Lili St. Cyr

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This article is about a deceased Burlesque performer

Lili St. Cyr.


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Lili St. Cyr - The Queen of Burlesque

Born Willis Marie Van Schaack ✦June 3, 1918 - January 29, 1999). We know little about the childhood that developed the young woman into the outspoken celebrity she became. Her grandparents, the Klarquists, reared her and her two show business sisters, Dardy Orlando and Barbara Moffett.

Having taken ballet lessons throughout her youth, she began to dance professionally as a chorus line girl in Hollywood. Unlike other ladies who have stroke-of-luck stories about being plucked from the chorus line and upped to a feature, Lili had to beg her manager at the club to let her do a solo act. Her self-choreographed act led her to bigger and better things, namely a bit part at a club called "The Music Box", with an act called the Duncan Sisters. It was here that she came to a revelation: A dancer's salary was 1/18 of what the featured star's salary was. What was the difference? The featured star was nude.

Inhibitions seemed insignificant versus the drive for success.

Lili’s stripping debut was at "The Music Box", in an Ivan Fehnova production. The producer had not even seen her perform. Her striking looks won him over. The act was a disaster. Instead of firing her, Fehnova reconsidered and put together a new act. At the end of the dance, a stagehand would pull a fishing rod attached to Lili’s G-String. It would fly into the balcony and the lights would go dim. This famous act was known, as "The Flying G,” and such creative shows would be Lili’s trademark

Once Lili began traveling, her act only grew more and more.

One of her better-known venues was "El Rancho Vegas,” a nightclub in the then-young town of Las Vegas. It was here that she would perform her staple act of taking a bubble bath on stage and having a maid dress her. Some credit her with helping to build the town into the empire it is today. She certainly contributed to the showgirl tradition.

Lili St. Cyr received the title of the most famous woman in Montreal throughout the 1950s. French Canadians are notorious for their exclusivity, but they welcomed Lili as one of their own. (Of course, not all Montreal residents appreciated her presence, such as church leaders who called her act indecent.) She reciprocated their appreciation in the 1980s, with her French autobiography, "Ma Vie De Stripteaseuse.” In it, she clearly states her love for the city of Montreal, and the "Gayety Theatre" where she performed.

No mention of Lili would be complete without bringing up her six serial marriages. It seems that Lili married for the thrill of it. When it was gone, so was she. Her best-known husbands are the musical-comedy actor Paul Valentine, and actor Ted Jordan. Jordan wrote a biography of Marilyn Monroe, which claims that Lili and Monroe had an affair. This seems to be just one of the doubtful claims he made.

While Lili starred in several movies, and acting career never seemed to be in her cards. Typically, she settled for playing the part of a stripper or playing herself. The films, which feature her dancing, are often the most fascinating, such as the Irving Klaw film "Varietease."

From the 1940s and most of the 1950s, Lili was believed to have taken the throne from Gypsy Rose Lee and Ann Corio as the queen of the striptease. Her act was like an erotic ballet, was rivaled by nothing in any burlesque house. Though she is rather obscure today, her name popped up regularly in 1950s tabloids: stories of her many husbands, brawls over her, and her attempted suicides.

As indicated by her suicidal efforts, Lili did not seem to find show business fulfilling. She never dreamed of stardom as a child: To her it was just a job. So as Lili retired from the stage, she began a business which she would retain an interest in until her death.

Lili started a lingerie business. Similar to "Frederick's of Hollywood" in its time, "The Undie World of Lili St. Cyr" designs offered costuming for strippers and excitement for housewives. Her catalogs featured photos or drawings of her modeling each article, and descriptions of lavish detail and hand-selected fabrics. Her company contended heartily with other lingerie businesses until it sold to a Santa Monica lingerie shop.

She dedicated her final years to remaining secluded, mysterious, and tending her cats. In 1999, she passed away. Since her final years were very Garbo-esque, her death was not widely known, but a small tribute appeared in "Life Magazine" in a summary of the year.

When the cult movie the Rocky Horror Picture Show came out, Janet Weiss (played by Susan Sarandon) is swimming ecstatically in a pool, singing an ode to decadence in a scene. A line of her song goes: "God bless Lili St. Cyr!" The line goes largely unnoticed, except of course by the fans that know every line of the movie.

As the Bettie Page craze came to a peak, legions of fans began discovering the other dancers in those Irving Klaw photos and movies. Dancers began trying to recreate the lost art of burlesque, and even an A&E Channel special was devoted to the subject.

The women who were secure with their sexuality, and who dared to be provocative before it was accepted will always be remembered, whether it be by a legion of devotees or a cult of enthusiasts. Lili's quote in her catalog stressed that her lingerie was for women of all shapes and sizes.

Her movies, in which she often played herself or a stripper, include:

  • Love Moods (1952)
  • Bedroom Fantasy (1953)
  • Striporama (1953)
  • Varietease (1954)
  • Teaserama (1955)
  • Son of Sinbad (1955)
  • Buxom Beautease (1956)
  • The Naked and the Dead (1958)
  • I, Mobster (1958)
  • Runaway Girl (1962)

A passing reference is made to her in the song "Don't Dream It" from The Rocky Horror Picture Show.

Retirement

When St. Cyr retired from the stage she began a lingerie business in which she would retain an interest until her death. Similar to Frederick's of Hollywood, the "Undie World of Lili St. Cyr" designs offered costuming for strippers, and excitement for ordinary women. Her catalogs featured photos or drawings of her modeling each article, lavishly detailed descriptions, and hand-selected fabrics. Her marketing for "Scanti-Panties" advertised them as "perfect for streetwear, stage or photography." St. Cyr spent her final years in obscurity and in seclusion, tending to her cats.

Death

She died in 1999 in Los Angeles under the name "Willis Marie VanSchaack".

Legacy

After St. Cyr's death, with a renewed interest in burlesque, and especially in Bettie Page, legions of new fans began rediscovering some of the dancers in Irving Klaw's photos and movies. During this time A&E devoted a special to burlesque in 2001 which included a piece on St. Cyr.

Influences and cultural references

Perhaps the most famous reference to St. Cyr is in the song Zip from the 1940 musical Pal Joey by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart (Rogers and Hart) in which the reporter/would-be stripper Melba Snyder rhetorically asks at the climax of the song "Who the hell is Lili St. Cyr?" [i.e. what has she got that I don't have?]

In 1981, actress Cassandra Peterson became famous for her character Elvira which achieved her amazing cleavage wearing a Lili St. Cyr deep plunge bra.

In 1989, one of St. Cyr's husbands, Ted Jordan, wrote a biography of Marilyn Monroe entitled "Norma Jean: My Secret Life with Marilyn Monroe", in which Jordan claims that St. Cyr and Monroe had a lesbian affair. The claim is widely disparaged by Monroe biographers. The publisher of Jordan's book, Liza Dawson, editor for William Morrow and Company, makes a more credible claim in an interview with Newsday in 1989, stating that "Marilyn very much patterned herself on Lili St. Cyr — her way of dressing, of talking, her whole persona. Norma Jean was a mousy, brown-haired girl with a high squeaky voice, and it was from Lili St. Cyr that she learned how to become a sex goddess."

Lili St. Cyr is mentioned in the musical The Rocky Horror Show. The final line of the song "Don't Dream It" (sung by the character Janet Weiss, as played in the film adaptation by Susan Sarandon) is "God bless Lili St. Cyr!"

From another source

Lili St. Cyr (born Willis Marie Van Schaack, June 3, 1918 – January 29, 1999), was a prominent American burlesque stripper.

When St. Cyr retired from the stage she began a lingerie business in which she would retain an interest until her death. Similar to Frederick's of Hollywood, the "Undie World of Lili St. Cyr" designs offered costuming for strippers, and excitement for ordinary women. Her catalogs featured photos or drawings of her modeling each article, lavishly detailed descriptions, and hand-selected fabrics. Her marketing for "Scanti-Panties" advertised them as "perfect for street wear, stage or photography."

The Undie World of Lili St. Cyr was Lili's lingerie line, which was made mainly for dancers, showgirls, pin-ups as well as regular girls with an exotic streak. It was really popular during the 1960s and competed with alot of more mainstream brands. I found some scans from magazines featuring advertisements for her line. In some of the advertisements, Lili modeled.

After her retirement from the stage around the early 60's Lili focused her attention on, on a provocative lingerie shop on Hollywood Boulevard called "The Undie World of Lili St Cyr" Later on the enterprise was sold to another lingerie shop located in Santa Monica Boulevard which she still retains an interest in.


Here's an excerpt from Gilded Lili:

Always interested in fashion, Lili also opened up a mail-order lingerie business and a Hollywood boutique known as "The Undie World of Lili St. Cyr." The catalog, which used both exaggerated illustrations of Lili and her glamour shots, promised that women would “be well dressed for that most delightful sport of all . . . [in styles] created to meet an unprecedented demand for the bold . . . the delicious . . . the naughty!” The sexy creations included bikini briefs, filmy negligees, lacy G-strings, and sparkly pasties, with names like Scantie Panties, Folies Bergere, Coy Miss, Lili’s Love, Lolita, and Fanny Hill.

Descriptions played up Lili’s connection to the lingerie. The ads divulged that in her personal appearances she wore the Illusion, a robe made of “yards and yards of sheerest Nylon -- draped to reveal and conceal.” And they trumpeted the notion that “only Lili St. Cyr could design such a fabulous Nylon Lace dance set” as Lili’s Love, a halter bra and bikini. The lingerie boutique, which sold the same items as Lili’s mail-order business, boomed and remained a Hollywood hot spot for over twenty years, attracting many designers and celebrities, including pop icon Madonna.

- as told by Bill Ward’s stepson Gary to Eric Kroll, author of “The Wonderful World of Bill Ward, King of the Glamour Girls”:

In 1962 Bill Ward was commissioned to do the illustrations for that year’s Lili St. Cyr catalog, The Undie World of Lili St. Cyr. Elmer Batters did another year’s edition.

When Ward was hired to do her catalog, a huge crate of lingerie came to the house.

As a lark, Gran tried some of the outfits and ended up posing for Bill to help him illustrate the catalog. I remember seeing ads for Lili St. Cyr in the back of Adam or Stag magazines, and it was usually a drawing of Lili. The reason being, it was less risky in terms of censorship to send an illustrated catalog through the U.S. mail system than one illustrated with photographs.

Ward created for the catalog precise model drawings with Lili's face on each.

See also

External links

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