LAS VEGAS — Tempest Storm is fuming. Her fingers tremble with frustration. They are aged, knotted by arthritis and speckled with purple spots.
But the manicure of orange polish is flawless and new, and matches her signature tousled mane. She brushes orange curls out of her face as she explains how she has been slighted.
She is the headliner. She is a star. She is classy.
“I don’t just get up there and rip my clothes off,” she says.
Indeed, the 80-year-old burlesque queen takes her clothes off very slowly.
More than 50 years ago, she was dubbed the “Girl with the Fabulous Front” and told by famous men she had the “Best Two Props in Hollywood.” Since then, Storm saw the art that made her famous on the brink of extinction. Her contemporaries — Blaze Starr, Bettie Page, Lili St. Cyr — have died or hung up the pasties.
But not Storm. She kept performing. Las Vegas, Reno, Palm Springs, Miami, Carnegie Hall.
Her act is a time capsule. She knows nothing of poles. Her prop of choice is a boa, perhaps the occasional divan.
It takes four numbers, she says adamantly, four numbers to get it all off. To do it classy.
But the producers of tonight’s show, just kids, want her to go faster. She gets just seven minutes. “I did seven minutes when I started,” she says.
Stardom and fandom feature prominently in Tempest Storm’s life — and in her neat, two-bedroom Las Vegas apartment.
Visitors are greeted by photos of a young Elvis, her favorite rock ‘n’ roller and, she says, a former lover.
He met her after her show in Las Vegas and fiddled with her skirt as he introduced himself. The relationship ended about a year later because Elvis’ manager didn’t approve of his dating a stripper, she says.
But she could not change who she was. Stripping had already made her famous.
It put her in the room with Hollywood’s heavyweights. Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Mickey Rooney, Nat King Cole. She dated some, just danced for others. The evidence is framed and displayed on tables and the living room wall.
Storm is rarely wistful. She has no doubt she still is what she once was. Although she performs just a handful of times a year, she would do more, if asked. She chides those who think age takes a toll on sex appeal.
“Ridiculous,” she says.
On Sundays, Storm tunes in to a televangelist who tells her anyone can overcome odds. It’s the only religion she has ever taken to.
She believes this is the lesson of her life. Be a survivor. Never stop doing what you love; it makes you who you are.
“If you want to get old, you’ll get old,” she says.
If some might see all this as chasing after lost youth, she says she cares little. Younger dancers tell her she is an inspiration to them, and she has no reason not to believe them.
“I feel good about myself. And I enjoy it,” she says. “I have fun when I’m on stage, and the audience loves it. Nobody ever said it’s time to give it up. Why stop?”
