Wonderland Burlesque's Let's All Go To The Movies: Burlesque Style - Part 2 of 10

Wonderland Burlesque's 

Let's All Go To The Movies

Burlesque Style - Part 2 of 10

In recent years, there has been a huge upsurge of interest in burlesque, creating a whole new generation of performers which have added sparkling new dashes of diversity and imagination to the brew.

This is the second post of a ten-part series where Hollywood shows us how it burlesques! 

Keeping 1987 as our cut-off point, we'll take a look at a few of the artifacts capturing the classic era of this art form.

So, tits up, ladies. Get your feather fans and tasseled pasties out. Let's all go to the movies and take another trip down mammary lane.  

--- ---

Paris After Midnite 

(1951)

(Locked up in a Parisian jail after a night of mishaps in a back alley with women from a French Hotel, two soldiers recount their adventures: an evening full of strip teases, bawdy jokes and titillating circumstances.) 

(This burlesque feature was directed by Robert C. Dertano and stars Tempest Storm, Iris Allen, Mary Andes and Flo Ash.)

(The set was raided by police during filming. Among the arrested was Timothy Farrell, who also served as an L.A. County Court Bailiff causing professional embarrassment for the actor.)

Tempest Storm and Friend

--- ---

Striporama

(1953)

(The Council of Culture is meeting in New York City to determine which art forms should be included in a time capsule. Word reaches three comics that burlesque will not be considered. This doesn't sit well with the men, who owe their livelihood to the art form. Disguised as gangsters, the three comics interrupt the council meeting in order to persuade them otherwise. Setting up a projector, they treat the council members to an afternoon of entertainment, in order to demonstrate the dance form's artistic merits.)

(This comedy was directed by Jerald Intrator and stars Bettie Page. Mandy Kay, Jack Diamond, Charles Harris, Lili St. Cyr, Georgia Sothern, Rosita Royce and The Venus Beauties.)

(The film features such acts as stripper Rosita Royce dancing with a number of trained birds, the Apache-style dance duo of Marinette and Andre, a male bodybuilder dubbed 'Mr. America' who flexes his muscles and plays the harmonica while balancing a blonde woman on his shoulders, several comedy sketches by comics Diamond, Kay and Harris, and a number of solo dance routines by the likes of Lili St. Cyr and Georgia Sothern.) 

Lili St. Cyr

Georgia Sothern

Rosita Royce

--- ---

Variatease

(1954)

(Legendary pin-up queen Bettie Page headlines a star-studded burlesque show, alongside 1950's icons Lili St. Cryr, Bobby Shields, Christine Rogers, Dave Starr, Vicki Lynn, and many others.)

(This burlesque feature is the first such directed by Irving Klaw, and stars Bettie Page, Lili St. Cyr, Chris La Chris, Vicki Lynn, Bobby Shields.).

Bettie Page

(Bettie Page performs a "particularly sexy but amateurish" Dance of the Seven Veils. Turns out, the girl can pose, but not dance. Of note: female impersonator Vicki Lynn does a turn in the film and is said to have been the first to have "crystallized the transgressive potential" of burlesque.)

--- ---

Teaserama

(1955)

(This is a compilation of several 1950s burlesque acts, so there's no real plot to summarize. There are some strippers, some stand-up comics of the take-my-wife-please variety and cult favorite Bettie Page who introduces the acts and frames the film by strutting her stuff.)

Bettie Page and Tempest Storm

(Directed by Irving Klaw, this burlesque film stars Bettie Page, Tempest Storm, Trudy Wayne, Vicki Lynn, and Dave Starr. It features a combination of B&W and color segments.)

Bettie Page and Tempest Storm

(The film opens with Bettie Page assisting Tempest Storm with her brassiere. Once the show begins, Page serves as emcee, introducing each act by using placards. Stripteases are performed by Storm, Chris La Chris, Twinnie Wallen, Trudy Wayne, female impersonator Vicki Lynn, and Cherry Knight, with stand-up duties provided by Joe E. Ross and Dave Starr.)

 (Vicki Lynn, who had also previously appeared in Klaw's previous burlesque feature, 1954's Varietease, appears in drag in the film. According to film historian Eric Schaefer, Lynn's performance in Teaserama was presented with "the same degree of sensuality and tease as the strips by women" and as "erotic to heterosexual men" as anything else in the film. He termed Lynn's act a form of "gender sabotage" - railing against the prevailing sexual norms of the time.)

--- ---

The Night They Raided Minsky's

(1968)

(A naïve young Amish woman runs away from her home in Pennsylvania to New York City, where she hopes to dance in religious stage plays.  But Billy Minsky's Burlesque seems hardly the place for her! The show's comedian wants to goad the local do-gooders by announcing the show's newest Paris sensation, 'Madame Fifi',. The theatre is raided while our young Amish dancer is mid-act. Things grow complicated when the show's comedy duo find themselves falling for the girl, all the while her father is scouring the city to find her and bring her home.)

 

(Based on the 1960 novel by Rowland Barber, this musical comedy was written and produced by Norman Lear (All In The Family), with music and lyrics by  Charles Strouse and Lee Adams (Annie), with direction by William Friedkin (The Exorcist) and stars Jason Robards, Britt Ekland, Norman Wisdom, Forrest Tucker, Harry Andrews, Denholm Elliott, Elliott Gould and Bert Lahr. The film is a fictional account of a purportedly true event: the invention of the striptease at Minsky's Burlesque in 1925 and the theatre's subsequent raid.) 

(The production has a storied history. Debbie Reynolds was hot to get her mitts on the book's rights, but was beat out by another producer, announced the the music would be written by Sammy Cahn as well as Johnny Mercer and Henry Mancini. However, when financial backing became hard to find, that producer simply allowed his stage rights to lapse. That's how it landed in the laps of producers Norman Lear and Bud Yorkin.)

(The first cut of the film was considered disastrous by all involved and Friedkin left the project in the hands of editor Ralph Rosenblum, who worked for more than a year to save it. The use of period film clips was Rosenblum's idea and the technique of returning from these clips to the movie by starting with a black-and-white version of a shot and changing to color was invented accidentally when the editor's assistant couldn't find the color copy of a piece of film fast enough.)

(Lear initially wanted Dick Shawn (Springtime For Hitler) for the male lead. Then Tony Curtis was offered the role, but declined due to disagreements over the script. A month before filming began, Curtis was replaced by Jason Robards. The role of Billy Minsky was initially offered to Alan Alda, however he proved unavailable due to his commitment to the musical, The Apple Tree on Broadway.)

(Bert Lahr's part was intended to be much larger, however the actor died during production. Lear drafted burlesque legend Joey Faye to stand-in for Lahr's uncompleted scenes. Due to the excessive overtime generated because of Bert Lahr's death, Lear gave gifts of initialed Tiffany silver money clips to the crew members at the wrap party.)

(This served as the last mainstream credit of former showgirl and Hollywood hopeful Helen Wood. She played one of the burlesque dancers. In 1969 she began making adult films under the name 'Dolly Sharp', leading to her appearance in 1972's groundbreaking porno, Deep Throat.)

Helen Wood

Dolly Sharp

--- ---

And that's all for now.

Tune in next week...

Same time, same channel.

Show Me How You Burlesque - Christina Aguilera

from the motion picture Burlesque