Last week, The Guardian's Hannah Pool featured Dita Von Teese in a rather judgmental interview. Clearly, Pool went into this interview with the obvious intention of trying to make Dita uncomfortable, on edge, and have to defend herself. However, I love the way Dita answered her questions: thoughtfully, gracefully, and with class.
Can you be a feminist and a burlesque performer?
Having your own choices, having equal rights - how is it not being feminist?
But you are encouraging people to see women as objects.
How am I being objectified more than an actress? When they sit down and they make a deal about their role in a film, the attorney says, "If we can see a nipple, how much is that worth? If we see her butt, how much is that worth? Full frontal nudity, how much is that worth?" It's worked out to the dime. How is that different?
Don't you wish you could do all of those things (fashion, theatre, dance) without having to take your clothes off?
No. Not at all.
Don't you worry that while it might be liberating for you, there are lots of women who are not in nice clubs, who are not having a good time?
With every profession it is not always going to be great. You can't just generalize. You can't say all strippers are abused. I've worked in some of those crappy clubs. It hasn't always been champagne and flower s and rhinestone sin my dressing room, and people giving me accolades. I've worked in biker bars in Wisconsin.
But a young girl looking at you won't know about those bars. She will look at it as an adventure.
I correspond with a lot of my fans and I make it clear that someone shouldn't be looking at me thinking, "Oh I want to be a burlesque dancer." I am kind of the exception and I try to make that clear without sounding too conceited. You'll earn more money quicker if you go to college than by being a burlesque dancer.
Where do you draw the line?
I have done a lot of things - I've made erotic films, I've posed nude. I've danced nude.
Isn't there something tragic about all that?
Yes, I think there definitely can be, and that was all part of burlesque, too. Not every burlesque dancer was Gypsy Roe Lee and Sally Rand. There was maybe some prostitution involved at some point.
I hate the whole idea of Burlesque clubs.
Have you been to one?
No. I don't want to encourage it.
Well that's okay. If you saw it, then you might see some things that you liked, and some things that you didn't like.
I hate the women that go. I feel they are letting the side down.
I have more female fans than male fans - maybe they go home and dance around for their boyfriend. It's harmless. What makes one person feel completely empowered makes another person degraded. Have you ever been to a strip club before?
No, again, I don't want to encourage that either.
Have you seen a video?
Yes, once.
And it's not for you?
Not at all.
But that' sokay for you to say it's not for you and you don't want to be involved. Part of what I love about burlesque is that it is risque and some people should be offended by it. I don't try to be anyone's role model. I don't think I'm right and I don't think that I'm wrong. I think everyone has to decide for themselves. All you can hope for is at least to have a choice.
