Strip City: A Stripper's Farewell Journey Across America (21 page)

She tells my father, who, as he drives me back to the train station at the end of the visit, says to me, sighing, "You have so many talents. It's a shame that you can't make a living using one of them." There is disappointment in his voice. And worry and hesitation, yes. But no anger. If nothing else, my parents are rational people—maybe to a fault. I do my best to assure them that where I'm working is safe. I'm not in any danger and I don't feel I'm doing anything distasteful (I sort of fudge that last part).

I only tell them about the Lusty, though. I don't mention Peepland. I am not ready to tell them about that.

From that day forward, we never address the subject head on. They'll ask if I'm still dancing. I'll say yes. We'll circle around, tensions crackling, Freud pacing the margins, then move quickly on to the next matter of discussion. I will wonder forever after if I shouldn't have just kept it to myself. The truth may have set me free, but what did it to do them?

For many women, the Lusty Lady is a portal club—an entry to the adult industry that leads to more challenging and lucrative venues. Lisa, a hyperactive, black-haired nymph I used to work with at Life Café, moved to San Francisco shortly after I did. One afternoon, we meet in North Beach for lunch. She tells me she has been working over at Mitchell Brothers. "Have you thought of auditioning there?" she asks.

The Mitchell Brothers O'Farrell Theater, located at the corner of Polk and O'Farrell Streets on the periphery of the run-down Tenderloin district, is the crown jewel of San Francisco strip clubs. The club has a daunting reputation for being the hardest to get into. Girls sometimes have to audition several times before they get hired. Others win the Monday night amateur contest and walk away with just the twenty-five-dollar prize, because taking first place doesn't mean you've got a job. You have to get The Card. Once the audition is over, the hopefuls gather backstage and Nellie, the personnel director, comes through and thanks the ones she isn't going to hire, and she hands out cards with her phone number to the ones she wants, saying, "We'd like to hire you, if you're interested. Please call me tomorrow to schedule an orientation." When I lose a few more pounds, I try out. After my audition, I stare in disbelief at the business card in my hand—baby blue with a dark blue star at the center.

I'm in.

Mitchell Brothers has the cachet of being the brainchild of bad-boy porn impresarios Jim and Artie Mitchell. The Mitchell Brothers have long enjoyed local celebrity status for their innovative tripleX films like
Behind the Green Door
and their hard-fought First Amendment battles. But in April, 1991, the Mitchell reputation is forever tarnished when Jim, heretofore considered the mellower of the two brothers, walks into Artie's house one night and fatally shoots him as he lies in bed.

I start working at the O'Farrell Theater in November of that year. On my first day there, I am excused from Mardi Gras, the dancer line-up and introduction that starts every shift, but I do have to lead the rotation of girls in New York Live. I hover nervously, inspecting myself in the mirror as the girls file past in their lingerie on their way to the stage. Some of them toss a quick "good luck" over their shoulder. When the introduction ends, I steal one last look at my reflection. I'm wearing my black suede thigh-high boots, a burgundy lace bra and panty set, and a shiny black cotton Victorian dress with a long, full skirt and leg-of-mutton sleeves. Not a slick ensemble—I look like bait for Jack the Ripper—but I am a beginner, after all. I pace behind the curtain taking deep breaths. The deejay introduces me, the curtains draw back, and I step out into the spotlight beam to the opening notes of "Hot Child in the City." The first word of the song is "Danger." I have arrived.

If the Lusty Lady is college—ideals, self-discovery, political consciousness, and all that—then Mitchell Brothers is the real world, a sophisticated venue that requires dedication and discipline. I love to sit in the front row in New York Live, the room with the big stage, and watch the show. Such range! Such talent! Dazzling, colt-leggedy gals who come out in beaded evening gowns and strut with such authority you'd think they were trained by Gypsy Rose Lee herself. Gymnasts able to do backbends so deep that they touch their chin to the floor behind them. Tiny, athletic girls who work the pole with ease, jumping all the way up to the top and swinging around for the entire length of a song.

Mitchell Brothers bills itself as "the Adult Disneyland," with enough fantasy tableaux to inspire E-ticket thrills in even the most jaded porn hound. When I'm not star-struck in New York Live or fumbling my way through my first lap dances (somehow I always end up poking a guy in the side or whacking him in the head with my elbow), I marvel at the shows in The Rooms. In the Ultra Room, latex-and leather-clad dancers flip from a trapeze and chase each other—crops and paddles in hand—up and down the length of the narrow mirrored stage while the customers watch through the glass of their private booths. The Kopenhagen Room girls, lit only by the flashlights that customers are given at the start of the show, writhe in unison in the red-carpeted pit between the deep-cushioned couches. The Green Door Room, a giant shower, hosts four-to-six bathing beauties at a time. The curtain draws up and the dancers sway together, limbs entwined, as colored lights caress their bodies. Their bare skin glows pink, then aqua, then sky blue, and back again under shimmering clouds of steam. They step from the shower and pair off for table-top shows, carrying baskets overflowing with feathers, lotions, powders, love beads, and other sensual paraphernelia. As I watch these women, each of whom exudes the supreme confidence of a sexual adventuress, I wonder,
will I ever ascend to that level? Do I dare attempt that extreme?

Dancers are granted flexibility in their style, but the rules of conduct they impress upon me when I am hired are not open to interpretation. New girls are given an orientation by Nellie, an officious blonde who used to dance at the theater but has since plumped into the role of wife, mother, and personnel director. Seated at her desk in the office across the hall from the dressing room, she outlines the rules with tense, don't-fuck-with-me authority: Dancers are considered independent contractors and are required to pay a stage fee for every shift they work—twelve dollars during the day shift, seventeen at night. No quoting prices for lap dances, ever. When seated with a customer, you must face forward and he can't touch your breasts, crotch or buttocks, and you can't touch him anywhere below the waist. This is useful information; however, I learn the most important things from the other dancers. Nellie's suggested enticement when approaching a customer, "Would you like company?" is only marginally effective. I see that the girls are more successful with lines like, "Would you like to play?" or "Are you ready for me?" I learn to always carry a twenty-dollar bill on me so when a customer asks, "How much?" I can sort of, kinda, not really make it visible so he can get the hint, even though what comes out of my mouth is the required, "Whatever you wish. The bigger the present, the bigger the fun."

The dancers teach me how to swing upside down from the pole, spotting me as I grab the pole at chest height and kick my legs up and over my head, then slide down. I practice the trick so many times that the shape of my ribcage is permanently altered. I am strangely proud that the left side has flattened in the spot where my body makes contact with the pole, cherishing this mark of experience like a dueling scar.

And the dancers teach me how to manage the stress of hustling for tips. Sitting in the customers' laps isn't the hard part. That's easy enough to become accustomed to, as dissociation is old hat to me by now. But the rejection is hard to take. For every customer who says yes to a lap dance, five more will say no. That's a lot of no to hear—I never get used to it. When I feel discouraged, I do what the other dancers suggest: Go upstairs and hang out in the dressing room until you feel better. I sit under the vanity counter, my knees tucked under my chin, telling myself that I am reclaiming my sexuality in the public arena. But I'm really learning to tether my self-worth to how much I earn. On a good night, I'm a porno superstar. On a bad night, I'm a wretch.

Access to the feminine charms at the O'Farrell Theater requires more than a handful of quarters like at the Lusty Lady. Admission is thirty dollars, thereby ensuring a flush clientele. The customers come from everywhere. Busloads of Japanese tourists. Rock stars. Conventioneers on expense account. Silicon Valley computer scions. Eccentric Asian businessmen. A German chocolatier who always drops in with a huge box of truffles for the dancers to share in the dressing room. Someone once quoted Artie Mitchell as saying, "Don't bring the deed to the ranch, you might fall in love." That probably really happened once. Heaven knows there are some amazing tokens of affection presented.

These men don't just proffer large sums of money. They love to play Stage Door Johnnie, too, showering favorite dancers with lavish gifts. One girl's regular, a gravelly-voiced college rock icon, buys her a brand-new Harley Davidson. Another girl is given a Porsche by her regular, which she immediately sells to pay for medical school. An eighteen-thousand-dollar emerald ring is presented to a girl onstage, insurance papers included. Some dancers talk shit, I'm sure, but a lot of the stories they tell about their trinkets are true. Rolexes don't lie—not the real ones, anyway. I prefer cash, as the presents possess weird energy. The man might not expect so much as a phone call from you saying when you'll be working next, but he'll want some kind of connection to you, some land of exchange, so whatever he gives has its own gravity. The married girls with regulars have to hide the gifts from their husbands, or sell them. The husbands don't mind the cash, but the stuff sends them over the edge, as a gift is so much more personal. A signifier that the connection with the customer has crossed the line between transaction and relationship–even if the relationship is limited to an hour or two in the customer's lap every week or so, with him petting your hair as he tells you about his day.

Nellie, the skirt of her baggy flowered rayon dress whooshing when she walks, enters the dressing room one morning as a dancer is winding an Ace bandage over the top of her newly implanted breasts to get them to drop down faster.

"My God, it's like Cyborg World in here!" Nellie exclaims. Every time you turn around there's a new nose, a new set of breasts, surgically slimmed hips.

Dashing off for a new cosmetic surgery procedure is as common as breathing at the O'Farrell. One Los Angeles surgeon does so many boob jobs for the theater, he offers a bulk discount. If three dancers at a time come in, he takes twenty-five percent off his fee. That we are considered San Francisco's stripper elite, beneficiaries of the genetic crap shoot, doesn't stem the constant march toward physical perfection. Girls tell each other constantly, "Oh, you don't need anything," but that's akin to, "Of course you don't look fat." If you've already got the idea in your head, there's naught that will persuade you otherwise.

But wanting a better body isn't the only reason for so much surgery—what else is a girl to do with all that money? Indulging has as much appeal as investing. I luxuriate in some lifestyle enhancements myself. I spend a couple thousand bucks on fixing my teeth. I treat myself to a month in Thailand. I upgrade my fanzine from newsprint to glossy paper. After years of roommates, I move into my own apartment, a five-room, roach-riddled flat at the corner of Fell and Gough Streets. Then I buy a BMW (how's
that
for punk fucking rock?).

Upon assessing my spending habits, my friend Len, a genteel Ivy League-educated butch dyke and former paramour, drills into my head that I need to stop squandering money on stereotypical stripper things and save some. Cars and travel are not investments. Dare to be radically solvent, she encourages. Don't end up broke like so many other dancers who cope with the stresses of stripping by shopping. "Think of it this way," she offers. "How many dancers do you know who have a closet full of Chanel bags and no savings account!" Plenty. And how many of them suddenly find themselves off the schedule at the O'Farrell with no warning?

Her point is not lost on me. I know there are dancers who are very serious about financial security. Some own several houses. Others invest in the stock market. Still others have a couple hundred grand buried in their backyard.

I knuckle down. Goodbye, piercings. Hello, gym membership. I color my hair Hollywood blonde and become the apotheosis of the yuppie stripper, hitting the Stairmaster each morning, then driving to the theater, where I work as hard as I can. To boost my profit margin, I cut back on dancing in New York Live in favor of working The Rooms. I am determined to save money. Eventually, I have enough put away to support myself for a year. Because I never know what might happen.

You can make a lot of money at Mitchell Brothers if you apply yourself—a thousand dollars a shift is not uncommon, though my average is considerably less. But that money comes at substantial cost. The club harbors a savage atmosphere of paranoia because you can be let go at any time, for any reason—being overweight, underweight, too old, frequent tardiness, and the absurdly cruel "overexposure." You have to keep on top of everything, especially your looks. We all feel the pressure. One night, I stand at the mirror in the bathroom between two women laboring over their makeup and one says to the other, "God, I can't wait to get married, have children, get fat, and just let myself go."

The management is capricious and tends to play favorites. Some girls stay forever because they're nasty in the audience and the guys love them. Other girls get fired for breaking a minor rule. There are girls who get sacked for rebuffing the advances of one of the owner's friends who gets fresh, while another suffers no repercussions for punching a rude customer right in the face and bloodying his nose. Now and then, they get rid of ten to twenty women at once, flushing out the ranks to make room for new faces. More than any other club I've seen, the O'Farrell Theater seems permanently cast with a pall of panic and doom. The sword of Damocles is forever overhead.