Tuesday, November 2, 2010

Burlesque Performers

Listed below are some of our favourite burlesque dancers.

Dita Von Teese

The first lady of Burlesque. The scene's most famous star. 

Immodesty Blaize, UK 

 Immodesty Blaize - the Uk's most famous burlesque star.

 

Miss Polly Rae, UK

Miss Polly Rae is one of Britains top burlesque dancers. She can be found performing around the UK with her Hurly Burly Girlys, London's leading troupe of singers, teasers and bump and grinders. 

Angie Pontani , US 

 Angie Pontani is one of America's hottest and sassiest burlesque stars. Angie was recently crowned "The Reigning Queen of Burlesque, Miss Exotic World 2008".

Kitten De Ville, USA

 A former winner of Miss Exotic World, Kitten is a fast rising star in the world of burlesque.
Kitten's signature look is her platinum blond Marilyn Monroe-esque locks.
Her fantastic shimmy has earnt her the title "Queen of the Shake".

Roxi Dlite , Canada

 Roxi Dlite is Canada's most popular burlesque star.

Masuimi Max

 Burlesque dancer, fetish model and pin up girl, Masuimi Max is of Korean and german descent and is hot, hot hot! 

Ivy Paige, UK

Ivy's club night, ‘Scandalous’, takes place once a
month in London at Volupté.
When she's not performing she teaches burlesque and cabaret workshops to women who don’t necessarily want to be performers but who want to boost their self-esteem, whatever their shape and size. 

Vicky Butterfly, UK

Classic burlesque with a modern twist. A trained costumier Vicky's clothes are elaborate and beautiful. Influences include Rita Hayworth and Lousie Brooks.

Lola Bel Aire, USA

 
 Burlesque dancer and pin-up girl Lola Bel Aire is a rising star on the American scene. Lola can be regularly found shaking her tush at Lili’s Burlesque Revue in Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota. 

Michelle L'Amour. USA 

  Michelle "Toots" L'amour, comes from Chicago. She was Miss Exotic World 2005. She hit the big time this year when she prefromed a sexy Knight Rider inspired burlesque routine in front of  Simon Cowlell, David.

Grotesque Burlesque Performers

Grotesque burlesque is a more extreme version of burlesque. It's a modern twisted take on the traditional striptease act, fusing cabaret and nudity with elements of horror, S&M and black comedy. Expect strap ons and fake blood. 

Below are a few of its performers.

Clea Cutthroat, Berlin 
 Clea uses blood, latex, hot wax and bondage. 

Empress Stah, UK
A star of the alternative scene. Stah has performed at Torture Garden, Skin Two and Erotica.

Julie Atlas Muz, New York 

Host of America's Favorite Burlesque Gameshow This or That! on public access, Julie's live shows are for the hardcore - involving cupcakes gang rape and vomit.


Monday, November 1, 2010

ET's Exclusive: Behind The Scenes of Burlesque

Trailer Watch: Burlesque Stars Cher, Tucci, Aguilera

Never underestimate Screen Gems topper Clint Culpepper. More than most studio execs, he gets to put together an eclectic range of projects under Sony’s low-budget Screen Gems label because he’s got that magic gut instinct for what audiences want and how to sell it to them. Since 1999, Culpepper has figured out which pictures to make without stepping on the toes of big Columbia and little Sony Pictures Classics: horror, urban and teen flicks like the Underworld, Hostel and Resident Evil franchises and Dear John.
One of Culpepper’s pet projects for a while now has been the Steve Antin musical Burlesque (due Thanksgiving) which stars Cher in a welcome return to the screen as the impresario of a struggling burlesque club. Christina Aguilera makes her screen debut; Stanley Tucci, Kristen Bell and Julianne Hough co-star. E.T.‘s first look and a new trailer are on the jump. (Farewell to departing E.T. vet Mary Hart, whose sizable salary got the budget axe this week.) 

Charm of burlesque stars endures decades later

Burlesque queens of yore, clockwise from top left: Marna Broadhurst, Lili St. Cyr, Blaze Starr, Dixie Evans, St. Cyr, Tempest Storm, Lily Rose and Sally Rand. Center: Storm. 


A thousand patrons — some having paid as much as 40 cents for a front-row seat — would be shouting. The pit orchestra would be playing, brassy and loud.
Listen carefully, and you can almost hear it still.
Yes, the Empire is fallen, gone for more than half-a-century, turned into another Washington Street parking lot. The ancient baggy-pants comics and their even more ancient jokes have faded away. Most of the dancers retired decades ago.
And yet this sexy yet strangely innocent entertainment still lives — and even thrives.
Ironic "Neo-Burlesque" shows play trendy theaters, featuring a new generation of performers. An upcoming feature film, "Burlesque," dramatizes the art with born-for-the-part divas Cher and Christina Aguilera.
Books like "Burlesque: A Living History," a multitude of websites and nonprofit social organizations like the Golden Days of Burlesque Historical Society allow veteran entertainers to keep in touch with each other, and their fans.
And an affectionate documentary, "Behind the Burly Q," opening today in Manhattan, captures it all, including those years when, outlawed in New York, the art took off in Jersey, providing, as director Leslie Zemeckis says, "a big show for very little money."
Wrapped in glamour
"Everybody thinks, oh burlesque, it’s just stripping," says Zemeckis. "But there was a chorus line, there were novelty acts, there were singers — in its heyday, it was a big show for very little money. Of course, there were the strippers, too. That was the attraction — ‘You’re gonna see stuff!’ But you really didn’t see that much."
The real raunch? That came later, towards the end of the ‘60s — the bottomless bars, the brass poles, the twenties tucked into G-strings. It wasn’t real dancing anymore, and the real dancers got out. But for a time there was a kind of glamour to the art, or at least a working-class idea of glamour — sequins, feathers, marabou.
And for years a lot of it was in Jersey theaters — the Empire and the Adams in Newark, the Hudson in Union City, the Globe in Atlantic City.
"When Mayor LaGuardia closed the burlesque theaters in New York (in 1937), the casts and crews just crossed the river," explained in an e-mail Jane Briggeman, author of several histories and founder of the Golden Days of Burlesque Historical Society. "When the society first started, I had a whole group who came from New Jersey."
Their fans crossed the Hudson too. New York might still have the Metropolitan Opera, Carnegie Hall and the Great White Way, but only New Jersey had "Peaches, the Incomparable Queen of Rhythm" or those "laffy daffy fun stars, Bob Ferguson & Max Coleman."
"The New Yorkers had to come to Jersey," said Nat Bodian, a Newark historian and veteran journalist who remembers going on the free passes that once papered newsrooms. "The tube practically brought them right to the Empire. . . . And when someone like Georgia Sothern came — the greatest stripper who ever lived — they filled the place."
Accident Became Act
By that time burlesque itself was already old, with roots in the cuckold farces of commedia dell’arte. According to legend, striptease was added in 1917 when a dancer at one of Minsky’s New York theaters started removing her costume before leaving the stage. The audience went wild, the accident became an act and modern burlesque was born.
It was still, though, more than stripping. In fact, remembered dancer Bambi Jones, 80, "you were never characterized as a stripper. You were a ‘character dancer,’ ‘exotic dancer,’ ‘interpretive dancer’— never stripper."
The striptease acts — or simply "strips" — were only part of the show, too. Sometimes there would be "a specialty" — for a while, Daisy and Violet Hilton, the conjoined twins of "Freaks," traveled the circuit. And there were the singers and comics, many of whom — Robert Alda, Phil Silvers, Lou Costello — went on to bigger careers.
"My dad started out as a ‘dancing juvenile,’" said Chris Costello. "He was supposed to warm up the audience before the top bananas, but he was so funny no one wanted to follow him! That’s where he met my mom, in the Ann Corio show. He was smitten — he’d just stand in the wings watching her in the chorus. Ann told her, ‘You know, you should go out with Lou, he really likes you.’ And my mom said, ‘Go out with a burlesque comic? If I want to starve, I can starve on my own!’"
She married the Paterson boy, though — and he teamed up with Asbury Park straight man Bud Abbott, and went on to Hollywood. Most performers, though stayed on tour, doing a week in Newark before moving on. Those who could afford it stopped first in Weehawken, where designers Rex Huntington and Robert Lockwood specialized in peel-away costumes. The rest stitched their rhinestones on the bus.
It wasn’t an easy life, and although a star like Corio, Gypsy Rose Lee or Lili St. Cyr could make thousands of dollars a week, for most it was just a way to feed themselves, or their children. Some were still children themselves (Sothern lied about her age, and started at 13). Others were fleeing abuse. Expenses were high and, for minority entertainers, engagements were often segregated.
"No one I talked to felt exploited, but nobody ever talked ‘empowering,’ either," Zemeckis said. "Most got into this because it was the only thing they could do."
Yet many look back on that life fondly. Sigrid R. Spangenberg, 68, was a young mother when a sexy sunbathing snapshot ran in the Milwaukee Journal; within a week, she had an offer from a burlesque troupe. Only after discussing it with her family did she sign on, doing a Dietrich-influenced act as "Lilli Marlene."
"Men thought we were easy, but the truth is that all of us either had boyfriends or husbands waiting," she replied in an e-mail. "The greatest satisfaction of being in burlesque came with payday."
Entertaining rules
The old burlesque world was its own world. There was the lingo (the small girl at the end of the chorus line was the "pony"; a dancer who could handle lines was a "talking woman"). There were the rules, which varied by city ("Pants not below four fingers from your navel," Jones remembered. "No touching yourself anywhere.")
And there was — even in a backstage full of cigar smoke and unwashed laundry — a real professionalism.
Stage names would be chosen ("Candy Cotton," "Chili Pepper," "Jade Green, the Jewish Lollipop"). Elaborate acts would be devised, with trained birds or giant champagne glasses. (For a while, Jones carried a football and billed herself as "Joi Naymith.") One dancer almost started a fire when one of her flaming tassels flew into the audience.
And yet, "Burlesque was family entertainment," Hudson dancer Joan Torino insisted in Briggeman’s "Burlesque: A Living History." "Fellows brought their gals to see stars, and to still have a little naughty fun." After a Newark show, couples would get highballs at the Empire Bar or black-and-white sodas at Emma’s Luncheonette.
But then in the ’50s, to boost profits, producers began firing the variety acts and loading the shows with more "strips" — a change which gave censors an excuse for raids. Dancers were arrested en masse. New ordinances were passed. Theaters were shuttered (the Empire and the Hudson both closed for good in 1957).
Eventually burlesque came back in clubs, but the tone had changed. Now, owners expected dancers to hustle drinks. New, X-rated tastes left nothing to the imagination.
"The decline of burlesque was due to the new wave of pole-dancers, and go-gos in the nude, and open porn," e-mailed Spangenberg, who quit in 1973. "It became boring and obsolete."
"You went from gowns to pasties to nothing, from a full orchestra to a three-piece band to a tape," Zemeckis said. "Blaze Starr talks about doing her act, and they’re projecting hard-core porn on the wall. Who could compete with that? Who would want to?"
And so the dancers exited, stage left. Some went into "respectable" endeavors. Some went into politics. ("Hope Diamond, Gem of the Exotics" eventually re-emerged as Jersey City Deputy Mayor Leona Beldini.) Some are still grinding away. (Jones just did a layout for Garage magazine.) Many more have died.
But those who remain have their memories, bright and shiny as a rhinestone. And a certain indefinable, indelible shimmy.
"In the early ’90s we were doing an Abbott and Costello tribute and they brought in Ann Corio," said Costello. "Well, they introduced her, they started playing ‘The Stripper’ — and she stood up and started peeling off the opera gloves again. I tell you, no one could take their eyes off her — in her ‘80s and still a knockout… But, you know, that’s what burlesque was. It wasn’t about the strip. It was all about the tease."

Friday, October 29, 2010

Druids, Magic, and Groupie Girls (& Boys)

This summer you might have glimpsed shape-shifting producer and performer The Swedish Housewife singing with The Fastbacks, hosting A Mid-Century Modern Celebration at The Triple Door, or demonstrating how to correctly butcher a chicken while in full Swedish Housewife regalia at Bumbershoot (dutifully pitching in for the launch of Kurt B. Reighley’s book United States of Americana: Backyard Chickens, Burlesque Beauties, and Handmade Bitters: A Field Guide to the New American Roots Movement). If such a display demonstrates how far removed from the production process modern end-users are today, Paula- aka The Swedish Housewife- is the antithesis. As a producer, if anyone can open a can of worms and dream up a full-scale, 90 minute production featuring custom sets and a 20+ cast of vanguard dancers, musicians, and burlesquers, it’s The Swedish Housewife. The woman just won’t sit still.
House of Thee Unholy, now in its fourth year, takes over The Triple Door this weekend for five shows in three nights. Billed as a rock-lesque extravaganza, initial inspiration and visual cues were culled from the rich album covers of the 70s and in the host of talented dancers and musicians Seattle is home to. Putting a burlesque spin on the hedonistic decade’s music was aided by an all-star band including Nick Garrison, belter Jen Ayers, drummer Charlie Lorme, and the return of soulful singer/actress Sarah Rudinoff. “Blues music is great for strip-tease,” says Paula (in conversation, she leans heavily on the second syllable). “And the 70s had really great, bluesy rock going on. It’s not a narrative performance- it’s more like an acid trip.”
The monstrous ensemble show updates what is perceived as burlesque and levels the playing field between male and female performers, musicians and dancers. Like most of her productions, House feels very grown up- feral women in power positions, men taking off their clothes, sexuality that is sophisticated and doesn’t pander to the cute or the coy. Viking ships, orgies, druids, sirens, zeppelins, and general excess are much more aligned with Paula’s Oz-like scope. There’s so much happening onstage it’s hard to take in; not to mention the sheer volume of dancers in various states of undress. Waxie Moon, Lily Verlaine, Miss Indigo Blue, Inga Ingénue, Lou Henry Hoover, Heidi Von Haught, Polly Wood, Leroi The Girl Boi, Gerard Delacroix, Douglas Ridings, Paris Original, Lydia McLane, and of course, The Swedish Housewife, will burlesque the 70s- sometimes en masse.
This year’s run will be the last for a while, as Paula sinks her teeth into another genre rife with button-pushing possibilities, glam rock. More details TBD on the new spring show… for now, get thee to the Triple Door.


Friday, October 22, 2010

Burlesque back on Bourbon Street in French Quarter

The burlesque revival in the United States began in earnest during the early ’90’s and has, after nearly two decades (almost the length of burlesque’s original heyday) hit critical mass. Neo-burlesque has spawned multiple conferences and festivals — including the inaugural New Orleans Burlesque Festival in 2009 — at least one bona fide international celebrity in Dita von Teese, and hundreds of troupes around the world whose styles of strut and flounce run the gamut from historical authenticity to punk-rock feminist gender commentary, and many variations in between.

 Trixie Minx is striving for a party-like atmosphere in her new Burlesque Ballroom show at the Irvin Mayfield Playhouse on Bourbon Street. 

The blonde gamine Trixie Minx leads the third burlesque troupe to be in residence at 615 Toulouse St. since 1999, when the Shim Sham Club debuted the thrillingly extravagant Shim Shamettes. The Shamettes were named in homage to the original Shim Sham Club, which was operated on Bourbon Sttreet in the ’30’s by Louis Prima’s brother Leon.
Their show illustrated that commitment to the past, with routines from the middle of the 20th century passed down by their original performers, such as Evangeline the Oyster Girl. Minx, who is as much a comedienne as a slinky ecdysiast, brought a little something different to the table when her Fleur de Tease group became the house troupe at the club, now One Eyed Jacks. (One recent Fleur de Tease dance was a can-can set to the music of the MC5’s “Kick Out The Jams,” performed in Converse All-Stars.)
The Burlesque Ballroom at Irvin Mayfield’s Jazz Playhouse at the Royal Sonesta is Minx’s latest venture, and true to form, it’s something different. For one, the slapstick element of Minx’s goofy sense of humor has been removed for the jazz-club crowd.
Unlike most neo-burlesque shows, the Ballroom is not a stage show presented as if it were theater. Even if the vision for the weekly night didn’t preclude that, the room would; the Jazz Playhouse’s stage barely fits Leon “Kid Chocolate” Brown’s quartet, let alone a dancer. So performers in Trixie’s show use the whole space, including a tiny area in front of the stage, customer’s tabletops, and the aisles between them. Remember Jessica Rabbit’s jaw-dropping crawl through the nightclub in “Who Framed Roger Rabbit?” It’s kind of like that.
The relaxed structure of the show was a joint idea of Minx and the Playhouse staff. The band and dancers share the spotlight, and the very dapper, dry-witted Brown — still crisp in his three-piece suit after a long night that began with an 8 p.m. set — appears as able an accidental burlesque emcee as he is a bandleader.
The addition of a live band always adds an extra, kinetic element of excitement to burlesque, and the laid-back vibe of the show contributed to that even more so. An unplanned drum solo during one of Minx’s performances, set to Louis Prima’s “Banana Split For My Baby,” played like a wild improvised duet for derriere and snare.
No matter how hot the combo, they’re at risk for fading into the background when there are also women with few clothes on onstage. Since the dancers used the whole club to perform — and the ratio of striptease numbers to songs the band played with no dancer was about even — the audience’s attention could, and did, go anywhere.
“I met up with Irvin Mayfield, and we discussed trying to create something new that’s not your typical show,” Minx said. “The main focus with the Burlesque Ballroom is trying to break down the typical barriers between the performer and the audience.”
“Once we hit seven nights of live music, we were looking for creative ways to extend the Playhouse hours and introduce jazz to new audiences,” Mayfield said. “We came up with the idea of collaborating with Trixie Minx and expanding into the ’Round Midnight time slot...,” Mayfield said. (The burlesque show is part of the Playhouse’s new late-night events, called ’Round Midnight. On Saturday, after the 8 p.m. show, the Soul Rebels Brass Band and other brass bands perform.)
“We created an intimate, sexy, jazzy, after-hours destination for mature local audiences,” he said.At the inaugural show on Dec. 11, there was a sharp attrition rate in the packed house after the first hour or so, possibly due to the late hour (the Burlesque Ballroom runs from midnight til 2 a.m.) but the later it got, the more the room took on the vibe of a louche, swanky late-night party. At some point after 1 a.m., Mayfield himself dropped in, wearing jeans and a T-shirt, and took the stage for a dynamic wake-up of a dueling-trumpet jam with Brown.
The only thing disappointing about Brown’s quartet — and this is purely burlesque-wise — was the lack of a saxophone. Sax can express sexiness like no other instrument; during a striptease, drums snap and pop on the bumps, but the long bleat of the sax is the soundtrack of the grind. Drums are the punctuation; the sax is the sentence. Brown is a masterful horn blower, but the lighter tones of his trumpet just didn’t carry the weight of so many undulating hips.
Attendees at the Burlesque Ballroom are having a last-stop-of-the-night experience very similar to what their counterparts on Bourbon Street saw after midnight 50 or 60 years ago.
“The mission of the event is not to have people just sit down and observe, but to really get into it and feel like dancing too,” Minx said. “Like they’re at a party.”

Burlesque is Busting Out on Main Street

                                         By Vee Benard

The Sag Harbor Cinema, tucked in the middle of Main Street, is about to revisit its former identity as a vaudeville house: this Friday, filmmaker and Sag Harbor resident Gary Beeber is holding the local premiere of his film “Dirty Martini and the New Burlesque” at the cinema, the screening of which will be followed later that night by a live burlesque performance featuring two of the film’s stars.
“Dirty Martini and the New Burlesque” is a feature-length documentary about the global resurgence of burlesque in recent years. Released in early 2010 in collaboration with the Seattle International Film Festival, the film premiered at the Moisture Festival in Seattle to wide critical acclaim. Beeber says that the film has now traveled to cities all over the U.S. and Canada, from the Toronto Burlesque Festival to Dallas’ U.S.A. Film festival.
Burlesque, which took root in late 19th century America, hit its peak in the 1930s and 1940s, after which point it suffered a slow decline in popularity chiefly as a result of its promiscuous content.
As Beeber explains, what was later associated with the term “burlesque” was really something entirely different.
“What they were calling ‘burlesque,’” he clarified, “was really lap dancing and other performances you might find in strip clubs. New burlesque comes from modern dance and performance art.”
Dirty Martini, who, as a burlesque performer, has hands-on experience with the evolution and misconceptions of the burlesque form, agrees with Beeber’s conclusion; but where he claims that burlesque was “dead in New York” prior to its comeback in the 1980s, Dirty Martini says that “burlesque never left New York City.”
“In fact,” she continued, “it was New York that really carried the torch for burlesque during those years. New York has always been open, always been experimental…and drag queens also played a large part in keeping that spirit alive.”
As Tigger! — another burlesque legend featured in Beeber’s film, who is dubbed “The Godfather of Boylesque,” “The Original King of Boylesque,” and the first-ever winner of “Mr. Exotic World” (an honor Beeber compared to winning an Academy Award) —
Tigger! (exclamation point required) explains that he, Dirty Martini, and the few other performers who have been involved with the resurgence of burlesque, are “accidental founders” of the new burlesque movement, their interest in the form born from a “frustration with the limitations of the art forms we were already in.”
“Burlesque allows us to bring forms together,” said Tigger!, who was cast in a production of “Much Ado About Nothing” the same day he received the honor of “Mr. Exotic World.”
One of the biggest threats to the widespread acceptance of burlesque is its frequent confusion with erotic stripping. As Dirty Martini describes it, burlesque is, put simply “a theatrical form without words.”
“I’ve been a dancer since I was six,” she shared. After moving to New York to become a modern dancer, she found it difficult to find a niche for her body type.
 “People who once would have used ‘differently-sized’ dancers,” she said, “had moved on and started using cookie cutter bodies, which made it so hard for me to find an outlet to perform. When I started to do research, I looked at old videos of burlesque and loved it. It features all body types, it showcases them all.”
Beyond offering an informative glimpse into the burlesque world, all parties involved with the production of “Dirty Martini and the New Burlesque” hope that audiences take away messages of positive body image and female empowerment after watching the film.
“I dare them to try not to!” joked Dirty Martini. “It’s not a preachy film. It’s a beautiful film about people working, working hard, making friends and family in a world that gives them support they might not get elsewhere.”
“Yes, you’re going to see gender play,” she said, “you’re going to see different body types, and different kinds of people, wacky people.”
 “This film truly puts women in a positive light,” said Beeber. “Women nowadays have some imaginary problem with their bodies. This film shows that it’s not how you look on the outside, it’s how beautiful you are on the inside.”
“Our job is to deliver a fun time,” said Tigger!, “and yet there is still an implicit message of combining sex, humor and personal liberation.”
“You learn to be more comfortable with your own self,” he said, “It’s not about having the most beautiful body in the room, it’s about understanding how absolutely beautiful every body in the room is.”
Despite the film’s tour around the country, this Friday’s event will be in a class of its own. The evening will start out with a “Pre-movie Gala” at the Richard J. Demato Fine Arts Gallery right next door from 9:30 to 11 p.m., during which time guests will be able to meet both Dirty Martini and Tigger!. Immediately following the screening, Dirty Martini and Tigger! will offer a live performance in the Cinema.
“The performances will be really, really amazing,” said Beeber. “Dirty Martini is a superstar of burlesque. Just the idea of being able to have her in Sag Harbor at all is pretty amazing.”
The Sag Harbor premiere of Gary Beeber’s “Dirty Martini and the New Burlesque” will be this Friday, August 13 at 11 p.m. with a Pre-movie gala and champagne reception next door at 9 p.m. at Richard J. Demato Fine Arts Gallery. Tickets are available at the Sag Harbor Cinema, 90 Main Street, Sag Harbor and cost $15 in advance, $20 day-of.

http://sagharboronline.com/sagharborexpress/page-1/burlesque-is-busting-out-on-main-street-8881

Thursday, September 30, 2010

Burlesque Days Again for the Feather Boa Crowd. Part II

Outside, civilians and buffet lines. Inside, cherry vodka, rich desserts and stories about tassel applications and acts with animals. “I worked with this little girl, and she had parakeets,” Nocturne remembers. “Parakeets in her purse.”
Nocturne, 79, who drove up from Texas with her husband, is alone in saying her burlesque days were her darkest. She found stripping to be a lucrative humiliation, and she detested the pressure to mix with customers so they would buy a club’s overpriced liquor.

But that is all behind her now, she says. Thirty years ago she found Jesus and has not had a drink since, “Praise God.” She has come to Baraboo to see old friends and to remember the one aspect of burlesque she adored, those glorious costumes.

Bambi, also 79, is Nocturne’s opposite: she left Holyoke, Mass., as a young woman and never looked back. Yes, some strippers would sabotage the outfits of their competitors, and yes, there was that abusive second husband, the one who forced her to flee. But one of burlesque’s many charms is its service as a kind of witness-protection program; for a few years, then, Bambi became Holly Simms. Of burlesque over all, she says, “I loved it.”

It is deep into the second day of the reunion now; time for a show. The coffee table has been moved aside, some chairs arranged. The Irish Mist will strut for a while, Bambi will grind that coffee bean, and a young burlesque star named Orchid Mei — who has been listening to the stories with undergraduate earnestness — will do an act that makes many in the room wish for 1955.

Another knock on the door. Is it Bones?

No: Pat Flannery. And what an entrance she makes: seated in a chariot of a wheelchair pushed by her elder daughter, Bekki Vallin, and wearing a pink sweatshirt, white socks that match her hair, and teal slip-on sneakers.

Her one-liners come out fast, most of them at her own expense. When she cannot remember the name of some Wisconsin town, she assumes a stage mentalist’s pose, with a hand against forehead, and intones, “The mind has left the body.”

Ms. Flannery watches the three women dance, one after another. She laughs at Bambi’s wisecracks. She admires the fluid grace of Orchid Mei. And when the show is over, she is wheeled to a place where she enjoys a cigarette while looking out upon some grass.

How do you do.


Burlesque Days Again for the Feather Boa Crowd. Part I

Jane Briggeman, taking pictures, as Orchid Mei dances for La Savona, left, Marg C and Bambi Jones at a meeting of former burlesque dancers in Baraboo, Wis.

In a modest hotel suite at the Ho-Chunk Casino, a few women from out of town gather for a reunion. Homemade brownies sit on the counter, along with a peach pie, some cheese curds, several cans of soda and a long, sleek bottle of cherry vodka — a perfect name, they joke, for a burlesque queen.

There is no Cherry Vodka in the room. But Nocturne is here. And La Savona. And Ann Pett. And the Irish Mist. And Bambi Jones, also known as Bambi Brooks, Joi Naymith, the Black Panther Girl, the Mona Lisa Girl, the Garter Girl, Evangeline the Oyster Girl — and, for a while there in New Orleans, “The Girl the Whole Town’s Talking About.”

And Pat Flannery, just Pat Flannery, may also show up. Nearly 60 years ago she did her “How Do You Do?” routine at the old Moulin Rouge in Oakland, wearing dark opera gloves, a polka-dot gown and a look that said, You naughty boy. By act’s end, only the look remained.

But Ms. Flannery might have to cancel her Baraboo appearance. She is 83 now, using a wheelchair and living in a nursing home about two hours north of here — though there is hopeful talk of an overnight furlough for the woman who once saucily sang to would-be suitors:

“How do you do? But now, How do you do?”

Either way, Ms. Flannery is present in some of the photographs splayed on a table. Here she is in a skimpy sailor’s outfit, saluting. And here is La Savona in midwrithe, during her signature Scheherazade routine. And here is Bambi in Miami, sharing drinks with Errol Flynn in the mid-1950s, and performing at a senior center in Connecticut just a few weeks ago, where she wowed them.

For that appearance she wore a pink Southern belle number that she proceeded to remove, slowly, before beginning a discourse on the history of burlesque. “I worked the walkers, and I worked the canes,” says Bambi, a limber 79.

Outside this hotel door, civilians plod about, playing the penny slots, shuffling toward the bargain buffet. What do they know of the old bump and grind? Of enthralling men through skin and suggestion — and then puncturing the moment with a bawdy one-liner?

Bambi shares a few of those lines, but you’ll have to catch her at the senior center to hear them; they cannot be repeated here. She also shares a basic burlesque technique. Imagine an apple to your left, an orange to your right, and a coffee bean in front of you. Now follow these pelvic thrusts:

“Hit the apple, hit the orange and g-r-r-ind the coffee.

“Hit the apple, hit the orange and g-r-r-ind the coffee...”

Where were we?

Oh, yes, we are in Room 1223 at the Ho-Chunk Casino in lovely Baraboo, where the days blur and the chitchat says this is no quilting bee:

“I had been kicking chorus in Cleveland ... I worked with Champagne glasses ... It took 10 guys to get the snake off of her. And I said, ‘So now I understand why you don’t work Massachusetts.’ ”

“That cheese curd is delicious,” Nocturne says. To which Bambi says, “Did you ever work Canada?”

Fifteen years ago, Tanayo, the Costa Rican Dream Girl, handed a worn address book filled with the stage names of lost friends to her civilian friend, Jane Briggeman. So began the Golden Days of Burlesque Historical Society, a nonprofit group dedicated to reuniting those who worked the circuit in the years before 1965: the strippers and dancers, the comics and straight men — the feather boa crowd.

The society had 235 members at its peak, many of whom helped Ms. Briggeman, 54, recover enough memories and photographs to write two books: “Burlesque: Legendary Stars of the Stage,” published in 2004, a year after Tanayo died, and “Burlesque: A Living History,” to be published this year. She continues the cause, in part by maintaining a newsletter with health updates, recent deaths and requests for help, as in:

“Lilli Marlene is looking for Luna, Goddess of the Spirit World.”

But the hook of time has reduced membership to about 135. A list of attendees from a reunion in 2006 includes the names of Lee Stuart, a great straight man; Sunny Dare, the Girl With the Blue Hair; and Carmela, the Sophia Loren of Burlesque. Gone, gone and gone.

As Ms. Briggeman says their names, La Savona, petite, elegant, and wearing a blond wig, sits with a magnifying glass, reading her newspaper notices and advertisements from the days when she was the Czech bombshell who escaped the Communists (“She’s the Cinderella that upset European royalty! Now making her first Toledo appearance!”).

At some point a knock at the door disrupts the memories. Pat Flannery?

No. A lanky, white-haired man, carrying in some chairs. Says his name is Bones.


 

Burlesque Trailer (HD)

Dance Burlesque Like Dita Von Teese


Learn how to perfect burlesque dancing with advice from expert dance teacher Zoe Morgan. VideoJug will show you how to achieve that sexy look through the art of burlesque dancing. Achieve that Dita Von Teese routine in no time!

Before doing more complicated moves, master the sexy walk. Imagine you're walking on a tightrope and place one foot in front of the other.

Use a prop such as a chair or a feather boa to show off the shape of your body.

Run your hands over the areas of the body you want to show off - such as along the length of your legs.

Lie back across the chair to show off the length of your body and legs.

Be confident, comfortable, and most of all have fun.


Thanks for watching video Dance Burlesque Like Dita Von Teese For more how to videos, expert advice, instructional tips, tricks, guides and tutorials on this subject, visit the topic Famous Dance Moves.

Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Burlesque as it was - Miss Orchid Mei

Daiquiri Dusk & Miss Hells Belle in their "Diner Dolly" act

About Burlesque Day At Disneyland

Burlesque Day At Disneyland is the unofficial name for the annual event where performers and fans of burlesque and their friends and families celebrate two nights of Disney themed burlesque (burlesque parodies of disney characters and stories) and one day at the theme park.

We were lucky to have performers from all over the country (and in one case, the world) join us for a pair of great shows and then a trip to Disneyland. After a very successful run in January of 2009, we will be doing it again in March of 2010.

The reason we moved it to March was because most everyone's favorite ride is The Haunted Mansion - which is closed for refurbishment in January.

We hope you can join us at the shows and a great day at D-Land. Our shows aren't for kids, (although there is no nudity) but are great for fans of Disneyland and burlesque alike over 21. In 2009 we even had some imagineers in the audience and they loved it! We hope to make the even bigger and bigger with each year!

This group is ONLY for adding photos that are related to Burlesque Day At Disneyland events. While photos aren't allowed during the actual shows except from our los angeles burlesque photographers, guests are welcome to shoot photos with the performers during intermission and after the show. And who's to stop you from shooting photos at Disneyland? ;D

~ Chris Beyond
co-producer, peepshow menagerie

www.peepshowmenagerie.com
http://www.myspace.com/burlesqueland

http://www.flickr.com/groups/1198426@N21/

Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Show Stopper

Biggest misconception about burlesque: That it’s about dancing around in hot pants with feather boas. Burlesque was about the striptease. The stars of burlesque took their clothes off, end of story, period.

Hardest thing about stripping: To make it look effortless and natural.

Her first corset: It was out of my life for a little while. It was stolen, by a friend of mine’s daughter. One day she returned it and said she was sorry. I was happy. I have hundreds of corsets, but that is the most important one.

Worst moment onstage: My hair caught on fire. I do an act where I sit on a vanity table that has candelabras on it. Well, there was a lot of hair spray going on. I realized what was happening and put my hair out. The show went on.

Next big purchase: I’m getting ready to make a new show, and that is always a big expense. It will involve $80,000 worth of costumes and props. This one is going to be especially rhinestone heavy.

Personal hero: Mae West. There hasn’t been another actress in the world who wrote every line she ever said in a film.

Morning routine: My waking time always changes, because sometimes I am really jet lagged. When I’m home, I am up around 9 o’clock. First, I check my BlackBerry, which is next to me in bed. Then I let my dogs outside and get everybody breakfast.

Best thing about divorce from Marilyn Manson: There’s a long list. I am happy to have the drugs out of my life.

Fear about new love: That I’ll fall for a man who wants a modern, minimalist interior.

Prized possession: I took my engagement diamond and had it transformed at Christian Dior in Paris into a beautiful ring. It’s nice; it’s big. I feel like I suffered greatly for that diamond, and it needed to be reborn into something better.

Performance piece: Yes, I do perform in a giant martini glass, but I don’t keep it at home. All my props are kept in storage, a really big storage space, because I have a lot of things even bigger than that glass. I have never been where they are stored, to be honest. It’s somewhere in Los Angeles.

Animal friends: I have various taxidermied animals. I have a peacock, swans and birds in large glass domes. They’re beautiful.

Rainy-day activities: Sitting in front of the fire with my pets, two dachshunds and three Devon Rex cats, which is a breed that has unusually large ears and wide-set eyes.

Indispensable gadget: A 1940s phone station. It’s a stand that holds the phone, and you sit in it. You can’t move around. I used to have a cordless phone and I hated it.

Waistline: I’m not technically a tight lacer. It’s a fetish, in which you wear extremely tight corsets all the time. I don’t sleep in my corsets, and I’m not obsessed with obtaining the world’s smallest waist. My waist is around 18 inches.

Velvet painting: A painting of me by an artist named Olivia, who specializes in pinups.

Burlesque memento: I have an artifact of the famed burlesque star Sally Rand, from 1939. It’s a box that says “Winter Underwear for Men” on it. Inside is a crocheted warmer for a man’s equipment. It’s hysterical.

Guilty pleasure: Eating foie gras in Paris. That has gotten me into a lot of trouble with PETA. But it is a guilty pleasure; I feel guilty and horrible about it.

Extra bedrooms: I turned one of them into a dark, jewel box of a bedroom. Another is a wardrobe with my dresses, shoes and vintage clothes. The third is devoted to my hat collection and vanity. It’s a real powder room.

Collections: I collect in a crazy way. I have at least 15 collections. I collect vintage hair combs; vintage clothes; vintage lingerie; hats; jewelry; cigarette holders.

Favorite collection: My hats. When I look at them I can’t believe these are things that women wore on the street every day. They are dramatic and distinctive.

Treasured eras: For taxidermy, Victorian; for furniture, Art Deco; for lingerie, 1940s stockings and Victorian corsets; hats I like mid-1940s, when they wore the little tilted hats, like men’s hats.

What she drives: I have two classic cars, a 1939 Chrysler New Yorker and a 1965 Jaguar S-Type. I drove a Chrysler 300. But I just got a new car, a BMW Z4.

Fanciest corset: It’s by Mr. Pearl, without a doubt the world’s most-sought-after corset maker. He lives in Paris, and all the couturiers go to him. He has an unmatched talent for creating the perfect wasp waist. Each corset requires between 6 and 20 fittings.

Evening routine: I have no routine. I am happy if I am in bed by 1 a.m. It’s a great victory for me if I can sleep eight hours or more.

By her bed: A beautiful Art Deco box with a condom in it. I’m a single girl.

Favorite chore: Grocery shopping. I wasn’t always able to afford food, so I love putting things in my cart and realizing I can afford them.

Always in fridge: Eggs and truffle sauce. I order the sauce online. It is called Truffle Gatherers sauce. It is so good with eggs. It is very precious to me.

What she misses about America when abroad: More value to the dollar.

Fitness routine: About 20 minutes jumping on the trampoline and an hour of Pilates. I often take Sundays off.

What she wanted to be when she grew up: A ballerina.

Obsession: Ballet shoes. I have a collection dyed in every color of the rainbow.

Belief system: There are superstitions in burlesque. You aren’t supposed to put your shoes on the table. I try to pay attention to that, but I really like looking at my shoes, so I put them on the table all the time.

Perfect kitchen: One of my big extravagances when I moved out of my former husband’s house was a matching pink stove and refrigerator in ’50s style. Unlike real vintage items, they work. Obsolete item she can’t bear to part with: Everything I have is obsolete. That’s the point.





http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/30/magazine/30wwln-domains-t.html?_r=1&ref=burlesque


Behind the Burly Q. Oh, Those Bawdy, Gaudy Ladies

The indiscreet ladies who would meet the elite on bawdy, gaudy 42nd Street, as the old song had it, were probably more than just careless. You wouldn’t know it from the musical “42nd Street,” certainly, but those ladies were probably bumping and grinding amid feathery fans and gurgling soap bubbles. In the 1930s, Times Square was where professional straight men like Robert Alda (father of Alan) warmed up audiences that strippers put on boil. A popular entertainment, stripping was — or so the theater owner Herbert Minsky insisted — an American art. But in New York and elsewhere, burlesque came with a price: a milieu of vice that alarmed religious leaders and business owners and the politicians who catered to them.

The story of American burlesque on and off Broadway has been told in musicals and films like “Gypsy” and “The Night They Raided Minsky’s.” The neo-burlesque movement, personified by the glamour-puss likes of Dita Von Teese, striptease troupes like the Velvet Hammer (in Los Angeles) and the transformation of pole-dancing into a mainstream fitness routine (from Tony Soprano’s pleasure palace to yours), suggest that the time is ripe for a thoughtful new look at a disreputable old art form. If only “Behind the Burly Q” were up to the task. A charming, uncritical, often entertaining jumble, the documentary was written and directed by Leslie Zemeckis, who produced the movie with Jackie Levine and its director of photography, Sheri Hellard. (Ms. Zemeckis’s husband, the director Robert Zemeckis, has an executive producer credit.)

The movie presents itself as a history of burlesque, but you would be hard pressed to find a coherent chronology here. The movie jumps from woman to woman, topic to topic (costumes to mobsters), as it moves across time. If you know what hairstyles were in fashion, you might be able to guess the decade. Otherwise, you’re often on your own. That’s unfortunate because the personal stories could use some political balance, including a deeper look at why Mayor Fiorello H. La Guardia of New York banned burlesque in 1937. That story, for the curious, is fleshed out in the book “Striptease: The Untold History of the Girlie Show,” by Rachel Shteir, one of the movie’s talking heads.

Ms. Shteir has some interesting things to say, but the real reasons to see “Burly Q” are the women who took it all off (or most of it, anyway) in cheap joints across the country and the occasional Art Nouveau palace. Among the legends featured in the numerous contemporary interviews — as well as the flurry of archival photos and film clips — is Kitty West, who performed on the half shell as Evangeline the Oyster Girl. Also on hand is Tempest Storm, a flaming redhead who, advertised as “the girl with the 40-plus bust who goes 3-D two better,” appeared with the pinup queen Bettie Page in the 1955 revue film “Teaserama.” Now camera shy, Blaze Starr, meanwhile, appears as a voice on a telephone, a ghostly presence.

Though badly and unimaginatively shot in ugly video, the present-day interviews with these women are a delight and also poignant, partly because of the contrast between their older and younger selves, though mostly because of the lives they lived. Some climbed out of poverty, leaving behind sharecropper families, to earn a living the only way they felt they could. Some of them talk about the hard times before they entered burlesque; as a rule, they are far more discreet about what happened during their stripper days, perhaps because many belong to the pre-Oprah generation. Like World War II veterans, they can tell a good story but are otherwise pretty close-mouthed when it comes to anything that might smack of complaint.

Ms. Zemeckis tends to overplay the empowering aspects of their stories as working, independent women. Despite a few nods at the mob and the calamities of too much booze, and a lingering, melancholic look at Lili St. Cyr, a statuesque blonde who spiraled into tragedy, the movie is generally upbeat, even giddy, an excitable attitude that the chaotic storytelling reinforces. Maybe Ms. Zemeckis wanted to protect the women; you can understand her desire to make sure they were not pathologized. At the same time, there is more to this story, including what it meant for women to strip for money in the era before women’s lib. It’s great that she immortalized these women, some for the final time. But this is history as nostalgia.

BEHIND THE BURLY Q

Opens on Friday in Manhattan.

Written and directed by Leslie Zemeckis; voiceovers by Jacquie Barnbrook, Ron Bottita, Cate Cohen, Matthew Henerson and Amber Gainey Meade; director of photography, Sheri Hellard; edited by Evan Finn; produced by Ms. Zemeckis, Ms. Hellard and Jackie Levine; released by First Run Features. At the Quad Cinema, 34 West 13th Street, Greenwich Village. Running time: 1 hour 38 minutes. This film is not rated.
 

Monday, September 27, 2010

"Striptease for Burlesque, Exotic Dance and Every Day" DVD with Jo Weldo...

Striptease for Burlesque, Exotic Dance & Every Day

Whether you are fascinated with exotic dance, looking to grace the stage as a burlesque performer, or wondering about stripping for your significant other, you have arrived at the ultimate source of pro-level guidance on all aspects of striptease performance. Jo Weldon, burlesque star and Headmistress of The New York School of Burlesque, will teach you how to take off EVERYTHING, to the last string of pearls and handful of lace ligerie, and how to make a breathtaking show out of removing every item, be it an earring, a wedding gown, or a sweat suit.


How do you take off a sweat suit for a viewer? A business suit? Stockings? Or even glasses...with grace, starlike flair, subtle flirtation, suspense and fanfare?


Jo Weldon shares a wealth of experience and a million tips and tricks to make a stageworthy show out of stripping from both everyday clothes and rigged burlesque costumes. Jo's Striptease program offers an array of striptease routines, first taught step-by-step and then demonstrated to music. Each routine is partly choreographed, partly improvised, so that you can layer your own personality and style of movement over Jo's suggestions. For each routine Jo gives detailed guidance about various aspects of striptease technique, such as body angles, the interplay of concealing and revealing, the order and choreography’ of items removal. She also offers acting and expression tips to add humor, suspense, and sophistication to your act.


Jo's striptease routines include:


sweatsuit

lingerie

skirt and blouse (3 variations)

dress / evening gown (3 variations)

men's clothes

jeans, boots, turtleneck

wedding gown

business suit

corset and stockings.


In addition Jo's program contains sections of cultural information about the nature and history of striptease in burlesque and exotic dance, striptease instruction resources, and advice on selecting a stage name for burlesque or striptease performances.

Knight Rider Burlesque with Michelle L'Amour

About Burlesque Day At Disneyland


Burlesque Day At Disneyland is the unofficial name for the annual event where performers and fans of burlesque and their friends and families celebrate two nights of Disney themed burlesque (burlesque parodies of disney characters and stories) and one day at the theme park.

We were lucky to have performers from all over the country (and in one case, the world) join us for a pair of great shows and then a trip to Disneyland. After a very successful run in January of 2009, we will be doing it again in March of 2010.

The reason we moved it to March was because most everyone's favorite ride is The Haunted Mansion - which is closed for refurbishment in January.

We hope you can join us at the shows and a great day at D-Land. Our shows aren't for kids, (although there is no nudity) but are great for fans of Disneyland and burlesque alike over 21. In 2009 we even had some imagineers in the audience and they loved it! We hope to make the even bigger and bigger with each year!

This group is ONLY for adding photos that are related to Burlesque Day At Disneyland events. While photos aren't allowed during the actual shows except from our los angeles burlesque photographers, guests are welcome to shoot photos with the performers during intermission and after the show. And who's to stop you from shooting photos at Disneyland? ;D

~ Chris Beyond
co-producer, peepshow menagerie
www.peepshowmenagerie.com

http://www.myspace.com/burlesqueland

Burlesque Trailer 2010 HD

Friday, September 24, 2010

Gypsy Rose Lee strip routine

Gypsy Rose Lee Remembers Burlesque

This is a spoken word/comedy album I found (oddly enough) in a bin along with Terry Riley's In C and Cecil Taylor's 3 Phasis (all severely undervalued) at an antique mall in Binghamton, New York last year. When LPs are a dollar or less, and the source is a 10 minute jaunt from my apartment, I inevitably start buying in bulk. Lots of albums I know nothing about, which I generally buy because I like the title or the artwork. Gypsy Rose Lee Remembers Burlesque (StereODDITIES, 1962) was no exception. Recently, I was trying to weed out some of the duds from my collection, which meant listening to many things for the first time. I anticipated chucking this one but was more than pleasantly surprised. This is an excellent record with a rich history behind it--though for anyone who likes burlesque, the name Gypsy Rose Lee is certain to be old hat.

According to Wikipedia,

Gypsy Rose Lee was born Rose Louise Hovick in Seattle, Washington in 1911, although her mother later shaved three years off both of her daughters' ages. She was initially known by her middle name, Louise… Louise's singing and dancing talents were insufficient to sustain the act without [her sister] June. Eventually, it became apparent that Louise could make money in burlesque, which earned her legendary status as a classy and witty strip tease artist. Her innovations were an almost casual strip style, compared to the herky-jerky styles of most burlesque strippers (she emphasized the "tease" in "striptease") and she brought a sharp sense of humor into her act as well. She became as famous for her onstage wit as for her strip style, and—changing her stage name to Gypsy Rose Lee—she became one of the biggest stars of Minsky's Burlesque, where she performed for four years.
Eventually she married up into the world of Hollywood, even fathering one of Otto Preminger's children. In films like Ali Baba Goes to Town (1937), Battle of Broadway (1938), Stage Door Canteen (1943), and Belle of the Yukon (1944), she acted alongside such venerable personae as Victor McLaglen, Randolph Scott, Tallulah Bankhead and Katherine Hepburn; and, in B-movie thrillers like the lurid Screaming Mimi (1958), opposite less respectable actors like Phil Carey and Anita Ekberg--still, at the age of 47, trying to belt out a rather painful-sounding "Put the Blame on Mame." She seems to have played exclusively either dancers or nightclub owners, often with jazz artists like Raymond Scott or Red Norvo providing the pulsating soundtracks. Owing to her literary reputation as the author of The G-String Murders and Mother Finds a Body, she portrayed herself as an intellectual among strippers, an attractive notion still being "fleshed" out today in books by Chris Kraus and the latest episodes of Desperate Housewives. Watch her rather tame appearance in Stage Door Canteen, as she lectures the audience on art and culture in a full Victorian gown while subtly removing stockings and garter.
After years of marginal status, Lee's memoirs of life in the biz were turned into the 1959 musical Gypsy, a Stephen Sondheim extravaganza with Ethel Merman playing the titular character [correction: playing Gypsy's mother]. As these things usually go, the stage show became a 1962 film with Rosalind Russell and Natalie Wood; which leads me to think that this 1962 LP was most likely released in order to coincide with/capitalize off the renewed attention to Lee's autobiographical odyssey. A true, ahem, "no rags to riches story," as the clip above phrased it.


The lyrics are by Eli Basse and the music by Bobby Kroll; the whole thing is produced and directed by Fletcher Smith. Not that these names mean anything to me. The "adults-only" feel is similar to Belle Barth's records, though the producers are obviously having a lot more fun with the novelties of stereo technology. The liner notes say it all: "You'll find yourself once again surrounded by the unique atmosphere that's become part of Americana. Here in all their gaudy glory parade the Dolls of the Chorus, the baggy-pants Comics and the Sensational Strippers. Set to the authentic sounds of the bumpy burly-beat pit orchestra, such realism has been captured that you'll swear you see the magenta spots and smell the powder and paint... and even the salami sandwiches!" Though I'm not sure that the words "Americana" and "realism" should ever be included in the same breath without a tinge of irony. The album has plenty of great moments, even some sad ones--particularly on side B, as Gypsy laments the disappearance of burlesque by asking passersby on the street if they share her sentiments. Even the women are sad: "Pardon me madame, how do you feel about burlesque being closed up?" "I think it's disgraceful and I'm going to write a nasty letter to the mayor." "Why, madame?" "Well, since they closed the burlesque theaters I have no idea where my husband is every night."
Gypsy Rose Lee Remembers Burlesque (StereODDITIES, 1962)
 

April Daye, Lady of Burlesque/Hope Diamond, Jersey City Deputy Mayor?

As anybody who spends time muckraking can tell you, pursuing stories about political corruption can take you to some passing strange places. Particularly in New Jersey…

In July the FBI bagged a passel of Jersey pols on corruption charges. Jersey City Deputy Mayor Leona Beldini was among the indicted. An intriguing rumor about Beldini surfaced in comments posted in response to various regional news articles about the roundup. The poster (or posters) claimed Beldini was a burlesque queen in the 1950s and ’60s. Performing as Hope Diamond. Aka “The Gem of Exotics”. Hope Diamond was medium famous. Not Gypsy Rose Lee or Blaze Starr, but definitely on the scene. Enough so to be referenced by legendary night life columnists Earl Wilson and Walter Winchell. The interest factor in the here and now was the idea of Deputy Mayor Hope Diamond. How Jersey is that?

The rumor turned lead when I found extensive exposition in a non-local chat group focused on bicycling, with a regular poster going off topic to say “WOW, I just saw my relative* get busted on the news”. (The Jersey corruption sweep received national coverage.) The poster went on to identify Leona as Hope, calling her “one of the last stronghold Burlesque Gals” and describing her past life and later career in Jersey City in some detail. The story was picked up at Burlesque Babes Blog Shop, a memorabilia site devoted to the glory days of glamor stripping– as opposed to the gynecological days of pole dancing. Burlesque Babes fleshed out the story with interesting but inconclusive background material.

More conclusive was a 1965 article** in The Harvard Crimson, in which a reporter interviews Hope Diamond backstage at a Boston Theater. Hope’s non-stage name is given as Leona Bonaccolti. The reporter observes that Hope/Leona seems “as much an efficient businesswoman as a performer”; contrasting her with other “burlies” for whom the spotlight was “the very breath of life”. He describes Hope/Leona as “more of a respectable madame figure than a temptress” and notes her expensive jewelry and minks, and the quality champagne she imbibes while being interviewed.

In the interview Hope/Leona mentions her Princeton, New Jersey origins and her residence in Edgewater, in Bergen County. Bergen abuts Hudson County, parent entity of Jersey City. According to an earlier (1961) Walter Winchell column Hope Diamond (Leona Bonaccolti) was married to crooner Bobby Colt but was in the process of separation. Hope/Leona’s web-chatty relative mentions a later marriage to noted jazz drummer Al Beldini. Eugene Chadbourne’s entry on Beldini (sometimes spelled Baldini or Baldiny) at the Verve Music website states his appearances on jazz records “come to a halt in the mid-’70s”.

By the 1980s, Leona Beldini was a prominent Jersey City real estate broker. By 2009, she was on the board of the Jersey City Economic Development Corporation (JCEDC) and deputy mayor in the administration of Mayor Jerramiah Healy. Mayor Healy, an ex-judge and cog in Hudson County’s Democratic machine (the gem of corruption) calls Beldini “a good friend”. Saying he’s known her for years. The Feds allege that Beldini, while Healy’s campaign treasurer, was also a bag woman. Ferrying bribes disguised as campaign contributions to grease development deals. Beldini got a piece of the real estate action. To date, Mayor Healey hasn’t been indicted. He claims to know nothing. (His detractors believe him.) Several other officials have pleaded guilty in the case, including Jersey City Housing Authority commissioner Edward Cheatam (!) who was simultaneously Hudson County’s Affirmative Action Officer. (Double dipping is a Jersey special.) Cheatam claims to have funneled bribes from several sources through former Deputy Mayor Leona Beldini. She maintains her innocence.

While digging into Beldini-as-Diamond I came across contact info for burlesque queen April Daye at one of the many sites that celebrate the ecdysiasts who made burlesque such sexy glam fun. (Not all these sites are memory lanes; a neo-burlesque movement is going great gams.) April Daye worked during the same period as Hope Diamond so I emailed her and asked for her thoughts on Hope/Leona. April’s reply email (hot pink background, purple text) while not directly confirming Leona as Hope, expressed sympathy for her situation “this publicity you don’t need at 74” and admiration for Hope Diamond as a performer. Saying she and Hope had sometimes appeared on the same bill. April described Hope as one of the “classy acts”.

I continued to correspond with April. April was (is) articulate, savvy, and often funny about her burlesque days. And her life has many colorful chapters besides her experience as the “Miss Behaving” April Daye. To go into those chapters would be beyond the scope of this article. But for a glimpse of one of the many faces (and names) of April, google “Gypsy Eden”. April sings! And unlike a lot strippers, she knew how to dance…

For April, performing was the breath of life. As a little girl she spent a lot of time wrapped in fabric swaths, dancing in homemade shows. She acquired some dance training, worked for Arthur Murray in St. Louis, Missouri and “wanted to be on the stage more than anything”. She linked up with another girl who wanted to be a model and headed for NYC. But April’s training wasn’t sufficient for Broadway. While in New York, she worked at the Latin Quarter and Copa Cabana as a hat check and camera girl. April was curvy and beautifully proportioned. She did some chorus work and figure modeling (she sent me a killer pin-up) and back in St. Louis, was tapped for burlesque by a major agent. She was still in her teens. Thanks to her youth, good looks and dance skills, April soon became a feature act making feature money. She was surprised to be paid “so much for showing so little”. As April puts it “it was the mid 1950s and the laws were most strict”. At the finale of her strip she’d be wearing what in 2009, would be “more than they wear at the beach”.

One of the things that made classic burlesque so entertaining (and at times adorably wacky) were its theme routines. As the experienced strippers in the musical “Gypsy” tell young Gypsy Rose Lee “you gotta have a gimmick”. Some strippers took fake bubble baths in tubs filled by bubble machines, or did ethnic themed strips in sarongs or peasant dirndl. Some had their clothes blown off by wind machines or snatched by invisible wires. Burlesque costumes involved special tech; no stripper wanted to struggle with a stuck zipper or become entangled in shucked-off garments. The ideal was “instant-off”.

April Daye had several routines. She danced to pop standards such as Love is a Many-Splendored Thing, St. Louis Blues, Night Train, and naturally– I’ll Remember April. Sometimes she wore translucent silk panel skirts that gave her spins “a twirling mystical floating appearance”. She did a bull fight routine “with authentic cape work”. She’s particularly proud of her “soft southern belle” routine; in which she wore a hoop skirt and carried a dainty parasol. Underneath her skirt was a pair of “instant-off ruffled pantaloons, snaps down the side”. April would bend over, back to the audience, and give them a smile over her shoulder. “Whoosh!” Off came the pantaloons. The audience would gasp in surprised delight.

If Scarlett O’Hara had worked the southern belle thing as well as April Daye she wouldn’t have had to run that nasty old lumber mill.

As said, April admired Hope Diamond’s classy act. April herself made a point of cultivating an aloofness that kept sleaze at bay and enhanced her routines. In April’s words “mystery always pays when it comes to seduction”. Other strippers got down and dirty. Despite its charm and color, burlesque was still a sex industry with plenty of sordid. April met her share of “the johns, the cons, the crooked, the mob, the jerks.” There were venues where dancers were expected to hustle drinks and/or themselves. One “bust out joint” in Kentucky had a sign-in sheet in the dressing room. April, still new to burlesque, assumed it was an attendance sheet and signed every night. Later she learned it was a tally sheet– so the owner of the joint could keep track of his cut from dancers turning tricks. The latter didn’t have to leave the premises; there was a brothel upstairs.

In the 1950s burlesque was in decline. By the ’60s and ’70s it was running on memory. April says this upped the sleaze factor. Theaters were “dirty, worn and cold”. Some did double duty as porn palaces, catering to the raincoat brigades. Eventually April focused on nightclubs, where strippers were still in demand and respected as entertainers. April danced till she was in her 40s. She appeared with, or worked the same venues as, some of the best strip acts in the business. Including Blaze Starr, Tempest Storm, and Tura Satana, star of Russ Meyer’s cult classic Faster Pussycat! Kill! Kill! April also worked with, or knew, performers such as Johnny Mathis, Jerry Vale, Tubby Boots (the one man vaudevillian sexual revolution), flamboyant wrestler/showman Gorgeous George, mega bosom babes Busty Russell and Chesty Morgan, and more top notch musicians than I can list. In her years on stage April was surrounded by some of the most talented and/or most outre members of mid 20th century American nightlife.

In the here and now, April Daye is a tad annoyed. Apparently some stripper cum comedian in Canada is performing under a very similar name. And she isn’t a classy act. More gynecological than glam. Still, April has a Zen influenced attitude toward life. She rises above the bad. As befits a lady of Burlesque…

Carola Von Hoffmannstahl-Solomonoff