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Fitness faddists move to Stripping

Fitness faddists move to stripping
Women finding feminist 'voice' in dance

By Richard L. Eldredge
Friday, January 23, 2004

Inside the seductively lit Cheetah Lounge in Midtown Atlanta, house music thumps hypnotically and ecstatic screams echo through the air. Dozens of women on two glowing red runway stages smile provocatively as music videos flash on two large screens behind them. They strut, exuding sexiness in black platform shoes with 6-inch heels. Finally, some shuck their tops along with their inhibitions.

A typical Saturday afternoon at the gentlemen?s club? Hardly. These are the customers.

For $25 a pop, the 36 women, including four girlfriends, a real-estate attorney and two socialites, are students in the club?s inaugural ??Catwalk: How to Move Like a Cheetah Girl?? class. The women range in age from 20s to late 40s and all body types are well represented. The session?s instructors are Cody, Holly, Vanessa, Victoria, Callie, Logan and Brandi all Cheetah performers.

Welcome to the latest Oprah-approved exercise routine/pop-culture trend that may or may not be destined for the hall closet as a future source of embarrassment for your children a la the Disco Trimmer, leg warmers and the Thighmaster.

The budding Brandis attending today's class are hoping to learn standard moves such as the booty shake, the hair swing and, naturally, how to perform a lap dance.

"Walking in was the hardest part," admits class attendee Tonya King, 32. "It was disturbingly hard. At home, I tried on about 45 outfits before I decided on something sexy I wouldn't look ridiculous in. Once the class started, I was fine, though!"

The creation of "Catwalk" came from the requests of female customers, who have started populating the club in the past year, many enticed into the formerly bastioned boys club by inventive promotions like "Ladies Night" and "Wine, Women and Thong."

"We're seeing women who are letting go of the idea that there's something wrong with this," said class instructor Cody, using her stage name. "When you're up there onstage, it's all about curvaceousness. It's not necessarily about doing it for your husband or your boyfriend. The women in the class today were looking for self-empowerment. It made them look and feel good. Guaranteed, when they're out in the clubs tonight, they're going to be holding their heads a little higher."

"It's like you've got this fun little secret you're carrying around with you," says King, the single real-estate attorney in the class. "I mean, it's like taking a cooking class. Now, I've learned how to cook and strip. Who wouldn't want to date me?"

"Catwalk" student Lotus Vizuete, 28, got no argument from her husband when she informed him she'd like to take the class.

"I didn't mind at all," said Vini Vizuete, 28. "It's a fun thing for her and her friends to do. Besides, I knew there was the strong possibility that she would come home and dance for me. How could that be a bad thing?"

Meanwhile, stripper poles, the occupation's main tool of the trade, have begun cropping up in residential homes. (The Cheetah, however, doesn't utilize poles. Explains Cody: "They're tacky.") Web sites such as stripperzone.com sell the poles to online shoppers. The popular red model will set you back $279. The solid chrome version runs a little higher. On the site's demonstration video, a bored, leggy woman orders a pole online that is then rush-delivered to her door. After installing it herself, she brings her equally bored, goateed boyfriend into the living room, throws him on the couch and proceeds to demonstrate her new piece of workout equipment.

OutKast member Big Boi has a stripper pole in the entertainment room of his home. The West Wing actor Richard Schiff, meanwhile, has one in his Los Angeles office. Technically, it belongs to his wife, former L.A. Law actress Sheila Kelley, who became an instant celebrity when she appeared on Oprah in November to promote her upcoming book, The S Factor: Strip Workouts for Every Woman. The tome on toning up hit stores this month.

While other modern-day feminists such as Martha Burk fight for the right to swing a golf club at Augusta National, Kelley gets in touch with her radical side in another way.

"When I'm swinging on that pole, it's the closest thing to flying I've ever experienced," says Kelley from her S Factor exercise studio in Los Angeles. "You're a goddess and a kid all at the same time. As far as I'm concerned, pole-dancing should be an Olympic event."

Kelley's business employs seven full-time instructors who teach strip workouts to clients, including Schiff's West Wing co-worker Allison Janney, who has provided a glowing blurb for Kelley's book.

"Stripping is the final frontier of feminism," says Kelley. "Let's face it: In the 1970s, women turned right instead of left. We forgot we're beautiful, sensuous creatures. It's about owning your sexuality. It's about saying 'I can be a powerful female and also be damn sexy.' "

Next month, Kelley will embark on a book tour. Her Web site averages sales of five to 10 poles each day, thanks in part to exposure on Oprah.

And if Kelley's husband, Schiff, who plays frequently frazzled White House communications director Toby Ziegler on West Wing at work, is "very, very good," he receives a private strip session from his wife at home at night.

Marketing ways for wily wives to please their spouses via sultry dances didn't originate with Internet stripper poles and "The S Factor" workout. In the early 1960s, Roulette Records was issuing LPs with titles such as How to Strip for Your Husband: Music to Make Marriage Merrier and How to Belly-Dance for Your Husband featuring music by Sonny Lester, his orchestra and chorus.

While some health clubs have added cardio-striptease and belly-dance workouts to their regimens, Leo Smith, the general manager of the L.A. Fitness in Vinings, Ga., says the trend is not on his "to do" list. "We're gonna stick to the tried-and-true exercise workouts," he says. "Cardio-striptease workouts tend to get folks in the door, but they're not necessarily folks interested in working out, if you know what I mean."

Back in a cushy booth at the Cheetah, class instructor Cody says the response to the inaugural session of "Catwalk" has caught her and the other women by surprise. "We're going to have to have a meeting and regroup while we figure out how we're going to accommodate everyone next month."

The scheduled date for the second "Catwalk" class? The afternoon of St. Valentine's Day.