Burlesque

Harlow Gold Burlesque Where: Bordello, 901 E. 1st St., L.A. When: Sundays, doors 8 p.m., show 9 p.m. Price: $10, $15 and $25 Contact: (213) 687-3766; advance tickets at www.harlowgold.event brite.com; group reservations at www.bunnyhopprod @sbcglobal.net Devil's Playground Burlesque and Cabaret Where: Bordello, 901 E. 1st St., L.A. When: Dec. 12 and every second Saturday of the month Price: $13 Contact: www.courtneycruz.

Paris Hilton arrives at Hollywood's new "it" club, the Emerson Theatre, amid a blinding barrage of camera flashes. The crowd outside pushes in around her, "Day of the Locust" style, before the club's doors swallow her whole. The hangers-on are left pressed up against the velvet rope that separates celebrity, wealth and status from their opposites. Past a coat check and up soft carpeted steps Hilton and other privileged club-goers, including Vin Diesel, Paul Oakenfold and Dallas Austin, emerge at the top of a sweeping grand staircase that leads to a writhing dance floor.

All over town, on billboards and in print ads, seemingly nude bodies poke through viscous liquid like aliens searching for escape. They herald the arrival -- or escape -- of "Zumanity," the latest Cirque du Soleil extravaganza to be unveiled here. The show, the Montreal-based company's 15th since its inception in 1984, is playing at Cirque's third permanent venue in Las Vegas and is its first for adults only.

The first time, when the spotlight beckoned, she backed away from the stage. She was nearing 40, a size 14, her body "long instead of perky. " "I think we have a runner!" the emcee yelled. A group of dancers blocked her way. And then, to the brassy notes of an old show tune, they nudged her onstage to strip. Eight years later, here in this land of the thin, blond ideal, the woman who changed her name legally to Lili VonSchtupp draws crowds to a dive bar in Hollywood to celebrate real women with real bodies.

A museum dedicated to burlesque memorabilia is struggling financially after spending $10,000 to fix a string of code violations. The Exotic World Museum of Burlesque and Striptease Hall of Fame, halfway between Los Angeles and Las Vegas, needs a land-use permit to continue to operate, according to San Bernardino County code enforcement officials.

In the art of striptease, Betty Rowland says, the emphasis was always on tease. She should know. At 81, burlesque's redheaded "Ball of Fire" still burns brightly as the grande dame of bumps and grinds. To listen to her cheeky memories is to return to an era when men brought dates to burlesque shows, the bump and grind and the German Roll were separate arts, and the dancer who touched her body while she was dancing ran the risk of going to jail.

IT'S Friday afternoon in the picket-fence suburb of Chatsworth. The sun is low as an iron gate parts to reveal a steep driveway leading to a classic, low-slung ranch house. The front door opens and there is Dita Von Teese -- a porcelain doll, not a raven hair out of place. Her scarlet fingernails are filed into pointy talons, her lipstick and beauty mark perfect. "Would you like some water?" she asks, her hips swishing as she walks in a ramrod straight, ice blue Moschino dress.

Dixie Evans couldn't sing or dance, but in her striptease act, she became Marilyn Monroe. At burlesque theaters on the East Coast in the 1950s, Evans acted out scenes from Monroe's movie blockbusters as she stripped down to a G-string. "Walter Cronkite used to come every year to see my act," said Evans, who now runs "Exotic World," a strippers' hall of fame in Victorville.

"Workin' Hot," the thrilling opening number of "Minsky's," the nostalgic and not terribly authentic backstage musical that had its world premiere Friday at the Ahmanson Theatre, gets off to a rather shaky start. Set in a burlesque house on New York's Lower East Side, the show begins with the testing out of a new song that's supposed to kick off the new revue with a bang. Buster (Kevin Cahoon), the resident pianist who probably would have been better off pursuing his dream of tap dancing, has composed a tune completely devoid of pep. Redeeming this dirge would appear to be a lost cause, but Billy Minsky (Christopher Fitzgerald)

In her one-bedroom apartment in Brentwood, Betty Rowland recently thumbed through a pile of fan mail scattered on her dining room table. The letters sat next to seven photographs of her as a burlesque dancer in the 1940s and '50s, wearing risque outfits and, in one case, appearing topless. It reminded Rowland, 93, of what she saw when she went to the Ahmanson Theatre on Feb.

127 Hours Fox Searchlight, $29.98; Blu-ray, $39.99 James Franco scored a well-deserved Oscar nomination for playing cocky thrill-seeker Aron Ralston in director Danny Boyle's true-life adventure "127 Hours. " When Ralston's arm gets pinned by a boulder in a remote Utah canyon, the hiker does what it takes to stay alive including, eventually, hacking away at the limb. The subject matter is harrowing and gruesome, but Boyle turns the story into more of a celebration of life and companionship ?

American Rose: A Nation Laid Bare: The Life and Times of Gypsy Rose Lee Karen Abbott Random House: 426 pp., $26 Gypsy Rose Lee became the most famous stripper in America with a stylish routine notable less for the striptease than for her witty repartee while she peeled. Her fans included H.L. Mencken; her wisecracks made Walter Winchell's column, though I doubt Winchell printed the one that Karen Abbott takes as an epigraph for the first chapter in her seething biography: "Mother says I'm the most beautiful naked ass ?

Oscar's best song category sometimes feels like the field that gets no respect. Two years ago, only three songs were nominated, and the prior year much of the music recognized by the academy came from one film, Disney's "Enchanted. " In 2010, a long-standing tradition was done away with, as the contenders for best song did not perform on the telecast. But what feels like a lack of attention from the academy isn't reflected in the films themselves. The likes of Randy Newman, Christina Aguilera, Cher, Carrie Underwood and John Legend were among the many who lent their vocals and musical talents to films this year.

When they were growing up, Jules Fisher dreamed of becoming a magician and Peggy Eisenhauer trained to become a concert pianist. Eventually they ended up joining forces to bring their special combination of hocus-pocus and musicality to films, including this month's "Burlesque," through theatrical lighting design. Traditionally, film uses close-ups in the same way that theater uses spotlights: to direct the audience's attention. However, with a résumé that includes Broadway and off-Broadway shows, operas and concerts, Fisher and Eisenhauer bring their dynamic, theatrical lighting sensibility to film sets, where lighting is usually more static.

'Burlesque' MPAA rating: PG-13 for sexual content including several suggestive dance routines, partial nudity, language and some thematic material Running time: 1 hour, 56 minutes Playing: In general release

Think of "Burlesque" as one ginormous music video theme party thrown by Christina Aguilera, with Cher in the house, plus boas, bustiers and dancing girls and about a thousand humongous Broadway-style showstoppers. Which is a far better way to consider "Burlesque" than thinking of it as a movie ? there, words fail. (Their words, not mine. I'm a long way from finished here.) But should you find yourself in the mood for Big Musical Numbers by the score rather than a film, there's a lot to like about "Burlesque.

Out in the desert somewhere between Victorville and Barstow, a woman crammed into a stifling cardboard barrel is just praying that her makeup stays fresh. The barrel, disguised as a giant can of Campbell's Soup, sits atop a makeshift stage on a dusty ranch where nearly 300 people have assembled to see the crowning of Miss Exotic World 2000. A lusty male voice intones, "Ladies and gentleman, she's mmm, mmm good . . . Miss Christi Campbell!"

With scissors at the ready, Kathy Fischer kneels in front of a 14-inch, silver fringe skirt. "Too long," Robin Antin says, holding the postage-stamp-sized garment up to her tiny waist. Snip, snip, snip. "Shorter, shorter!" There's no skirt too short or corset too tight for the Pussycat Dolls. When Antin created the burlesque group seven years ago to perform as an opening act at Johnny Depp's Viper Room, costuming it was a one-woman show.

Thanksgiving represents the start of the home stretch for the record industry's year-end blitz of new music releases, and from here on out it's a nonstop slate of music and music-related videos that labels hope will turn into 11th-hour hits. This week: Christina Aguilera, in her silver screen debut, finds a stripper-bar role model and mentor in Cher in "Burlesque," and they share space as well on the soundtrack album. Swedish club queen Robyn releases her new "Body Talk," and British post-punk band Killing Joke returns with "Absolute Dissent.

A few paparazzi were loitering on the hot concrete outside of Chelsea Handler's talk show studio in West L.A. last week, waiting for pop diva Christina Aguilera to emerge so they could take her picture. But they weren't sure their idling would pay off. "Her walking with a coffee cup is basically worth nothing," said Bobby Rachpoot, a photographer for Bauer Griffin. "Unless she is with a new boyfriend. That would be like $100,000. " In the wake of a tough year, it seems Aguilera's stock has plummeted.