the coronavirus pandemic. In the last two years, a number of prominent businesses have closed their doors, including Mexican Radio, Bombers Burrito Bar and Great Flats Brewing. However, as The Gazette reported last month, many business owners remain positive about downtown Schenectady.

"There are a lot of people who want to tell us what we're doing wrong, but we are doing something right," Renson said.

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