This is the first in a new series of interviews with Brooklyn women artists at their favorite bars by Sarah Deming. She met the magnificent burlesque dancer Peekaboo Pointe for a Manhattan at Quarter Bar in Brooklyn’s South Slope.
Peekaboo leaves this week for a month-long tour of Australia, but when she comes back you can catch her lighting up the stage at Galapagos Artspace in Dumbo and the Bell House in Brooklyn as well as The Slipper Room on the LES and Tribeca’s Duane Park. She will also appear in Washington DC at the Lucky Daredevil Thrill Show on April 9 and the Richmond Varietease Show in Richmond, VA on April 10.
Sarah: Tell me about your dance background and how you ended up in burlesque.
Peekaboo: I have a BFA in Choreography from George Mason University, and I studied modern dance with Bill T Jones and Afro-Cuban with Cutumba in Cuba. I’ve always been fascinated by the low-brow tradition in art, strip clubs, that kind of thing. When I came to New York after school I took a burlesque class taught by Ducky Doolittle now a sex educator. I wasn’t hooked right away, but the first time I performed burlesque onstage – at defunct Carroll Gardens joint called Boudoir Bar – I felt like I was home.
Sarah: How has your classical dance training affected the way you approach burlesque?
Peekaboo: I use my modern dance training to create interest and variety in the routine. I want the audience to be dying for the next move, to get a clear build from the beginning to the middle to the end of a routine. I also use different levels of the stage and am especially big on floor work. Nothing is sexier than a woman on her back!
Sarah: Your performances are always sexy. In fact, you won the title of “Most Sensual Performer in Burlesque” at the 2009 Golden Pasties Awards. How important is it to you to create sex appeal on stage?
Peekaboo: It’s so important. A lot of people in the new burlesque try to take the sensuality out. They want to make burlesque into something political or something verging on performance art. I really enjoy that kind of burlesque, but I feel that the mission is to bring the hotness back. When burlesque originated, it was dirty! These girls were the strippers of their day. They were turning tricks in the back of the club. Sometimes people see my routine and they say, “Those moves were so dirty!” but the same moves they think are the raunchiest are the ones I stole from Jenny Lee tapes, from the old burlesque dancers of the 1950’s. People have been having dirty sex forever. We didn’t invent it.
Sarah: Do you get turned on when you dance?
Peekaboo: Absolutely. And when I’m turned on, I know my audience is, too.
Sarah: How can I learn to twirl my pasties like you?
OUR BARTENDER: It’s all in the toes.
Peekaboo: (laughing) Actually, he’s right. It’s all in the toes. You have to bounce on the balls of your feet. I teach classes in tassel twirling at the School of Burlesque.
Sarah: What advice do you have for our readers?
Peekaboo: Quit your day job. I quit my job working retail at Agent Provacateur four years ago. Everybody said I was crazy, but it’s made me a better person. You are never going to get anywhere as an artist if you play it safe. Humans are built to survive, and you are stronger than you think you are. Just take that leap and trust that someone will catch you.
MANHATTAN RECIPE:
As prepared by our groovy bartender Richard, after owner David Moo. These proportions are my own – adjust them to suit your taste.
2 ounces Old Overholt Rye Whiskey
1/2 ounce Carpano Antica Sweet Vermouth
Four dashes Angostura bitters
Four dashes Peychaud’s bitters
Lemon twist
Orange twist
Brandied cherry – at Quarter they make their own!
Chill a cocktail glass. Shake the bitters into bottom of glass and express oil from rinds into glass, then rub bitters all over glass using inside of rinds. Dump out the excess bitters, leaving glass coated with deliciousness. Stir rye and vermouth very well over cracked ice and strain into prepared glass. Garnish with a cherry and drink with someone sexy.
What a wonderful column this is. I’m actually the main character of a new novel that is trying to get published. I perform a sexy dance for my lover Angel Guerrero in which I put on some hoppin music and sexily gyrate for him. In addition to being a very sexy scene I hope it frees up readers to loosen up about sex, enjoy it to the max and just have fun.