"The
feeling
remains...
Even after
the glitter fades"
Stevie Nicks
Email Address:
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The Body Shop
Dancers
Click to enlarge
Angel
Carter 
Angel Carter was a stripper from Las Vegas, but originally, she was from the Island of Samoa. She was a vocalist who also sang in her act. She was the dancer that gave me the hardest time when I first started at the Body Shop, but eventually we did become friends. She was dating Peter Graves from Mission Impossible then, and she had appeared on the Johnny Carson Show.
Kriss Kross
and unknown
Moriah
"Red"
The Body Shop had once been a burlesque
club,but when I was there, it was in the midst of a lot of changes. The girls that worked there were the greatest strippers in the world. Most of them
had
worked in Las Vegas as strippers or showgirls. When I started, Al, the owner had decided to become the first nude club on the Strip. I was hired as the
Body Shop's first all-nude dancer, which caused a lot of friction between me and
the other girls for a while, especially Angel.
Susie
and me
Kitten
This is a recent photo of the Body Shop taken by
Steve Sasco during his trip to
Hollywood in August, 2003.
A recent Body Shop dancer, Vivian, has written to me.
We compared then and now notes and came to a conclusion.
The Body Shop today, is a great contrast to the past.
Here's Vivian's photo she sent.
Vivian, Body Shop 2002
I once found a quote from the Motley Crue band
describing the meaning of the song, Girls, Girls, Girls.
"All the places mentioned in the song--like the Dollhouse in Fort Lauderdale, the Marble House in Paris, France,
The
Body Shop and the 7th Veil in L.A.--these are all strip clubs. It's pretty self-explanatory."
Me, as Simone,
wearing a wig, two
hairpieces, and three
pairs of eyelashes
Oscar Cartier,
the comedian, was from the old Vaudeville
school. He wasn't very funny, but he knew
that there wasn't much he could do to
get attention and respect from the
audience anyway, because of the
environment he was in. He was
a wonderful man who turned me
on to some great books about
life, and God, and the other side.
Oscar won Comedian of the Year in Australia.
He was the Master of Ceremonies for the TV show, Your Hit Parade,
and was in the movie Six Pack Annie as Louis Danton.
In 1975 he put out a 45 called 'A DJ's Nightmare.'
Within a year, all the dancers in the club
were nude,
along with all the other strip clubs on Sunset Boulevard--including the Largo and the Phone Booth.
Things rapidly
went downhill because the clubs were competing with each other for customers, so to entice
business, the dancers were getting raunchier.
That's about the time I left Hollywood--
in the early seventies. I refused to dance that way.
Tommy, the doorman,
young and mischievous
This is Monica, who was from
South America. She started at the Body Shop as a
waitress, but when the club went nude, she wanted
to dance, so she was the second dancer in the show to
go completely nude. Monica was a strange bird--
sultry and funny and warped.
Yours truly,
Simone
