** Kittie's Essays & Musings

Diamonds From the Rough

A collaboration with Gypsy Charms with input from Vicky Butterfly.
First Published (edited as The Darker Side of Burlesque) : 8th July 2008 in Bizarre Magazine. Dennis Publishing

‘Diamonds From the Rough’
Tinted, Tainted & Tarnished - A Portrait of Golden Burlesque

Since their emergence in the early 20th century, American burlesque shows have specifically promoted adult-oriented entertainment. In many respects, the early promoters even pioneered the genres within – the ‘striptease’ and ‘burlesque-striptease’ – a hybrid comic form. To Americans, such shows would become known generically as ‘burlesque’.

In writing about the history of these burlesque shows, many have been seduced by the ideals portrayed by modern PR companies and the nostalgic notions of wishful thinking.

Beyond the vision of rose-tinted retro-spectacles, the history throws out many more contrary issues and a bleaker portrait of this sex industry enterprise than is often acknowledged. To fully appreciate the impact and legacy of the American burlesque/striptease story, it is important to do justice to those facts.

It has long been said that creative genius and ‘dangerous’ art are often the fruits of pain, hardship and repression and perhaps the misunderstood form of burlesque is no different. But like any other form, for every genius or ground-breaking work, there are countless tales of ruin and misery. Furthermore, ‘stars’ rarely find stardom through their own genius. More often, they are engineered products designed to make money for their creators.

For example, Little Egypt often regarded by new performers as a ‘pioneer’ or ingénue, was not as it turns out, expressing anything at all. In fact, she was a gimmick. She was a series of interchangeable girls with poor education and often poor English, brought in to boost a failing World’s Fair and, was frequently arrested for her trouble.

Such conflicting ‘histories’ have often encouraged a glossy, selective view of the turbulent reality and the phrase ‘all that glitters isn’t gold’ certainly applies.

The so-called ‘Golden Age’ of burlesque is commonly believed to have started with the Wall Street Crash, where a shortfall in disposable income made the price tag for a burlesque show (which was the fraction of the cost of a Broadway show) an appealing option. Coupled with the mass immigration of unemployed men to urban centres such as New York, the social fabric was firmly in place for “striptease” to take hold.

Far from the glamour of Broadway, burlesque in New York found its roots in the gang warfare, drugs, crime and prostitution which dominated the Bowery area of the city.  It took the famous Minsky’s almost 15 years to bring burlesque from the less salubrious surroundings of Bowery, to Broadway.  Gover, an anthropologist in the area during the 1930’s, described it as being filled with “For Men Only” hotels and rooming houses.  George Kneeland, author of a 1913 survey of New York’s nightspots declared: “practically all of the women in burlesque shows are professional prostitutes”.  In view of these kinds of accusations it’s hardly surprising that the more family orientated Variety and vaudeville shows tried to distance themselves from burlesque and regarded it as a ‘low’ form.

Minsky is often heralded as being the first to coin the term ‘striptease’ but who the first striptease artist was, is continually debated.  Some say it was ‘cooch’ dancer Omeena at the 1896 St Louis Fair, who allegedly stripped off the majority of her clothing in a midway tent; others credit Millie De Leon, Hinda Wassau or Mae Dix with the first ‘official’ striptease.  Regardless of who can officially claim the title of the ‘world’s first striptease artist’, by the 1930’s this new form, known curiously as ‘burlesque’ had taken over 7 major Broadway theatres.

The rise of burlesque, particularly in New York, was marred with links to corruption and criminality.  Burlesque and pornography went hand in hand with ‘candy butchers’ selling pornographic postcards and photographs during intervals.  The Minsky’s and other theatres adopted a ‘red flashing light code’ known as ‘John’s Law’ or ‘Boston Law’ to alert dancers on stage to tone down their acts when members of the city’s Vice Squad were on a raid – which by all accounts was a regular occurrence.     Jimmy Walker, a mayor of New York, associate and supporter of the Minsky’s resigned in 1932 amidst allegations of corruption.   This change in office resulted in only 30 of the 60 existing burlesque theatres operating in 1933.   Five years later with the sudden death of Billy Minsky, their Empire began to collapse.

The Minsky’s may have reached the heady heights of Broadway, but for your average burlesque dancer it was not a glamorous life.

Society’s views on burlesque meant that many women who worked as artists were adversely affected by social stigma.  Lois de Fee, found herself being sued by those she lodged with for custody of her own children on the basis of grounds for criminality and adoption proceedings were subsequently undertaken. Maggie Hart, one of Minsky’s artists reported in 1935 that conditions in the theatres were ‘real bad’ - dancers in the lowly chorus were often permanently in debt to the theatre owners as accommodation and food was deducted from their wages.  Hart spoke of playing to rough audiences and that many girls ‘got through it on a diet of drugs, liquor and nicotine’.

Similarly, in reading Gypsy Rose Lee’s ‘The G-String Murders’, Lee conjures up world where money was a constant worry. It portrays a life where dancers, often recognised in the street from pictures of police raids, were the victims of lecherous abuse and their boyfriends told how no ‘decent’ woman would be a burlesque dancer.

NOTE: In the UK, striptease didn’t take a hold until after WWII. Until then, Britain had to make do with Tableau Vivants and troupes like the Bluebell and Tiller Girls.  While the UK tried to cling onto anachronistic obscenity laws, the strip scene that sprouted in London’s Soho during the 1950’s was run by the notorious ‘Malts’ - the Maltese Mafia until the 1970’s. ‘Burlesque’ has always meant something quite different in the UK and was not traditionally associated with stripping or the sex industry.

Minsky’s girls generally had a far rougher ride in Showbiz than the supermodels of the day, The Ziegfield Follies.  By the 1950’s competition from showgirls and glamour models began to affect the burlesque-striptease scene.    Burlesque became about staring lasciviously at women, and vital statistics mattered more than ever.

Following the Golden Age era, Skipper and McCaghy’s research (conducted in 1969/70) confirms that the trend for strippers was of physically larger than average American women - larger hips and chests with “several approaching astronomical proportions”.  Their somewhat notorious research details the vital statistics of 35 strippers in the 16-45 age range.  According to their findings, 60% of the women came from broken homes and almost all stripped due to an unrequited need for ‘paternal love’ as their fathers had ‘abandoned them’ during adolescence.

The majority of their interviewees were first born (89%); matured physically early, had early coital experiences and came from the lowest strata of society.  These women, according to Skipper and McCaghy, displayed exhibitionist labour for gain and had few skills that would allow them to enter an alternate career that was as financially lucrative.  Allegedly 50-75% of them had ‘lesbian tendencies’ and some moonlighted as ‘whores’.

Listening to the personal memoirs of still living Golden Age performers (now affectionately known as ‘Living Legends’) we hear colourful 1st hand stories of glamour, good-times and a sense of ‘sisterhood’ but these tales are often paired with far more confessional ones of glamour to hide poverty, good-times out-weighed by bad and a sisterhood of women who had nothing but each other - having said that, even ‘sisters’ could be mortal enemies…

“I knew one girl, she used to like to go get somebody [whose costume] had a lot of beads, and she’d cut just a few threads in the right place, and her whole costume went. It was destroyed. And those costumes cost a lot of money. Even if you did it yourself, the beads and stones and things cost a good bit of money. I had one gown I did myself, and it was $1000 in beads and stones.” - Cherry Labrech

The New Orleans dancer, Cherry Labrech, adopted the name ‘Wild Cherry’ owing to her tendency to brawl. Like many others, Cherry ended up in burlesque due to her having no alternatives - having had no formal education.  Today, Cherry talks openly about her experiences.

“There wasn’t hair pulling and scratching, these girls duked it out with fists. Everybody pretty much did. There wasn’t a lot of that catfight stuff. Nah, these girls were pretty rough. And if they did decide they didn’t like somebody, in theatres I’ve seen, they would take a rolling pin and a lightbulb, break a lightbulb, and grind that glass up fine like a powder and put it in your face powder. They would put shoe polish in the eye mascara tube. They could get really rough. They didn’t play.” – Cherry Labrech

There is also a known case where a dancer started to copy another dancer’s routines and then had surgery to make herself look more alike by copying the other girl’s nose. The copy-cat victim dancer promptly punched her, and broke it.

There was also, for many women, a lot of time travelling alone on the road. As such, dancers sometimes died alone like Dian Rowland who had a heart attack and died alone in her hotel room at the age of 29.

Competing for work was in many cases, tantamount to competing for attention from criminals.  Drugs, vice and tax evasion were all common themes of scams and scandals in which the women were frequently embroiled – and these were neither small-time nor petty crooks.

Among the mob affiliated club owners was the notorious Jack Ruby who was also later arrested for the murder of Lee Harvey Oswald (who was arrested for the shooting of JFK) and died whilst in prison.

One of Jack Ruby’s friends and subsequent interviewee of the FBI was the famous cowgirl styled stripper Candy Barr and her story too, is one of tragic serial abuse and criminality. A survivor of childhood sex abuse, a victim of white slavery and teen prostitution, she reputedly married (briefly) at age 14 and went on to become the ‘first porn star’ by age 16. Candy maintained that her appearance in this underground film was against her will having been drugged and coerced. The ongoing tapestry of criminality meant that Candy eventually did time in prison herself too.

Similarly, the notoriously wild-living stripper, public streaker and sexploitation b-movie star Liz Renay was another known gangster’s moll who eventually went to prison herself (for perjury) and reputedly blamed her incarceration for her failure to fulfil her potential as a star.

Among other tragic figures was Honey Harlow who openly discussed her heroine addiction until her recent death. Her husband Lenny Bruce (famous US Comic) died of an overdose.

Further criticism on the exploitation of burlesque dancers lies in the attitude that the women’s identities were controlled by the male run industry. For example, much of the vintage aesthetics which were being mimicked (corsets, tight skirts, voluminous petticoats, high heels) were designed to repress women by further enforcing gender roles and restricting their movement and speed.

On a similar note, it has been suggested that girls like Zorita and Satans Angel were actually fired from certain clubs for not hiding their sexuality.

In his celebrated book ‘Horrible Prettiness’, Robert Allen also says that Lydia Thompson’s British Blondes (1860s) had plastic surgery to present a more unified and bland appearance - one that was more ‘pleasing’ to men.

Although the research that is still cited today paints a rather bleak picture of the US peeler, there were those (e.g. Gypsy Rose Lee, Tempest Storm, Lili St Cyr, Ann Corio and Sally Rand), who headlined and did live the glamorous life that we associate so keenly with burlesque but their own stories are undoubtedly fuelled with their own heart aches too. There are even those who have gone on to become reluctant legends post-hoc. The now legendary Bettie Page abandoned her burlesque career, feeling ashamed and repented her sins.

The true face of the Golden Age may well be a tarnished one but of course, a tarnished truth is not a less beautiful one.  It is a more complex one -both fascinating and more seductive than any ideal.  It is complicated and diverse. It shows tears and tiaras, devotion and desperation – it shows the full spectrum of human emotion including triumph over adversary and strength of character over disappointment in life.

It is important to keep feelings and facts in perspective. Looking back on the era’s harsh reality we must also be careful not to obscure the beauty and strength that the American burlesque once displayed and inspires today.

We must take the bad with the good, the rhinestones with the diamonds and remain objective. After all, using a cracked mirror to examine a facade will only yield a distorted picture.

No true tale of beauty is without elements of tragedy and loss; and with a history so shrouded in it’ own glamour, the American burlesque will always maintain at least one enduring quality – it’s inimitable mystique.

A collaborative piece by Kittie Klaw and Gypsy Charms, input from Vicky Butterfly.
With thanks to Jo ‘Boobs’ Weldon.