The site is dedicated to celebrating the world of burlesque. Along with our dedicated YouTube Channel, Burlesque Showgirl aims to provide a focal point for burlesque video from both amateur and professional performers along with information and resources for the burlesque community and anyone interested in learning or taking part.
For a while it seemed as if burlesque was consigned to history, until in the 1990's it made a remarkable recovery. Its resurgence was largely due to a change of image. This new Burlesque is no longer about just entertaining men. It has been embraced by women as a medium through which they can own and experience their own sexuality, far removed from the exploitation of the past. Typical burlesque audiences are predominantly female, and the atmosphere at shows is lively and invariably supportive of the performers. Burlesque expresses a new found confidence that rejects the manufactured images off advertising in favour of real women asserting their right to be fabulous.
Now, what began as a niche movement is increasingly felt in mainstream fashion and popular culture. The UK has more than 200 professional burlesque performers working in clubs all across the country. There are over 100 teachers working with an estimated 10,000 students, as well a huge influx of new retail shops marketing and selling burlesque fashion. Burlesque is everywhere and its influence is growing.
Burlesque Showgirl is the story of how women re-invented a genre founded in exploitation and transformed it into a life affirming, confidence building and supportive world of their own. It will also be hugely entertaining and most importantly of all, fun!
Burlesque has a long an venerable theatrical tradition which can be traced back to the theatre of ancient Greece, but is more usually associated with the risqué variety shows of American vaudeville in the 1940's and 50's. These show often incorporated mild forms of striptease aimed squarely at the male patrons. Burlesque stars Gypsy Rose Lee, Tempest Storm, Lili St Cyr and others achieved fame and notoriety in equal measure, but by the 1960's their appeal was fading as TV took over as the entertainment medium of choice and vaudeville died out. 