Whorephobia: Strippers on Art, Work, and Life

Filmmaker Borden presents a diverse and authentic anthology of autobiographical essays by strippers. Drawing on her experiences making the 1986 feature film Working Girls, Borden begins with stories focused on New York City strip clubs in the 1980s and ’90s, where women made a precarious living by dancing on stage and persuading customers to enter seedy VIP rooms. As the collection progresses, however, Borden includes more recent and unusual accounts, including Reese Piper’s musings on how her autism is sometimes easier to navigate as a stripper than it is in regular life; the Incredible, Edible Akynos’s reflections on the sex industry and Blackness; and AM Davies’s stories of performing sex work as an amputee. Each piece is paired with an interview—conducted by Borden or another contributor—with the author (or someone close to her if she has died), providing intriguing details about each performer’s background and offering a window into the supportive relationships among sex industry peers. Most of the women featured are activists, writers, or artists, and they excel at narrating their own stories and evoking the atmosphere of the clubs and digital spaces where they’ve performed. The result is a humane, multidimensional portrait of an industry typically shrouded in artifice and shame. (Oct.)