Burlesque Hall of Fame - Tempest Storm

With a new documentary of her life currently available in independent movie houses in the USA, it’s a good moment to explore the career of one of the longest-performing burlesque stars ever, Tempest Storm.

Born Annie Banks, and now 88 years old, she still travels to burlesque conventions although she hasn’t danced on stage since she fell, breaking her hip, aged 80. Famed for her physical charms, she was 44DD-25-35 with flaming red hair, she once managed to start a near riot at the University of Colorado's Boulder campus simply by taking off her mink coat. To be clear, it was 1955 and the riot was due to her physical allure, not the fact that she was wearing real fur!

There are so many things that Tempest Storm is famous for - she ‘stepped out’ with both John F Kennedy and Elvis, the longevity of her career, her success in film as well as onstage, that the darker and more challenging aspects of her life might easily go unnoticed. The new documentary, entitled simply ‘Tempest Storm’, makes clear that the high spots of her burlesque career were often reactions to tragic realities offstage.

The dark side of burlesque

To begin with, she was ‘molested’ by her stepfather as a young girl, and then, aged thirteen, victim of a gang rape by four youths who were never brought to justice. Married and divorced twice by the age of 20, she could have become an unknown statistic - the victim of a broken home with poor judgement in men. But it was her twin attributes - a stunning body and an unstoppable work ethic - that took her to the top of a then-controversial profession.

But her success brought its own problems - she married Herb Jeffries, Hollywood’s first ‘black cowboy’ and an accomplished vocalist who sang with jazz ensembles but this relationship, at a time when the USA still practised segregation by race, ended when their daughter was ten years old and Tempest abandoned the little girl to life with her father, and resumed her touring career. They are still estranged. It’s all evidence of how hard life was for the pioneer burlesque stars who made it to Hollywood and fought for their right to be viewed as equal to the studio-created starlets of the same era.

Costuming like Tempest Storm

But there are wonderful things to celebrate about this veteran burlesque star too … like her costuming! A simple google search will reveal that she had an inspired instinct to create ultra-feminine and yet ultra-sophisticated outfits that earned her as many column inches for her clothes as for taking them off. The stunning mermaid cocktail dress she’s wearing in our picture is just one example of her ability to dress for success. To recreate the breathtaking womanly style of Tempest Storm, we’d suggest our red and gold corset with tulle bustle, a true golden age of Hollywood evocation and because each one is made-to-order, it will cling to your body and flatter your curves just as Tempest’s costumes did. Elegant hair is also a prerequisite to make this look work so regardless of whether your hair is long or short, try to create as much volume as you can, use plenty of hairspray and add some glittery hair-slides to give the required sophisticated air.