Baltimore's Neo-Burlesque Scene

It’s 10 a.m. on a Thursday, and Larry Flynt’s Hustler Club is waking up. The bartender restocks the shelves, the manager talks on his cell, and a janitor vigorously vacuums the carpet, as if trying to rid the place of its musky, libidinous smell. In the middle of the room, suspended between the twin brass stripping poles on the stage, Trixie Little and the Evil Hate Monkey are flirting with theatrical disaster.At the moment, Trixie, a petite redhead who is built more like a gymnast than like one of the “Hustler Honeys” who usually perform on this stage, is clinging to a pole with both hands. Her legs are draped over the shoulders of her partner, Monkey, who stands with his head squarely in her crotch, wondering out loud what to do next. This is not an unfamiliar position for these two, the twin pioneers of Baltimore’s neo-burlesque scene. Monkey (Adam Krandle by day) once drove a motorcycle across a high wire four stories up, while Trixie (formerly Keri Burneston) did stunts on a trapeze below. He’d learned how to operate the machine just days before.