As far as I'm concerned, there's nothing better than a good night out
at a burlesque show
especially when the headline is the lovely Immodesty Blaize...
..one of the finest exponents of the art of the striptease.
It's naughty and bawdy but it's all done in the best possible taste.
(VOICE DROWNED OUT BY MUSIC)
So what's the likes of me doing watching strippers you might ask?
Well, believe it or not, my love for burlesque and strippers
began at the age of 11 when I stumbled across a musical
on the telly called Gypsy.
Inspired by a true story, Gypsy is the tale of an American girl
who blossoms into the most famous stripper of all time -
Gypsy Rose Lee.
# You can pull all the stops out
# Till you call the cops out... #
And this number is the absolute showstopper...
..in which a large than life, bugle blowing stripper, Miss Mazeppa,
initiates young Gypsy into the world of burlesque.
# You can sacrifice your sacro... #
And from the moment I saw it, I was hooked.
Now, I know you probably find this hard to believe,
but at one time I was an altar boy and a very pious one.
I took it seriously. Extremely seriously.
I was... I should have been on the cover of a chocolate box,
I was so devout. However, after seeing gypsy that night on the TV,
the following Sunday, we had a different altar boy.
So the thurible, which, you know, you have the incense in,
was slightly more active than normal.
It was like this. And also when I was going down the altar steps,
whereas I used to just go down like that,
I started to do this with the cassock.
And doing a real stripper's dip.
It was highly embarrassing for my mum and dad,
but, for me, it was wonderful
because the altar was the nearest thing
I thought I was ever gonna get to a stage.
When I eventually took up the cause and became a drag queen,
the musical was a big influence on my act.
I was still doing it in 2001 at the Royal Variety Performance...
Wait for it.
..in front of the Queen.
(BLOWS TRUMPET)
It took the Duke of Edinburgh a long time to get over that.
Over the years, I've tried to find out about the real Gypsy Rose Lee
but she kept her cards close to her chest
and she's a difficult person to get to know.
What annoys me is I don't know enough about her
so I'm off to New York to find out who was the real Gypsy Rose Lee
and what made her tick.
(BLOWS THE BUGLE)
Which is gonna be very difficult because she was once described
as the most private public woman in show business.
So I've got my hands full. Never mind.
(MIMICS AMERICAN ACCENT) New York here I come.
In the 1930s, Gypsy Rose Lee became one of the most recognisable faces in America.
A genuine superstar, and a woman so captivating
that a Hollywood film would eventually be made about her life.
But what kind of person was she?
And how on earth did a stripper reach such incredible heights?
Well, that's what I'm here to try and find out.
Here I am in New York.
As you can see, the weather is lousy, but who cares? I'm in New York.
I've got to be honest with you, I love this city. I really do.
And of course, this is home of, well, burlesque.
These days, we tend to associate burlesque with stripping
but when it began in the mid 19th Century
right up until the 1940s,
a typical bill also featured singers and comics
including future big names such as Abbott and Costello
and Phil Silvers.
It was lewd and rude and it must have been fabulous.
In Gypsy's day, the mothership of burlesque was Minsky's Republic -
owned and run by the enterprising Minsky Brothers
and located just off Broadway.
It was in this building that Gypsy made her name
although, these days, it puts on a rather different sort of show.
Fabulous!
Oh, I wish I had a time machine!
Originally, there was a runway that came out like that
and for the first time, the customers could see the girls close up.
Although it was called Varicose Alley
because...erm...some of the showgirls were...
How can put this? ..passed their sell by date.
You know? And the lighting was quite cruel so they didn't look good.
But it didn't matter because the punters were near naked flesh.
They could smell the girls and they could hear them breathing
and that's all that mattered.
The Minsky Brothers tried to give their theatre a veil of sophistication.
When you think of what's gone in here, really, in the past.
Velvet drapes and doormen dressed as French gendarmes
were an attempt to evoke Paris's Folly Bergere
but I suspect much of that would have gone over the heads
of their clientele.
Burlesque was cheap entertainment for the working classes
and, in Gypsy's day, it served a very important purpose.
In October 1929, the US Stock Market collapsed
and 13 million people were driven out of work.
For the largely disenfranchised male population,
bawdy burlesque offered a perfect escape from the trials of life.
Imagine this place. The air thick with cigarette smoke
and the perfume from the strippers on the runway.
And the place packed...
..mainly with lots of gentlemen with...erm...
How can put this politely?
..newspapers over their laps, if you know what I mean.
Sailors up there in the Gods, shouting, "Get 'em off!"
"Give 'em a glove."
History was made in March 1931,
when, in this very theatre, a young Gypsy Rose Lee
became burlesque's biggest star.
God, I wish I was born in those days.
I'd love to have seen this place in full swing. I really would.
Gypsy rushing down the stairs from her dressing room.
Putting her fag out and having a quick swig of brandy.
Straightening her bows. Straightening her bra.
And out on stage and delivering the goods. It must have been wonderful.
All successful strippers had a gimmick that made them stand out
from the crowd.
So what did Gypsy have that made her top of the bill?
Our own Gypsy Rose Lee!
Would I lower my gown a fraction?
And expose a patch of shoulder.
A recording of her act suggests a woman with a refined manner.
And would I raise my skirts for slyness and dexterity?
I can hear the crowd roaring now.
"Get 'em off."
And Gypsy would be up there giving it a...
"Ooh, would you like to see a little bit more, gentlemen?"
It just must have been wonderful.
I need to get to the bottom of Gypsy's gimmick
if you'll pardon the expression but I can't come to this temple of burlesque
without first showing off my own little gimmick.
Don't panic viewers. I'm not about to strip.
I feel a blast of my bugle coming on.
Are you ready?
(BLOWS MILITARY TUNE)
(TUNE BECOMES RAUNCHY)
Voila. Ha-ha-ha!
When Gypsy first stepped on to the runway at Minsky's,
she was just 20 years old
and within two years, she was such hot property that the Minsky Brothers
were paying her equivalent of £24,000 each week.
I don't know what her gimmick was but when you look at it there,
I mean, she's not a stunner.
She's not like what you'd expect of a burlesque stripper -
big boobs and brash. She's not at all.
And she's got, like, spare tyres and...
(LAUGHS) God, I sound a right bitch but I'm not.
I'm just, you know, observing.
To help me understand the root of Gypsy's appeal...
Now swing back to front.
..I've arranged to meet one of the biggest names in striptease.
You're gonna remove the glove.
You have to loosen the fingers to make it slide off easier.
Jo 'Boobs' Weldon is a sexy encyclopaedia of all things burlesque.
She also happens to be the headmistress of the New York School of Burlesque
where she teaches the tricks of the trade to the next generation
of aspiring stars.
You want to put that in every single solitary movement.
I'm hoping Jo can shed some light on the secret of Gypsy's appeal.
Hello. Jo.
Hi. You made it. Hi. How you doing?
It's good to see you. Good to see you.
But the first thing I'm learning is it doesn't always pay to be early.
Can I watch? Absolutely.
You can participate. OK.
Sorry. (LAUGHS)
We're gonna do a little bit of bump and grind, you guys.
Visualise an apple on one hand; an orange at the other.
And a coffee bean between your legs.
And you bump the apple...
..bump the orange and grind the coffee.
Bump, bump, bump, grind.
And without me saying anything.
Grind the coffee. Other way. We're gonna bump the orange.
Bump the apple. And grind the coffee.
Oh, I wish school would have been like this years ago, I tell you.
I would never have stayed off.
As with any skill, the art of striptease takes years to perfect.
You certainly know your stuff.
And I'm looking for Jo's expert opinion
on what made Gypsy such a master.
What do you think was the secret of Gypsy's success?
Cos when you look at pictures of her, she's got a beautiful face.
But she hasn't got the equipment, if you pardon the expression.
The boobs and everything.
Her gimmick was her personality.
Her gimmick was her intelligence, her playfulness, her openness.
She spoke directly to the audience breaking the fourth wall
and it made each of them feel as if she was telling them
something about herself, like showing her personality.
You're right. She was the first stripper to speak.
It sounds like such a small thing but Gypsy's voice
was her touch of brilliance and by revealing her personality,
as well as her body, she did something no other stripper had done.
And she blew the competition out of the water.
Jo, on this piece of modern technology here,
we've got a couple of the old girls from the glory with their gimmicks.
This is Rosita Royce. Didn't she do it with doves?
Yeah, I would be afraid to work with doves.
And that is not a dove. No, they're parrots.
A cockatiel and a parrot.
She likes a cockatoo. She's wearing a big feather cape.
I wonder how the birds feel about that.
Probably not amused. Do they feel threatened at all?
The strippers of Gypsy's era were years ahead of their time.
I think animal lovers might object.
This was an age that expected them to conform.
It's just so playful. Exactly. And cheeky.
But they were out there liberated and uninhibited.
There she is. Georgia Sothern.
Here you are. Look at her.
God, she goes wild, doesn't she?
That would have been her gimmick, wouldn't it, that? The head banging.
She was probably the original head banger, wasn't she? Definitely.
I mean, it's not erotic by any means. But it's... It's fascinating.
Compared to the wild and weird routines going on around her...
She's great.
..Gypsy oozed intelligence and class.
She called her act The Psychology of a Stripteaser
and as she slowly revealed herself, she joked with the crowd
that the whole process bored her senseless.
Do you think she was a comic as well?
Yeah. Definitely. I do. Her sense of humour.
The way that she made fun of herself. Well, she did.
"Oh, I take all this with a grain of salt." Exactly. "This is boring."
All that business. "And I'm really thinking about painting."
She's doing this. Oh, well, you know.
"But I'm thinking about whatever."
Yeah. Would you ever consider doing Gypsy's number? Yeah.
But I would really, like, to put my own twist on it.
My own personality. See what would happen in my own costume.
Show the love by also being myself. Cos she was hersself.
Well, do you fancy giving it a go? I'll narrate the story.
I'm feeling brave. I think I'll give it a try.
Come on. I'll zip you up in your corset.
Thank goodness.
Now, you'll have to bear in mind that Gypsy was performing this
around 80 years ago so although she was funny,
you're not likely to find Jo Brand performing this kind of material!
I'm thinking of my country house,
And the jolly fun in shooting grouse.
But in the 1930s, what she did was truly groundbreaking.
So, for one night only, we're bringing it back to New York
with our tribute to the queen of burlesque.
Now, the things that go on in a stripteaser's mind,
Would give you no end of surprise.
But if you are psychologically inclined,
There's more to see than meets the eye.
For example, when I lower my gown a fraction,
And expose a patch of shoulder,
I'm not interested in your reaction,
Or the bareness of my shoulder.
I'm thinking of some paintings by Van Gogh or Cezanne,
Or the charm I had in reading Lady Windermere's Fan.
And when I lower the other side,
And expose my other shoulder
Do you think I take the slightest pride,
In the whiteness of my shoulder?
I'm thinking of my country house,
And the jolly fun in shooting grouse.
Gypsy's audiences found their talking strip so captivating,
she could apparently get away with taking nothing off at all
for around 15 minutes.
The combination of body and brain was so popular,
she made almost no changes to this act in over 20 years.
I mentally computing just how much I'll give to charity.
She'd found the ultimate gimmick.
And were I to display my charms...
..in all their dazzling splendour,
And prove to you conclusively that I'm of the female gender.
Clutching an old velvet drop,
And looking demurely at every man,
Do you believe for a moment I'm thinking of sex...
..well, I certainly am.
What a fabulous show.
60 years after Gypsy Rose Lee peeled off her final silk glove,
she's still regarded as the queen of burlesque.
She was a pioneer of the art revealing not only her body
but also, by talking to the audience, her personality and wit.
In doing so, she gave striptease class that no-one before achieved.
But I'm keen to find out how Gypsy first got involved with stripping.
After all, it's not the most obvious career choice!
Though I have to say, I do rate it as an option.
I'm gonna tell you something now.
I work in the clubs over the years doing Lily.
I worked with a lot of strippers. Some did it out of necessity.
Often they were single mothers.
So I've got nothing but admiration for them.
And people who wag their finger at them, I've no time for you.
No time at all. Very sorry.
As far as I'm concerned, being a burlesque stripper
is a very honourable profession.
To work out what led Gypsy into the business,
I need to travel back to her childhood
which should be a fascinating journey.
If I can find my way!
250 where? West 57th Street.
The lengths of these addresses.
250 West 57th Street.
Try saying that when you've had a few drinks.
Let's get a cab. Hang on.
280 West 57th.
250 West 57th.
Can't you ask him? It'd be a lot bloody easier! 250... For God's sake!
Taxi!
250 West 57th Street, please.
Gypsy Rose Lee was the stage name of Louise Hovick.
Born in 1911, Louise first performed at the tender age of four
in a song and dance act on America's vaudeville circuit.
Just in case you don't know, vaudeville was American's music hall.
It was a, sort of, early addition of Britain's Got Talent.
Kid acts. Animal acts. You name it.
There you are. The Flints' Hypnotic Skirt Dance.
Now, I've no idea what that is but there's a load of fellas in frocks
doing what looks to me like a can-can.
Actually, it looks like a load of old tat. (CHUCKLES)
Performing alongside talent like this, Louise's act was successful.
But in those days, it was actually her younger sister June
who was the star of the show.
Here she is here in action.
June. Alias Baby June.
On points. Quite remarkable.
They toured around America in an act called Baby June and the Newsboys.
There's the star of the show. June is lying on the floor
with all the newsboys pointing at her as you do.
And Louise is one of the newsboys.
Just plonked in there. Pushed to the side lines.
Louise was intentionally kept out of the limelight by their manager
who called her overweight and talentless.
It must have been absolutely humiliating.
That manager was Rose, Louise's mother.
So this very pretty lady here was Rose Hovick.
Don't judge a book by its cover!
Underneath this ball of femininity was a tigress. Absolute tigress.
Thank you. See you. Bye.
Rose was fiercely ambitious and her primary concern was the act.
250 West 57th Street.
And if her daughter's feelings got hurt along the way, too bad.
Hello, could you tell me what floor Nancy Carson's on, please?
Now, I want to find out whether young Louise's early experiences
could somehow have led her down the path to striptease.
Nancy. Ah, come on in.
I've come to see Nancy Carson, an agent who's represented
child stars for more than 30 years including the young Ben Affleck
and Britney Spears.
Wasn't she just adorable? She radiates sunshine. Really.
Darling child. Yeah.
Do you meet genuine Madam Roses? I do.
I mean, I can tell right away.
If I'm talking to the child like I'm talking to you.
I'll say, "Do you dance, honey?" And the mother yells, "She's wonderful!
She taps. Show her. Show her, honey. Show her!"
I know I don't care how good that child is
that mother is out, we're not doing it!
Sadly, in the 1920s, agents like Nancy didn't exist
to protect young Louise from a mother like Rose.
I don't know if you've seen any of this.
Oh, how wonderful. Look at this.
(READS) The Temple. We take pleasure in being able to present
Dainty June, the little big star of screen and stage.
Poor old Louise is at the bottom of the bill singing some dreadful song.
That is what she thought of her.
Yeah. Take a look at this one.
Dainty June, the greatest juvenile artist in the world.
Not the country, the WORLD today.
I reckon that's Rose's phrase. Do you? Of course it is.
She was a brilliant publicist. Brilliant.
She was dynamic, forceful... And she was a horrible mother.
Because she owned the children. They were her property. That's right.
They weren't individuals and human beings. Nail on the head.
When I see a bad situation, it's always that kind of thing.
Yeah. Yeah. I read... She was a great one for dreams, Rose.
She'd come in and she'd say, "I had a dream last night about a cow.
We need a cow in the act." All of a sudden, she makes this cow costume
with a papier-mache head. Poor old Louise is the rear end of the cow.
That is exactly how she treated her. Imagine what that did.
Shocking, isn't it? It is shocking.
It is. It's shocking.
What do you think the effect of a mother like Rose,
a pushy stage mother like that, would have on her children? Lifelong.
Yeah. Lifelong. Scar them for life.
I think that Louise probably always felt her mother liked her sister better.
In a family where there's a favourite child,
the other child is always trying to prove something.
The real her wasn't good enough
because her mother was putting her down so much
that she felt less than so she created this other person
who was Gypsy Rose Lee and that person was a validated person.
Exactly. Yeah. Shame isn't it? Yeah.
What came out of the conversation between Nancy and myself
was that Madam Rose was a monster.
It was all about her and she used her daughters to get what she wanted.
It's quite nasty. Quite nasty.
It's interesting to think that a girl who grew up
in her sister's shadow ended up making her name with an act
that was all about her own personality.
But was the transition from Louise to Gypsy Rose Lee
really a response to her mother's abusive behaviour?
I'm on my way to Sardis,
a restaurant long favoured by New York's showbiz set,
to meet the author of a riveting biography about Gypsy Rose Lee.
Karen. Hi, Paul. Thanks for seeing me. Thank you for having me. Cheers.
In the course of her research, Karen Abbott got close
to Gypsy's sister June who also had a hard time under Rose's rule.
Cos she was talented, June. Oh, she was very talented. A dance prodigy.
But suffered for it, I should imagine. Yeah.
Her mother took her to the professor as they called the dance instructors
and the instructor said, "Do not put this little girl in toe shoes."
She's too young. Her feet are not yet formed. You're gonna ruin her.
But Momma Rose saw dollar signs, of course.
And June would talk about her toes bleeding
when she was three, she could feel the blood squishing
as she performed on stage. My God!
Yeah. I mean, it really is child abuse. Gross neglect...
Yes. ..of these children. Exploitation.
Rose wasn't mothering her children, she was destroying them
and while Louise was being shoved into the side lines,
June was being pushed slowly over the edge.
At the age of just 12, she had a nervous breakdown.
By 15, she'd had enough and ran away.
Now you'd think that losing her start turn would mean
the end of things for Rose... Oh, no.
She still had one daughter left and the show must go on.
Poor Louise was rebranded Rose Louise, in an act that flopped.
Vaudeville was dying and the future Gypsy Rose Lee found herself
booked into a burlesque house
and she realised she may have found something she could excel at.
But it takes time to refine any act.
And the witty artiste Gypsy Rose Lee is unlikely to have debuted fully formed.
I visualised third rate burlesque as pretty nasty. Yeah.
You know, with gangsters, prostitutes, drug addicts, pimps.
All manner of low-life. What do you think happened?
Before she made that transition
into the legend of Gypsy Rose Lee at Minsky's.
I don't believe that automatically she became this star
from doing this and taking her glove off.
I talked to June. She says Gypsy was exposing herself like everyone else.
She had it right out in people's faces and was blatant about it.
And June was appalled. She expected her sister to differentiate herself
and have some respect in what she chose to do
even though it was burlesque.
When June went to go see Gypsy and she talked about the men
hiding themselves with newspapers spread across their laps.
All manner of lewd behaviour. And June ran from the theatre horrified.
The man next to her talked to her and thought she was a prostitute.
That's the kind of theatre it was. Do you think Rose encouraged her?
Or was she a good mother and said, "My daughter's not gonna prostitute herself."
Part of me wonders if Rose, you know...
I think there's nothing she wouldn't have let her daughters do.
One of my favourite sayings of her is -
It's not the principle of the thing, it's the money.
She was just so demented. Completely.
So demented. Completely.
Having always been second best in Rose's eyes,
perhaps stripping was initially Gypsy's way of gaining validation.
But it wasn't a damaged childhood that made her a star.
That was all down to her.
You know, I'm a massive admirer of Gypsy Rose Lee
for what she achieved. Yes, it was nothing short of miraculous.
You're right. It was nothing short of miraculous.
You know, she started off where everybody else did.
June said she was the only one to climb out of the slime.
"My sister was brilliant. She was the only one who could do it."
It was her genius.
The musical Gypsy which introduced me to Gypsy Rose Lee,
does portray young Louise's journey from vaudeville to burlesque.
But her real life was clearly far darker
than anything shown in the musical.
This number, You've Got To Get A Gimmick,
depicts Louise's first taste of burlesque.
No prostitutes. No drug addicts.
Just Miss Mazeppa, the bugle blowing stripper.
You can see in her eyes the little glimmer of...
"Hm. I'll have a bit of this."
That's exactly what happened to me.
Why didn't I watch a programme about a vet instead?
I'd be sat in the back of a cab watching strippers today.
Go on, girl.
# You can sacrifice your sacro
# Working in the back row #
The musical may not reflect Gypsy's reality
but as a piece of theatre, it's glorious.
You can sacrifice your sacro...
I mean that's just sacroiliac. Is it a sacroiliac?
Or sacrophiliac or is that where they bury mummies? I don't know.
I'm getting into deep waters here.
As I was saying before I digressed,
you can sacrifice your sacro working in a back row
bumping a dump till you're dead,
but you've got to have a gimmick if you wanna get ahead.
Anyone who writes lyrics like that
and especially - if you want to bump it, bump it with a trumpet,
is all right in my books, believe you me.
Thank you.
Now when I found out I was coming on this trip,
I sent a letter to the chap who wrote those words
never expecting in a million years that he'd agree to see me.
But he has.
So, brace yourself, folks. You're about to meet a living legend.
Hello. Hello, it's Paul O'Grady. I'm here to see Stephen Sondheim.
(DOOR BUZZES OPEN)
Stephen Sondheim was just 29 when he penned the lyrics
for the musical's original Broadway run.
Fresh from his success on West Side Story,
Stephen was an obvious choice for the creative team being assembled
by Gypsy's writer Arthur Laurents.
Thank you for doing this, by the way. Of course.
Aren't you beautiful? Oh, that's Willie.
You're a good boy, aren't you? They're so good.
I have to tell you this - Gypsy changed my life.
Oh, that's nice. After I watched Gypsy,
I was in the marine cadet's when I was a teenager.
I found a bugle and taught myself. You taught yourself to play?
Yeah. Yeah. That's not easy. So years, years later
at the Royal Variety Performance, myself, Cilla Black,
and Barbara Windsor did You've Got To Get A Gimmick.
Come on. You did it? We did it for the Queen.
You've got me in the gladiator giving it the bumps with the trumpet.
with the head between the legs with the Queen in the Royal Box. You did it.
Semi-naked. That's funny.
That's funny. That's funny. It always kills that song.
Whoever does it, it always kills. It always goes well.
Stephen's genius as a lyricist was vital to the musical's success.
I love the playing with words. I was trying to show how good I was at rhyming.
Just showing off.
And despite its liberal approach to the truth,
the musical has been vital to preserving Gypsy Rose Lee's legend.
What was Gypsy like? I didn't know her very well. I met her twice.
Er...mostly to shake hands with and be polite with.
She appeared for the first day's reading
because there were a lot of cameras and we wanted the publicity.
The next time was on opening night.
That was part of the deal - she would not be allowed to interfere.
Arthur said to the producer, "I cannot write this
unless I have carte blanche. I have to be allowed to do what I want."
Do you know, you're talking about the truth. It has nothing to do...
with telling the story on the stage. We need theatrical licence.
That kind of truth telling belongs in books.
I should imagine that the casting call for the strippers was interesting.
Where did you get the one with the trumpet? Mazeppa?
She, curiously enough, was a distant cousin of Arthur Laurents'.
I don't know that she was a stripper
but she had this act and she came and did her trumpet act.
And ended up blowing it...
Leaning over and blowing it through... We fell out of our seats!
And Jerry Robbins who directed it said, "We hire her."
Her name was Faith Dane.
But what a peculiar act, don't you think? Sure. But she had a gimmick.
Exactly. You've got to be different from all the other strippers.
What do you think of Gypsy now today? Are you proud of it?
It's one of the best musicals. I say that with no immodesty.
Cos it has an energy to it.
Because it's got these absolutely wonderful characters.
who drive the thing. You know we're doing it in London next year?
If you're looking for a Mazeppa...
Well, don't think I wasn't going to suggest that.
I'm available, sir. I'm waiting. OK.
I'm waiting. Polished trumpet in hand. Tassels ready to spin.
I'm your man, Mr Sondheim.
I find it interesting a stripper was ever a muse for Broadway's top talent.
What a lovely dog.
(CHUCKLES) Look at him. What a cutie.
I mean, it's one thing to be the darling of the lairy working classes
but it's a big leap from that to national treasure.
So how on earth did Gypsy pull it off?
Time to dig deeper into her past.
With routines crammed with humour and personality,
Gypsy Rose Lee single-handedly elevated striptease to an art form.
But now did she make the jump from queen of burlesque
to national superstar?
Following her death in April 1970,
many of Gypsy's personal papers were donated to New York's Public Library.
I'm hoping they might contain the answer.
Oh, thank you. You're welcome.
Gypsy's collection includes thousands of newspaper cuttings.
All of them about herself.
Gypsy Rose Lee says French showgirls are too undressed.
What's this one here now?
Was the little girl who had been pushed into the shadows
finally revelling in the attention? Maybe.
But there seems to be something else very interesting going on here.
This interviewer says, "Will you tell your fans
how you happened to take up the art of stripteasing?"
And she claims she was in a drama called the Gay Nineties
and a terrible thing happened - a shoulder strap broke.
"These days I wouldn't care but then I blushed
and I blushed so hard the other shoulder strap broke.
And all of a sudden, I'd invented the striptease."
(CHUCKLES) Pack of lies.
Gypsy was living in an age before the concept of marketing existed.
But she clearly grasped the value of publicity.
Every story she gives them has a beginning, middle and end.
And a great punchline.
(READS) Six men outstrip Gypsy Rose Lee
and they flee with $25,000 worth of jewellery.
Police suspect Follies star is only hunting headlines.
It's the same old stuff.
Katie Price does stuff and they all say
"She's only doing this to grab the headlines."
(READS) The robbery began in striptease tradition -
with one man grabbing her muff.
(LAUGHS)
It's fun.
The great work that worked so well for Gypsy on stage,
was earning her a whole new audience off it.
She was a brilliant self-publicist.
She'd have made Max Clifford look like a rank amateur.
By 1940, Gypsy was no longer just the property of burlesque's working classes,
she had become a 'must-have' guest at society coffee mornings
and was well on her way to becoming a household name.
Every little thing she did was newsworthy.
So when Hollywood offered to buy her story,
she wasn't worried if the script followed the truth.
She knew it could secure her place in history.
Now this is the contract from Warner Brothers.
It's the deal for the movie rights. Let's see what she got.
This is fascinating this.
About $1.6 million.
Well done, Gypsy. I admire her enormously.
When you consider stripping has always been a controversial profession,
it's remarkable Gypsy was able to gain
such a high level of public acceptance.
But what about the private woman?
Well, by the magic of television...
..I've come to San Francisco where I've tracked down a man
who probably knew her better than anyone else.
This is a great day for me
because I'm finally gonna meet Erik Lee Preminger
who was Gypsy Rose Lee's only child.
And he wrote the most wonderful book which I've read and re-read
and read since it first came out.
Who better than Gypsy's son to give me a personal picture
of the great lady?
Apparently, he's got a store room full of his mother's stuff.
So guess who's gonna be searched on the way out?
(LAUGHS)
Thank you very much. You're welcome. Have a nice day.
And you. Take it easy. Bye.
He's jolly, isn't he? Bye!
Talk about over egg your part.
(LAUGHS)
Gypsy was married three times but never to Erik's father.
What a lovely house.
He was the result of a brief liaison between Gypsy
and the Hollywood director Otto Preminger.
But, according to Erik's book,
he was brought up not knowing who is father was.
Hi, Paul. How are you? Welcome. Erik. What a pleasure to meet you.
This has been a long time coming. Hello. My wife Lynda.
Hi. Lynda. How lovely to meet you, Lynda.
Let me take your coat. Thank you very much.
I've adored your mother since Day 1.
That's wonderful. Thank you.
Gypsy didn't retire from stripping till Erik was 12
and through all those years, he never left her side.
Let me show you something that I found.
He must have had an extraordinary childhood.
I was at a coffee shop where I found this
which is a picture from... The Bristol Hippodrome!
..the Bristol Hippodrome where I was six years old.
Is that you? That's me. Look at this. Who's she on with?
Morecambe and Wise.
Now, Morecambe and Wise became the biggest stars on British TV.
Really? Yes. And they toured with Gypsy.
Did you find it strange to watch your mother stripping?
No. No.
When she was home, she was very modest.
You know, you never saw her without her robe
or undressed but there was no time for modesty when she was working.
Because I lived in the dressing room with her,
I learned about all her tricks.
The wonderful thing was this brassiere which she fashioned
out of dental floss.
She would take a piece of dental floss and wrap it around
and then tie it on these pasties and they would pull her breasts up.
And you couldn't see the dental floss? No. She covered it with paint.
You do realise there's people making notes back in England
saying, "Right. I know what to do now the boobs are sagging."
Dental floss round the nipples. Dental floss is the secret.
I think you've started something, Erik.
The Gypsy Rose Lee boob lift!
(LAUGHS)
Now, I want to know what Gypsy was like away from the spotlight.
and helpfully, it turns out Erik wasn't her only travel companion.
Ever the self-publicist, wherever she went so did her movie camera.
Would you like to see a few? Of course. I'd love to.
All right. Let me show you a few. OK. Please do.
Erik has miles of private footage which few have seen.
Well, how wonderful. Erm...
My mother was an avid fisher.
Is this you? That's me.
Look at the size of that thing.
I mean, this is wonderful stuff.
Look at her having a bath out in the open air.
Now this was the only bath tub on this carnival.
She used to fill it with leftover ice water from the Coca-Cola machine
let it warm up in the sun and she froze in it.
For a fan like me, these glimpses of gypsy are like manna from heaven.
They're evocative of an era that's long gone. That's it. Long gone.
But this was Erik's life and, all things considered,
it's a miracle that he's turned out all right.
Doing laundry with the bearded lady.
It's that...? It's a woman?! That's a woman.
Oh, my God! Erm...married to the Alligator Man.
It's just... You couldn't make this up, could you?
Now, I'm gonna ask you the ultimate question.
What was your mother like? She was an acquired taste. Yeah.
Erm... But I'm an acquired taste, Erik, as well!
You know, what you saw was really what you got.
Direct. Straightforward.
Extremely funny.
Did not suffer fools.
And insisted on getting what she wanted.
How old were you when you found out who your father was? Well...
when I actually found out, I was 17.
I'm living in New York in my own apartment at 17
and I've had my girlfriend move in with me.
Now, did she approve of that? No. No.
Oh. Oh!
I said, "I don't see how you can object."
And she said, "I've lived my life beyond reproach."
And I said, "Well, then, how come I'm a bastard?"
Oooh! That must have been like a slap in the face.
That was probably the cruellest thing I ever did to her.
And I said, "Who IS my father?"
What she said was, "It's none of your business."
How did you feel when you said, "Who is my father?"
and she said, "It's none of your business." I understood what she meant.
And it was who she slept with was none of my business.
The fact it happened to be my father didn't occur to her at the time
because she looked at things from her point of view.
She was a star.
I just accepted it because it was the way she always was.
Yeah. And he was...
Erik's remarkably accepting of what seems to be appalling behaviour
on Gypsy's part but then given what she went through in her childhood,
maybe it's OK to forgive her a few flaws.
Was she always Gypsy Rose Lee or was she ever Louise Hovick?
She was Gypsy Rose Lee. That's who she was.
Louise Hovick, that was gone.
Why go back to somebody who's dumpy and plain
when you can be somebody who's glamorous and fabulous? Exactly.
I guess it comes as no surprise that the stripper raised
by a domineering mother had a few issues of her own.
Is it up here, Erik? Yes. Watch your head. But then, who doesn't.
But what Gypsy accomplished is extraordinary.
(GASPS) Wow! Erik, look at all this.
I know. Look at this beautiful sculpture.
Yes. That... For a while we had that in the living room
but it was sort of like having my mother looking over my shoulder.
From difficult beginnings, she made her life beautiful.
It's her portrait from Sadis. Fabulous.
For anyone who's still thinking of looking down their nose at strippers,
get over yourself!
It's a record of where she's been.
They're wonderful people. And because you're such a dog lover.
Oh, no. Look at the puppies. Oh, my Lord!
But I think Gypsy's greatest legacy is her impact on striptease.
Do you recognise this? Oh, my God!
She raised it out of sleazy burlesque houses
and turned it into an art form. You'd be able to twirl it.
Give me five minutes and I'll be out there with it!
To Erik, this room is just an attic full of his mother's old stuff.
Wherever there's anything of my mother's, there are her gloves.
But, to me, it represents the life of a true showbiz legend
and a true idol of mine.
It's such an important piece of theatre history
and I love what those gloves have seen.
You know... Where they've been. ..where they've been.
Where they've been flung and what she's used them for
to her best advantage and it's just great to see this stuff.
Thank you for showing me all this, Erik. My pleasure.
Honestly. Thanks for doing the show.
Are you sure? I couldn't think of anybody else
I'd want to do a programme about than your marvellous mother.
There should be a museum to this great lady, Erik.
It's been a bit of a pilgrimage for me, this trip
and I'm very happy to say cos it could have gone the other way.
I could have gone home thinking, "I don't like her."
My admiration for her and, indeed, love for her, has increased tenfold.
And meeting her son, Erik, well that was the icing on the cake.
It was bliss on a stick, to tell you the truth.
But my pilgrimage isn't quite over yet.
You see, although it was the musical that sparked my interest in Gypsy,
the impact it made on me wasn't down to Gypsy herself.
That was down to Stephen Sondheim's marvellous lyrics
and the performance of an amazing actress.
I'm ending my travels in Washington DC, home to Faith Dane,
the incredible Miss Mazeppa.
Before starring in Gypsy, Faith was working in New York strip bars
and her gimmick was playing the bugle dressed as a gladiator.
When Sondheim saw this act at the musical's auditions,
he wrote an entire number around her.
Why does this still make me laugh? I've seen it a million times.
I still roar laughing.
Now aged 89, Faith is on her way to see me.
I've seen various Miss Mazeppas and various productions of Gypsy
through the years but there's nobody to touch Faith.
Faith has travelled her today with her husband Jude
and this gal is still cooking with gas.
(PHONE)
Thank you very much. Thank you. Bye.
Well, she's here.
I'm dying for this.
Dying to meet her.
(KNOCK ON DOOR) Come in!
Hello. Oh, my God.
Faith, welcome. Look at you. Look at you.
You look fabulous. He is such a handsome thing.
Lovely to meet you. Lovely to meet you.
Faith, come in, sweetheart. Let me stand up.
What a pl... Oh, I can't believe this.
I'm... Look at him. Look at you.
I'm gonna jump on your bones.
So you're a fan of Gypsy the show? And a huge fan of yours.
I still have my... I can triple tongue.
Oh, can you? Where's the bugle?
Ha! I'm gonna die and go to heaven here.
(LAUGHS)
You look wonderful. Yes. Yes. Yes.
Have you still go the original Mazeppa's bugle? Yes.
I got... Didn't I...? Hello there.
I just love you, Faith. Honestly.
Faith, you're killing me.
(GUFFAWS)
It didn't sound as well as it should.
It's not bad, though. Not at all.
And they're hard to play those things.
I never did that before. I brought my bugle as well.
Really? Oh, yeah.
Do you want me to go and get my bugle? Sure.
I'll go and get my bugle. You want me to get up and do the number?
I want you to do it.
Faith, that's a bit like painting in front of Picasso.
I shall do my best, Faith. All right. Let it rip!
# You can pull all the stops out
# Till they call the cops out
# Grind your behind till you're banned
# But you've got to get a gimmick
# If you wanna get a hand
# You can sacrifice your sacro
# Working in the back row
# Bump in a dump till you're dead
# But you've got to get a gimmick if you want to get ahead
Hang on, here's the bumps.
# You can... You can... You can...
# A-A-Ah
# That's how burlesque was born
# So I...ummm and I...umm
# And I ummm...ummm...ummm
# But I do it with a horn #
Hold the horn up.
(BLOWS MILITARY TUNE)
(TUNE BECOMES RAUNCHY)
Excellent. Splendid.
Oh, Faith. Well, that is indeed praise.
Indulge me, will you please, viewer?
I'm having the time of my life.
I can't tell you how much I've enjoyed myself today
and what a real treat it is to meet the great Faith Dane.
Beautiful to be with you.
I didn't know I had any fans in England.
Yeah. Yeah. I want to thank you for liking me.
Honestly, folks, unless Gypsy's ghost turns up with room service,
there couldn't be a better ending to this trip.
I love you.
Oh, she's glorious. Right, I'm gonna go and ring half of England
to tell 'em who I have just met.
# If you wanna bump it, bump it with a trumpet
# And get yourself a gimmick and you...too...
# Can be a star! #
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