Burlesque Legend Dusty Summers tells you how she feels about full nude

Burlesque Legend Dusty Summers is as nimble with her words as she is with her feet. She’s direct, opinionated, and seasoned with a sass decades in the making.
Interviewing Summers was one of the highlights of our documentary team’s recent trip to Las Vegas and the Burlesque Hall of Fame weekend event June 1-4. During the trip, we also visited Lacy’s Lounge, a more traditional strip club, but one that emphasizes performance over transactions.
Documentary “Do the Dance” uses the examination of a precedent-setting 1969 strip club indecency trial to tell a broader story about the limits to Free Expression. The trial over bottomless dancing (full nude) made national news when Judge Earl Warren Jr. ruled the jury needed to see the dancer ‘do the dance.’
Summers worked at the trouble-making club, the Pink Pussy Kat in Orangevale, before embarking on a career as a touring exotic dancer. At age 69, Summers is still working as Las Vegas’ only stripping magician.
Summers left the Pink Pussy Kat before -- at the urging of the club’s owner -- the performers started dancing bottomless. The fully-nude go-go performances starting a multi-year battle between the beer bar and the local authorities. Summers would later share a billing with the performer at the center of the trial Susanne Haines. Haines won Miss Nude Universe in 1972 and was the headliner.
While Haines famously fought to go fully naked, Summer didn’t want to show it all then and doesn’t now.
To find out just what the sharp-tongued Summers said you’ll have to watch the documentary.

She was one of the featured performers at the Burlesque Hall of Fame weekend. Dustin Wax, executive director of the currently expanding hall was another one of our interviews.
Our two-night stay, also took us to Lacy's is located in North Las Vegas. It bills itself as Las Vegas' only Atlanta-style (hip hop) strip club. To pull himself out of a hole, longtime Michael Jackson impersonator and dancer Craig Parks started performing in male review shows then hosting big booty events before taking on his own space connected to the historic Palomino Club. We also talked to dancers Destiny and Dream.

Free expression documentary fund nears 70 percent

San Francisco topless legend Carol Doda performs during Sacramento indecency trial 

The online campaign funding a Sacramento documentary exploring the 1969 strip club indecency case that took the jury to the club is approaching 70 percent funded with 9 days remaining.

Using the crowdfunding site Indiegogo, Fletcher and his team are trying to raise $10,000 by March 22. Through March 15, the month-long campaign was at 68 percent of goal.

The feature-length documentary will use the colorful 1969 trial over “bottomless” dancing at Orangevale’s Pink Pussy Kat to help to tell a broader story about the limits of free expression then and now.

The impactful Sacramento trial went national when Judge Earl Warren Jr. decided to take the jury to the club see the dancers “do the dance.” The case helped write the rules for exotic dance in California.

Sacramento journalist and filmmaker Ed Fletcher said he was confident the team will hit the goal.

“There is so much Sacramento love for a deeply local story. We will get there,” said Fletcher.

The reaction to the campaign has been mostly positive, Fletcher said.

“Some people don’t want to talk about it or maybe they think it’s anti-women. To me, it’s just history,” Fletcher said. “This happened and we want to tell the story. I’m not pro-strip club or anti-strip club. I’m a journalist. But at the same time you can’t be afraid to show a little leg in marking if you’re making a project about free expression.”

Directing the project is DQ Hayes, an emerging filmmaker and former musician from the band Shakedown.

"There is love for this project from all over. We get people hitting up our page from UK, Spain, Sweden. Free expression and women's empowerment is universal," said Hayes.

More information at: Dothedance.net

CLICK HERE to contribute

California beer bar challenged legal nudity limits of late 1960s

During the summer of 1969, a beer bar in the Northern California community of Orangevale dared to go full-nude setting off a series of legal challenges that ended with the dancers, including Carol Doda, performing for the jury.

"Do the Dance," a documentary telling the story of this wild and influential trial, is currently raising funds on the Indiegogo crowdfunding platform.

Cable show: Where are you at with film project?

I recently sat down with Elisia Gonzales and Rafael Siegel, the hosts of the community cable show Sactown Underground, to talk about the exciting updates on my documentary film project "Do The Dance." Do The Dance explores the 1969 Sacramento's strip club indecency trail that wrote the rules in California for exotic dance. The conversation also hits on how to setup the feature film screenplay "Pink."

Pink doc kickoff planned for February

We are still working out the details but look for an official announcement soon on  February "Free Love Free Expression Film Fundraiser" for the Pink documentary. (That name might need help.)
The night will feature a screening of a preview trailer utilizing historic footage, it will also include an auction of "Free Expression" artwork, a chat with Judge Earl Warren Jr. and a burlesque performance.
We're expecting it to raise a significant amount of money towards the project. We have Feb. 21 penciled in.
The night also kickoffs crowdfunding campaign to finish funding the film and expand the market for the documentary and the feature film.
The February event and the flurry of activity after will give the documentary the proper launch it deserves and serves to elevate the entire Pink project.
The documentary uses a look back at quirky 1969 indecency trial to launch a broader conversation about the present state of free expression.
Thank you for following the journey. I'll need your help as I prepare to host this fundraiser then run a crowdfunding campaign. More on that soon.
If you'd like to get more actively involved in event planning, web design, graphic design, marketing, and publicity or any number of other areas please don't hesitate to ask.

Ed Fletcher

Naked celebrity selfies suggests time right for free expression documentary

The Pink Pussy Kat in Orangevale went to court over the right to dance fully nude.

In many ways, a documentary was the logical step.
From the moment I pulled the fading stack of newspaper clips on Sacramento's Pink Pussy Kat trial I knew I wanted to tell the story somehow.
I'd brushed aside earlier consideration of doing a documentary, preferring to keep my eye on the prize: a major release feature film.
I'm not saying my initial mission was wrong, but it's time to pivot. This is a story that's ripe for the telling. Big stars like Miley Cyrus, Kim Kardashian West and Emily Ratajkowski are making news by sharing their naked bodies in the name of free expression.
Hey, Emily, Kim and Miley here is a more meaningful way to address the issue of free expression.
Here are some of the questions our documentary will tackle:
Was the push to go full nude at strip clubs in the late 1960' about free expression or exploitation?
How have our social more changed since the flower power movement?
How is it that Sacramento has all but eradicated strip clubs, yet they're all over Portland?
With our the acquisition of KCRA's coverage of the trial, for the first time we're able to see and hear the players first hand. It's 20 minutes of some pretty amazing footage: including some of Carol Doda dancing during the trial.

The question before my cohorts is whether to go after a modest prize of a 20-minute documentary or to develop the plan for an hour-long version that could land on HBO or Showtime?
Secondary question: How do we get Emily, Kim or Miley involved?

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