{"id":314,"date":"2021-10-20T23:00:00","date_gmt":"2021-10-20T23:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/supplychainstrategynow.com\/?p=314"},"modified":"2025-06-11T10:06:42","modified_gmt":"2025-06-11T10:06:42","slug":"why-some-dancers-are-finding-an-outlet-in-burlesque","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/supplychainstrategynow.com\/index.php\/2021\/10\/20\/why-some-dancers-are-finding-an-outlet-in-burlesque\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Some Dancers Are Finding an Outlet in Burlesque"},"content":{"rendered":"

If you hear that someone\u2019s a burlesque performer, you might call to mind Gypsy Rose Lee\u2019s journey from vaudeville youngster to snobby stripper in\u00a0Gypsy<\/em>, or even the painted ladies of\u00a0Moulin Rouge!\u00a0<\/em>Burlesque, however, is neither. And for the growing number of women who have found their way to nightlife performance from a concert-dance background, burlesque can feel pretty close to a feminist utopia\u2014one where women\u2019s bodies and choreographic voices are celebrated.<\/p>\n

Yes, stereotypes and tokenism remain an issue. But burlesque performers often find an outlet they never imagined in formal dance studios. \u201cIt really fills my cup,\u201d says Marcy Richardson, who marries aerial dance, opera and pole dancing in her nightlife act, and also performs with the burlesque troupe Company XIV. \u201cI get to be my most authentic self and let go of any expectations that people have.\u201d<\/p>\n

Burlesque\u2019s history in the U.S. has deeper roots than modern dance or even ballet. It grew out of Victorian music hall, Victorian burlesque and minstrel shows in the second half of the 19th century. Today\u2019s version of burlesque best resembles that of the early 1900s, when vaudeville reigned supreme. The form flourished during prohibition, and, pushed partially underground, the striptease took center stage. A wave of censorship shut down shows in the late \u201930s, but burlesque came roaring back in the \u201940s and \u201950s, thanks to female trailblazers like Lili St. Cyr and Tempest Storm.<\/p>\n

An entrepreneurial spirit remains firmly embedded in 21st-century burlesque. Like concert-dance choreographers, burlesquers often wear many hats: dancemaker, costume designer, self-promoter, makeup artist. \u201cGenerally, we\u2019re independent artists,\u201d says Jeez Loueez, a New Orleans\u2013based burlesque performer who started out in musical theater. \u201cIt\u2019s up to you to seek out the jobs\u2014and get your own rehearsal space, edit your own music and design your own costumes.\u201d<\/p>\n

One of the most rewarding differences from a formal dance career is how often you get to perform, says burlesquer Dirty Martini. Burlesque acts translate well to myriad venues with the capacity to pull together a show quickly. \u201cWhen you\u2019re rehearsing for a contemporary-dance work, it takes, what, six months to get a concert together, and maybe you can perform for one weekend,\u201d says Martini. \u201cIn nightlife, there are shows four or five times a week. You can take an idea you have, and in a week it\u2019s onstage.\u201d<\/p>\n

The need to constantly market yourself in order to generate an audience and a loyal following feels similarly exhausting to the hustle demanded of independent contemporary choreographers, however. For most of Loueez\u2019s burlesque career, she\u2019s had to get enough butts in seats to turn a profit for herself. \u201cSay there\u2019s a bar that wants to have a burlesque show,\u201d she says. \u201cYou might reach out to a producer, who\u2019ll say, \u2018Great. It\u2019ll cost me $2,000 to produce this event.\u2019 Now you have to sell tickets and match that cost before getting a cut of the door.\u201d Loueez likes to joke that if she worked at Walgreens, she wouldn\u2019t need to constantly post on social media that everyone should come visit her at a certain time. \u201cI wish I could just go to work without having to shout about it every day on social media.\u201d<\/p>\n

Despite burlesque\u2019s hustle culture, the transition into nightlife for most dancers-turned-burlesque-performers feels like taking a big gulp of fresh air. \u201cBefore burlesque, I would go to auditions, and I could see that I was a better dancer, but I wasn\u2019t getting the job because I looked a certain way or I wasn\u2019t the right height,\u201d says Michelle L\u2019amour, known colloquially as The Most Naked Woman. While she was dancing for an industrial glam-rock band, the front man, whom she was dating, asked her if she\u2019d like to create a burlesque show as an opening act. L\u2019amour said yes (\u201ceven though I had no idea what that was,\u201d she says with a laugh). When she did her first striptease, she knew this was going to be her life. (And that front man is now her husband.)<\/p>\n

For Zelia Rose, a burlesque performer who is also a swing in Australia\u2019s production of\u00a0Hamilton,\u00a0<\/em>the absence of needing to look or perform better than someone else is a big draw. \u201cSure, there\u2019s always going to be competition,\u201d she says, \u201cbut there\u2019s never a sense of \u2018Oh, I\u2019m comparing myself to this person, the way my body looks.\u2019 There\u2019s more of a celebration of coming together.\u201d<\/p>\n

Burlesque offers a particular performance haven for plus-size women, who are weary of concert-dance companies that seem to uniformly hire a highly specific body type: thin. When she graduated from Purchase College\u2014a program she says she entered on weight probation\u2014Martini knew the odds of finding a contemporary-dance gig were small. \u201cI auditioned for everyone, and I knew no one was going to hire me, because I was a size 14 or 16,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

\"A
Zelia Rose; Richard Marz, Courtesy Rose<\/small> <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Carving a space for herself and helping to shape the nascent burlesque scene in New York City in the 1990s was thrilling. \u201cIt\u2019s exciting for me to present a body that people get excited about,\u201d says Martini, a past winner of burlesque\u2019s version of the Olympics, the Miss Exotic World pageant. \u201cIt\u2019s not just men being excited because it\u2019s titillating\u2014the majority are women who are so excited to see a body that\u2019s not reflected in magazines or in television or the movies. They\u2019re like, \u2018Oh, thank God! Somebody\u2019s representing the majority of women in the U.S. who are over a size 12.\u2019 \u201c<\/p>\n

Of course, stereotyping still exists. \u201cWhen you look at the ways shows are cast, it might be five thin white girls and a brown girl and a fat girl,\u201d says Jezebel Express, a burlesque dancer who recently began performing out of a specially outfitted school bus. \u201cYou still see some idea that people are welcome, but only if they\u2019re achieving at a super-high level.\u201d It\u2019s common for plus-size performers to feel relegated to comedic routines, Express says: \u201cThey expect to have to deflect their sexuality.\u201d<\/p>\n

Burlesque, like nearly every performance field, still has work to do when it comes to moving beyond tokenism and successfully integrating performers of color. \u201cI get pigeonholed into always being the representation card,\u201d says Rose. \u201cI\u2019ll often be the only POC visible in shows.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s an audience-diversity issue, too, says Loueez. \u201cProducers will ask me, \u2018How do I get my audience to be more diverse?\u2019 \u201d she says. \u201cWell, you booked 10 skinny white ladies! If you\u2019re not seeing yourself reflected onstage, you\u2019re not going to go to those shows.\u201d<\/p>\n

Loueez, who 10 years ago founded Jeezy\u2019s Juke Joint, a Black Burly Q Revue, as a way to shine a light on Black burlesque performers, uses her teaching career as a tool for change. \u201cI started teaching because I was tired of seeing appropriation,\u201d she says. \u201cA lot of people were using it for comedic effect: \u2018How hilarious is it that I\u2019m white and I\u2019m trying to twerk!\u2019 But if a Black burlesque performer did the same act, it would be too stripper-y or raunchy. I have to remind myself that burlesque is not a sparkly bubble where racism and ableism and classicism don\u2019t exist.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u00a0is<\/em>\u00a0a space, performers argue, that offers a wider range of self-expression than its concert-dance counterpart\u2014and seems more ready to tackle the problematic issues that need fixing. \u201cWe live in a culture that created a hierarchy of bodies that serve the patriarchy,\u201d says Express. \u201cBut people are slowly hopping off the train, one at a time. And I get to help them off the train\u2014with burlesque.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

The post Why Some Dancers Are Finding an Outlet in Burlesque<\/a> appeared first on Dance Magazine<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If you hear that someone\u2019s a burlesque performer, you might call to mind Gypsy Rose Lee\u2019s journey from vaudeville youngster to snobby stripper in\u00a0Gypsy, or even the painted ladies of\u00a0Moulin Rouge!\u00a0Burlesque, however, is neither. And for the growing number of women who have found their way to nightlife performance from a concert-dance background, burlesque can […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":316,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[14],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/supplychainstrategynow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/314"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/supplychainstrategynow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/supplychainstrategynow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/supplychainstrategynow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/supplychainstrategynow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=314"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/supplychainstrategynow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/314\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":317,"href":"https:\/\/supplychainstrategynow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/314\/revisions\/317"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/supplychainstrategynow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/316"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/supplychainstrategynow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=314"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/supplychainstrategynow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=314"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/supplychainstrategynow.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=314"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}