From the Guardian article by Catharine Arnold on the late Paul Raymond’s biography, offering an insight into the world of gentlemen’s clubs and erotic publishing:
“Raymond arrived in London at the same time as the striptease boom. While nude tableaux had been popular since Queen Victoria’s day, it was illegal for the performers to move. The Lord Chamberlain could close down a show if he considered it obscene. Raymond swiftly exploited a loophole in the licensing laws by making his club “members only”, although he endured battles with council officials, the police and moral watchdogs throughout his career. When Raymond opened his Revuebar in 1958, it proved an instant success. At a time when it was fashionable in London to be northern, this middle-class Catholic schoolboy from Glossop reinvented himself as a hard-boiled spiv, gaining credibility with the Krays, Frankie Fraser, Peter Sellers and Diana Dors. Soon he was boasting that his income from the Revuebar was £2,000 a week, 10 times more than the prime minister, Harold Macmillan. He’d never had it so good.
Raymond’s genius was to package mainstream pornography as a lifestyle accessory. The self-appointed “king of the keyholes” understood the voyeuristic aspect of male sexuality, providing a titillating, rose-tinted world populated by statuesque strippers with names like Creme De Cocoa and Tempest Storm. By appealing to the lowest common denominator, Raymond built up an empire worth £650m, ranging from magazines such as Men Only to a property portfolio. By the time he died he owned most of Soho. But there were lapses of judgement. An attempt to emulate the Bunny club drew the threat of legal action from Hugh Hefner. Raymond sold up to John Aspinall and shamefully left the club as normal one evening, minutes before his entire staff were fired. An attempt to cash in on the emerging gay scene with a transvestite revue floundered until it was rescued at the eleventh hour by one of Raymond’s proteges – Danny La Rue.
Showbusiness disasters make good copy, and Willetts provides a string of anecdotes, such as the lion-taming act that featured in one of Raymond’s early national tours. This involved two girls posing nude in a lions’ cage, while Nikolai the lion-tamer put three elderly big cats through their paces. The routine nearly ended in tragedy at the Nottingham Empire when Rana the lioness lashed out with one paw. With admirable sang-froid, Nikolai stared her down and completed the performance, as his white glove turned crimson and the girls remained motionless on their pedestals in poses of frozen immobility that would have impressed the Lord Chamberlain himself.
Another life-threatening act involved Miss Snake Hips, who performed with a nine-foot-long boa constrictor. When, on her opening night at the Revuebar, the boa got aggressive and started to squeeze, Miss Snake Hips had to be rescued by former heavyweight boxer turned doorman Nosher Powell. One gimmick, which featured naked girls swimming in a giant fish tank, nearly ended in tragedy when a performer passed out after being overcome by chlorine fumes. After this, Raymond restricted himself to less dangerous acts, such as one featuring a horse trained to remove girls’ underwear. A simple trick – sugar lumps attached to the lingerie at strategic points – ensured that neither strippers nor animal were injured.”
Full review here.
