HER TREASTIE ON HOW TO PICK A BURLESQUE NAME:
DO NOT USE:
Kitten, Kitty, Vixen, Honey, Von, Lux or Deluxe, Lola, de Ville, Violette, Pinky, Femme or Belle.
Why, you may ask? Because these names have been taken a million times over! Seriously, this is like calling yourself Jennifer.
Nothing is more shattering than coming to perform and having an audience member say “Oh, I thought you were that other gal!” And, honestly, you don’t need to tread the same ground; you should want to have your own, individual personality.
PORN NAME:
This has always been the tried and true: the name of your pet and the first street you lived on. (In my case it would be Natasha Tacoma.)
MAKES AND MODELS OF CARS:
Sure, de Ville is out of the running (since you’d never want to be compared to the legendary Kitten de Ville), but look at all these choices: Continental, Coupe, SuperSport, Zephyr, Valiant, Corvair, Mustang, Nova, Futura, Mercury, Rocket 88, Metropolitan, Citrone, Fiat.
COCKTAILS AND BOOZE:
Yes, there are names besides Martini:, Campari, Negroni, Gin Fizz, Dubonet, etc. Did you know there is a cocktail called Poussé Café? How about a play on the name Frenet Blanca, a digestif from the late 1800's.
GEMSTONES:
Pearl, Ruby, Emerald, Opal, Garnet, Toapz…you get the idea.
SLANG:
These are slang for ‘woman’: Baby, Bearcat, Skirt, Hoofer, Broad, Bimbo, Chassis, Dame, Doll, Dollybird, Gold-Digger, Moll, Twist… There are any number of websites devoted to the slang of the 20's, 50's, vaudeville, circus, hip-hop, etc.
WORDS IN ANOTHER LANGUAGE:
Star in French is etoile; fire in Spanish is fuego. There are several websites that offer basic word translation when googled. Do be sure that you are pronouncing it properly!
GET A DRAG QUEEN TO NAME YOU:
Those gals have such great names like Amanda Wreckinwith or Sugar Placebo.
WATCH OLD MOVIES, READ BOOKS:
Do you know there is a Lolita Haze and Dolores Haze? Know where those came from? That’s the name of the girl in LOLITA.
What about Eve Harrington, the conniving ingénue in ALL ABOUT EVE? Or better yet, Bettie Davis’ character in that film, Margot Channing?
Constance Chatterly (LADY CHATTERLY’S LOVER), Lady de Winter (THE THREE MUSKETEERS), Kid Twist (THE STING) are possibilities!
STILL STUCK?
Well, here are some names I’ve come up with:
April May June—“The Girl for Every Day!” (good for girl-next-door)
Danielle Boom!—“Queen of the Wild Frontier”
Mitzi Tov—“Look at Those Blessings!” (good for a Jewish performer)
Jolly Roger (doesn’t have to be a boy’s name)
Delta Dawn (This is a song from the 70’s)
Lady Mustache (Good for gender bender performer)
Dutch Courage (this is slang for liquid courage, aka booze)
Dieter Von Cockenstien (well, OK, that speaks for itself)
Oodles O’Quim (thank you comic-book author Alan Moore, from the sequel to AAAAAAAAgraphic novel THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN, BLACK AAAAAAAADOSSIER.)
Tia Juana Hooker aka TJ Hooker (William Shatner's legendary cop show)
Cutty Sark (a clipper ship and a brand of Scotch)
Poussé Café (a fancy cocktail made up several different liquers)
Duke L’Orange (maybe best for a male performer…)
Knockers McGee
Tighty Whitey
Dot Matrix
Sally Funbags
Miranda Warning (or Miranda Rights)
If you take any of these names, please e-mail me directly at
augusta @ itsachick.com, as I’ll want to remove them from the list.
LASTLY:
Any name you pick you should Google the name followed by the word "burlesque", so that you are directing the search to the burlesque world, and not hte roller derby or drag queens. If it pops up, you should keep looking!
If it doesn’t, you should join the Miss Exotic World yahoo group and introduce yourself “Hi, I So-N-So from (your town here) and I am a burlesque performer!” to claim your name. Remember, until you can copyright your name legally, you need to show provenance that you have been using it in case any upstart wants to call themselves the same thing.
I hope this helps!
Ciao,
PENNY STARR, JR.
This information is the product of Augusta/It’s A Chick Production, LLC and can not be used or re-printed without proper permission. Striptease Symposium www.itsachick.com
