The Chippendales

Witness History

BBC

History, Personal Journals, Society & Culture

4.4 • 1.6K Ratings

🗓️ 30 December 2019

⏱️ 10 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

The Chippendales nightclub in downtown Los Angeles was looking for ways to attract customers on a weeknight – when they hit upon the idea of male strippers. The Male Exotic Dance Night for Ladies Only became wildly successful and inspired imitators all over the world. But there was a dark side to the Chippendales’ story.

Lucy Burns speaks to Chippendales co-founder Bruce Nahin.

Picture: Actress Linda Blair with Chippendales dancers, 1984 (Ann Clifford/DMI/The LIFE Picture Collection via Getty Images)

Transcript

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1:10.0	Hi and thanks for downloading witness history from the BBC World Service,
1:13.5	first-hand accounts of the moments that shaped our world.
1:16.5	I'm Lucy Burns, and today I want to take you to a nightclub in Los Angeles in 1979. The promoters wanted to try something new so they
1:26.7	introduced strippers. What was unusual was that these strippers were men.
1:31.6	The club was called Jippendales and their dancers would become an entertainment phenomenon.
1:37.0	Ladies, welcome to your band. There would be an MC. He'd do some opening jokes to warm up the crowd and get the girls into the mood of the show. You know, what are the three magic words take it off you know and
	...

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