The Gate with No Fence

Memories of Exotic World

Jun 07, 2024

Jennie Lee’s Exotic Dancer League union meetings evolved into reunion meetups as the dancers retired from striptease, and her bar The Sassy Lassy, where the meetups happened and the g-strings were tacked to the wall, was eventually moved to the desert near Helendale Calivornia.

When I first met Dixie, I was in awe of the light that sparkled from her and shone on the items she described as she walked us through her collection. I looked at all the promotional photos of dancers on the wall, the rhinestone g-strings, the beautiful worn props and costumes traced with the material being, the actual DNA, of their wearers, and got tears in my eyes. I was not used to seeing the lives and accomplishments of my stripping forebears honored or celebrated. I was used to either not seeing them at all, or seeing them dehumanized as vectors of vice or mere kitsch. I knew we influenced culture, for what would be seen as good in the opinions of some and for ill in the opinions of others, but I don’t know if I had, at that point, really appreciated that we not only create our own culture, but our creations and influence are truly integral to the arts and culture of the larger world.

In the 1980s in strip joints I had known a burlesque queen from the 50s who came in to sell us costumes – and who had such contempt for us, with our jukeboxes and spandex and sugary shooters instead of the live bands and minks and fine champagnes she enjoyed in her prime. I was fascinated by her stories, her attitude, her crimson dagger nails (how did she sew?), and her bright red beehive (how did she sleep on her side?). Even then I was aware of what we now call the whorearchy, the idea that some sex workers are better than others because they are more “classy,” as I discuss in my paper in The Radical History Review. Some of the women I worked with, especially if they had training in ballet, would say, “I’m not a stripper, I’m a dancer,” as if a layer of skill purified the job. I was usually willing to look past these disclaimers if I could hear a good story or learn a dance move, but I didn’t hesitate to point them out.

Even in neo-burlesque, which was generally warm and welcoming, I had experienced a few whorephobic neo-burlesquers who were contemptuous of my sex work history and my big fake boobs (for awhile I was talking to all my burlesque friends who have implants about doing a burlesque show called “Big Fake Boobs” with no unenhanced breasts allowed) and were appalled by my history on the bread and butter side of stripping. I was mostly amused by folks who thought my actual sex work experience tainted my burlesque, even though burlesque is either based in sex work or is itself sex work, depending on your point of view. Recently, someone who complained about sex workers and strip joint strippers in burlesque justified their disgust by saying that they got their more arty art from a deeply important force they called “the source,” and I thought to myself, “Well, who doesn’t?” Such burlesquers are few and far between, with most neo-burlesquers being indifferent to, impressed by, or actually involved in the sex industry. Still, judgment from fellow burlesque performers can sting in ways the judgment of social conservatives and religious fundamentalists does not. And because no matter how tough you are, how shameless you are, how in-your-face you are – and I certainly am and have been for a long time – for some of us there’s still that internalized whorephobia, that little bit of self-judgemental civilian remaining in your soul that can be triggered by encountering contempt where kinship was expected. I know that strippers are from burlesque, and I know that one is not inherently more artistic or spiritual than the other – but there was a time when I wasn’t a sex worker, and I didn’t know it the way I know it now. Simply put, those deep inculturations are more dormant than dead, and are occasionally triggered by a fear of being unloved.

Dixie was rapt as I told her how inspired I was, as if no one had ever told her such a personal story to her before, as if I was the most interesting person she had ever met in her life and she wanted to adopt me. I thought then, as I tried to reign in my enthusiasm so she could talk to her other fans, that Dixie understood both flirting and seduction: flirting as the art of letting people know you’re interested in them, and seduction as the art of letting them know they’re interested in you.

“I’m just a strip joint stripper, though,” I said apologetically. It was a strange thing for me to say, because I had done my first feather fan dance and my first fire-eating acts in strip joints when I was a feature dancer, and feature dancing is still alive and rocking in strip joints. Even if I hadn’t, though, even if I had been the most mundane table dancer on the planet, there’s magic in all of it. Even knowing this, that fear of being expendable trash can pop up, whether it comes out in attempts to be the smartest stripper in the room, brags about being a more expensive escort, a dominatrix urgently telling everyone they never have sex with clients, or a burlesque performer who would never touch a pole.

Dixie flared briefly, hearing in my voice the echoes of people who had tried to put me in my place and knowing it extended to her and the people she loved, and knowing it was a flaw in the perceptions of the place-putters instead of in the actions of the movers and shakers. “You’re not just anything! You’re family here. Anyone who appreciates this belongs here.”

The longer I knew Dixie, the more I saw her welcome neo-burlesquers of all backgrounds, styles, and levels of experience with the same love and enthusiasm. She taught me that the greater the number of people who develop a love of a burlesque, the more of a future it has. She loved their love of burlesque almost as much she loved burlesque itself. She was as passionate about the present and the future of the art form as she was about its past. Elitism was not her thing–she loved adventure and possibility more than expertise and pedantry. She had a perpetual beginner’s mind.

Dixie made community. When she was in the hospital, performers around the world, some who didn’t like or trust each other, came together and raised over $40,000 for her care and her memorial. Even when community isn’t everything it could be, it can still offer something as precious as that: recognition of an elder who made burlesque what it is today, in this tenth or twentieth golden era of burlesque striptease. She knew that people across the globe cared about her, at the end, and appreciated what she had done to give burlesque its own museum and its own special stage.

That’s not to say that I never saw Dixie get justifiably mad or develop a dislike for someone or start a lawsuit. She wasn’t afraid of conflict. She wasn’t a doormat. But she was, above all, the facilitator of an artistic community, a joy enabler who didn’t attach a fence to the gates. To the very end, when she was in hospice, she reminded me to encourage my students to do burlesque their own way. She was infinitely generous and kind in the sense of encouraging everyone’s approach to burlesque, and everyone’s different desires and motivations around it.

Above: Dixie near the old goat pen in Helendale.

That is what I emulate as a teacher and community member.

Dixie made a believer out of me by letting me know that I never needed to apologize for who I was, and that if wanted to belong, I belonged, and had always belonged. I feel a responsibility to share this message, and to work toward making as many people as I can feel welcome in burlesque. This is why I have been saying to new performers, who are often intimidated, sometimes by their own fears and sometimes by the cruelty of territorial and insecure artists, “Burlesque is yours for the receiving. You don’t need permission to make it your own. If you start performing or producing, you become the future of this. Feel free to fuck up whatever it is now. Whatever you do will make burlesque what it will become, so do it the way you want it to be. Your audience will find you if you are true to yourself. Be the burlesque you want to see in the world.”

Tonight I’m co-introducing (along with Gigi Holliday) my friend Aurora Boobrealis, as she is awarded a Sassy Lassy. This award is all about contributors, all about looking at what people have built. In the spirit of Jennie Lee and Dixie Evans, without whom this event would not be taking place, I’m proud to honor another builder, another person who would never put a fence around possibilities.

Gate and Museum Image source:

https://clui.org/ludb/site/exotic-world-burlesque-museum-site

Dixie in red image source

https://briansmith.com/rip-dixie-evans-burlesque-legend/

Dixie Fixing her shoe:

https://lisakereszi.com/news-and-events/rip-dixie-evans

Aurora performing:

https://www.timeout.com/newyork/clubs/brown-girls-burlesques-hot-bothered-slide-show

Jo Weldon: A Whore To Culture

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