Stag Parties
I had begun sending Jaye to strip at private stag parties in 1986. I could charge a lot for just 15 minutes of work. Accompanying Jaye to some of these places really opened my eyes about human nature. I guess I was a bit naive; the first time I saw a strip was in 1981 when I was 24 years old.Those stag parties from 1985 - 88 really opened my eyes. Most of them were private parties, and often in private homes, not in public venues. It was often difficult and Jaye would be in a vulnerable situation. Usually, I would meet Jaye at the door, and I'd stress that she should work speedily.
One time, I sent Jaye to do a dance in a private home. There, I saw men behave in a way I did not expect. There was verbal abuse, suggestive invitations, and attempts to reach out and touch her while she was dancing on the carpet in the living room. There were about 10 guys of mixed nationalities - Asian, Middle Eastern, and Caucasian-and all of them a bit tipsy. But nothing happened and we left quickly, right after the show.
My competitors would have their dancers do stags and then socialize. The girls would make money for other kinds of service. Fortunately nothing ever happened, but after that I always went along with Jaye when she did stag parties. I'd go in first, to make sure my presence was noted by the audience. Then Jaye would follow. That strategy worked. Audiences wouldn't shout abuse. Then I'd collect the money and we'd leave.
One day, I took Jaye to do a dance for a guy who had his bachelor's party at a private club. She did such a good show that the guys were asking her to do oral sex. I thought this was going get out of hand, that there might be a riot. I quickly sneaked Jaye out. I realized that the men aren't what they often claim to be. So that's why I say it opened my eyes. I didn't change my strategy about stag parties: we never socialized and always departed right after she was done.
In my prime years from 1983-88, I'd do at least 1 - 2 fashion shows a month, and have Jaye dancing one or two weeks per month. To give me the time to go to the bars or stags, I always had only one dancer working per week, and I never overcharged for Jaye. I charged a fair price for the dancer, according to the bar and its usual patrons. Just like my fashion shows, my policy was that everyone had to win; bars, audiences, dancers, and me.
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By 1986 I saw that the WCFDA's strategy of one show per year to promote the work of designers was useless. If I wanted to promote a designer like Trish Northrup, I couldn't do it on one show a year. Like some other designers, her regular clientele tended to be young women who were getting married or attending parties: she carried what I would call elegant evening dresses. They would go to her studio and request an outfit based on the designs they'd seen at the show. If the goal was to promote her only as a designer, then you could do only one show a year.
To promote sales for retailers of ready-to-wear, I had to let them do at least two to three shows during the spring, and two to three shows in the fall, and provide the right target audience so they could sell right after the show.
When Trish became a client, my job was to figure out what venue would be suitable for her clothing. At what specific events could I promote her so that she could make money? That was the turning point. That was really the difference between me and other producers.
As I developed this strategy, it increasingly set me apart from my competitors. In the early 80s, a lot of fashion producers did fashion shows for the sake of making money, just like I did. We all wanted to make money, but my philosophy was also to help my client make sales. My mentors Peggy Morrison and Judy Larsen once said, what is the point in charging clients $2000 or $3000 even if they had a good show? Because if the client says, "Well we didn't make any money," was it worth it? If I wanted to retain these clients, if I wanted to eventually promote them at say the Regency or at the Bayshore (where they'd have to pay several thousand dollars just to rent the ballroom), I first had be creative and show them in locations where they would both make money from sales and become better known.
A lot of "producers" in Vancouver did a show every now and then, just to make a quick dollar. They didn't pursue it as a career, and they certainly didn't have a long-term business strategy. I think many just wanted to brag that they were doing a show at the Bayshore Hotel. I was not concerned about how many other producers were in Vancouver, where they did their shows, or how much they charged designers and retailers. I don't even know how many there were. One of the reasons I lasted so long was that I was committed. I was dedicated to what I was doing, and people knew me for this. I didn't worry too much about competitors.
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I began doing seasonal shows with clients like Suzie's Lingerie and Primavera, in the hotels I mentioned earlier, rotating the shows between the different venues inside each hotel depending on the show's special needs, so that my shows wouldn't become boring. If a hotel had two venues, I'd choose the fashions to suit the taste, income, and age group of the women who usually favoured each venue.
The Granville Island Hotel catered for the younger generation, and George Walker the manager liked seeing girls in bikinis and lingerie. Usually I showed lingerie only in nightclubs. I also did a lingerie show in the Wedgewood, but that show was for more conservative lingerie. The models wore peignoirs over bras and panties.
For example Primavera at Oakridge Centre designed fashions for women aged 20-40. They would pay for shows that brought in that group. You could find that age group, the younger businesswomen, at the Granville Island Hotel and the Wedgwood. The Bayshore catered for older women, who'd be clients of Boris Chinkus, who catered for that group. So for his fashions I'd use the Garden Lounge at the Bayshore.
The venues inside each hotel were also different. Like the William Tell restaurant in the Georgian Court Hotel. It was an expensive restaurant so I'd feature expensive fashions for the over 30s + businesswomen. I wouldn't show Bev Boys Sports designs there, but I did show her swimwear at the Wedgwood, because Eleni Skalbania had bought one of her swimsuits and liked it. Shows with Bev Boys swimwear were usually at night clubs, the Vancouver Aquatic Center, at Granville Island Hotel in the lounge, or at special venues.
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In March of 1986, I hired an aspiring policewoman, Wanda Rey, a Lee Remick look-a-like from The Days of Wine and Roses (1962). At that time Wanda was training at the Delta RCMP branch. I put her in a swimwear fashion show at a Richmond nightclub. The house was packed. That evening Wanda worked with Leah, and alongside were Valerie and Anne Rae. Wanda and Leah came out wearing matching bikinis from Bev Boys Sport. The girls were supposed to be in pairs. It was Wanda's first show. Nobody would have thought Wanda was a policewoman.
Wanda liked Leah's sense of humour and personality, and they got along well. Wanda needed someone to support her at shows. She always liked having Leah there. Wanda also got along with Anne Rae - the three of them were quite a team.
Leah occasionally worked the bar at a night club. She liked having a good time, and one night she was drinking. I wasn't there, but I heard that she got a bit tipsy and started stripping. A week later we did a fashion show at the Granville Island Hotel. A guy in the audience had been in the bar when Leah was stripping. He recognized Leah and shouted, "You know what, I saw her strip in a bar! Maybe all the girls are going to take their clothes off!"
Carrie Fieldgate got upset at this. Carrie wasn't one of my models: she had been lent to me by an agency called Rob Haines, because the client specially wanted Carrie in the show. This was very unusual, but Carrie was considered one of the best models in Vancouver. Her father was a former football player. She was a classy, elegant model, and she'd be paid more than Leah. Carrie approached the client and said she didn't want to do the show. And basically said I had to choose between her and Leah for the show.
This happened only 30 mins before the start. The client took me aside and asked me please to take Leah out of the show, or cancel it.
In the change room were Wanda, Anne, Linda, and another model, Lori Rose, a former Miss Canada. They all witnessed this. Because the client had already given a deposit, I had no choice. So I pulled Leah out and the show went well. The client paid up and was happy. Leah sat in the audience during the show but was very upset.
Afterward I went to the change room and told Carrie that Leah would be in every show. Everyone heard me. It was the first time I'd gotten angry. That incident confirmed my special relationship with Leah, no matter if she was a fool in private life, or forgot something. That incident confirmed which models would stay with me and which not.
Several models left soon after this. Lori, for example, said to me later that she wanted to leave because she agreed with Carrie. But several, like Linda Thulin, realized that I would protect them. This was another example that Leah was the one model I protected. Linda also appreciated that because she was unusual. Leah was impressed because I protected her. It made both more comfortable.
At that, Carrie Fieldgate quit the team. She had been thinking of joining my team, as she was leaving Rob Haines' agency.
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My 10-year high school reunion was in August 1986. I took Wanda Rey, who was closer to my age than Leah. And at that time I had a good relationship with Wanda and was grooming her to be my team captain after Anne Rae left (she was training to be an optometrist). We ran into class rep Mark Dohmann who said he wasn't surprised at my success, remembering my dedication from school days. I invited a former class mate, now a lawyer, to my next show at the Wedgewood Hotel, featuring swimwear by Bev Boys Sport. I introduced him to Wanda. He learned she was a model and training for the RCMP.
But several things coincided to cause an unpleasant incident. He had found out previously that Wanda was in the RCMP. The show was at cocktail hour (4:00-6:00) in the Bacchus bar lounge with relaxing piano music.
Leah arrived wearing no underwear (when Leah was young, she was very undisciplined. Another time, at the Wedgewood she brought the wrong pair of shoes). So Anne Rae and I had to buy body stockings for her. I knew Leah's size and preference, and Anne came along to make it faster.
So we began late, at 5:15. Most of the audience was seated, but some people had been drinking at the bar. By the time the show started, they had consumed more than usual. Wanda came out third in a black bikini with high heels, wearing a beach robe. The routine was to walk around the lounge and circle back past the bar. As she did this, my somewhat tipsy classmate sitting at the bar, tried to grab Wanda as she passed. He tried to pull her robe off. Fortunately Wanda could avoid him, but she had to take her shoes off to maneuver away from him, and she almost tripped. There were lots of other guys with him, and I didn't approach him. The show had 25 outfits, a long show, and he grabbed her first time out. On the 2nd time, she just avoided him.
I was sitting next to the piano player, doing the commentary. Eleni Skalbania, the owner, was standing next to me. When this happened, neither of us was impressed. This had never happened anywhere else.
Eleni didn't say much, but she was actually shocked and said, "No more swimwear!" I also realized we should not do swimwear shows in any restaurants where the models were close to the audience. Eleni could have cancelled her contract for two shows a year, but she knew it was just a random incident. It didn't affect my relationship with her. The only reason we were doing swimwear was that Eleni liked Bev Boys Sports and had even bought a swimsuit from her.
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Photographic
I got a new 60 lb. stainless steel "one arm drive" wheelchair in the fall of 1986, and I changed my public persona in other ways too. I started wearing a trench coat with a fedora like Humphrey Bogart did, in preference to the dark suits that I had always worn in the past. I used this "tough guy detective" image when dealing with new clients.I saw potential business in photographic modeling and began pushing models to do photo shoots. I sent the headsheets to various photographers in Vancouver. I would usually follow up by talking to the photographer about my models, asking whether they liked any of my models. If they did, they would possibly have my models out to do a test shoot, and then of course I would negotiate with the
photographer for that model to do an assignment.
For example, a major photographer in Vancouver was Gunter Pichler. He had contracts with Woodward's, Fields and various department stores. Gunter would call me up and say, "Victor I need a model to pose for spring fashions." So Gunter and I would negotiate over money. I would inquire how many hours a girl would have to be there, and exactly the fashions she had to wear. If the photographer agreed to the money, then we go ahead with the assignment. Some negotiations would last two or three days. And the photo shoot would probably happen a week later. And then of course I would have to come into the photographer's studio, collect the money, and of course, the girl would then get paid.
Photographers felt my presence even when I was not there. In late October, 1986, Penny informed me that she was retiring because a tough divorce had taken a lot out of her and she needed a change. I understood and thanked her, but felt sorry that the last original member of the team had to leave. I saw Penny for the last time when having coffee with her at the Wedgewood Hotel after she had become a taxi dispatcher in 1987 (her former husband told me three years ago that she'd finally become a mother and that Penny was still beautiful).
A show for designers for strippers
Because so many bars in greater Vancouver employed exotic dancers during the 1980s, a lot of conventional designers were creating costumes for exotic dancers. They saw the business there. An example was Caroline Friessen, who I had met at the WCFDA.Meeting Caroline gave me the idea of doing a fashion show featuring costumes and lingerie for exotic dancers. At Caroline's suggestion that I set up a designer show featuring costumes for exotic dancers at Systems Cabaret.
There were many other designers who produced fashions for exotic dancers, but were afraid to join the WCFDA. Caroline had connections to them.
This was the biggest and most challenging show that I ever did. I worked with a dozen designers and about 50 models (though not all of them were exotic dancers). I had tickets sold by dancers everywhere in the Lower Mainland. Candy Bee advertised for models for the show in the press, and with my own dancers we managed to recruit enough people to do the show. That made it easy on the rest of the team.
The show was anchored by Leah Sarrazin, my best leader. On November 17, 1986, she lead the models and dancers, including Janet, Jaye, Anne Rae and Wanda, onto the stage of Systems Cabaret for a terrific night of entertainment in front of at least 500 people, with myself as the commentator. Each of the designers showed their collections separately - in total, about 100-150 outfits.
Everything about that show worked, including the music and order of fashions accord to designer. At the end of the show, each designer was escorted onstage by a model wearing one of her creations. I still rank this show as the best I've ever produced. I planned to do it annually, even if it drained me.
There were difficulties in using so many models. I had no choreographer at that time, and Patty Ribbins the music person had retired, so I could not rely on her timing of the music to be the coordinating cues for models. The key to the show was my communication with the models. Also, I knew my regular models very well, and they knew my routines. But I hadn't previously worked with most of the models I used on this show. I wanted to avoid the pressures that would result if I used only a few models-like the bottlenecks when changing.
Including the Systems Cabaret event, I produced 20 fashion shows in 1986. I sent Jaye to strip in bars and she did six stag parties. The year ended with a show we called "Gentlemen's Nights," for Suzie's Lingerie, on December 1 and 2, 1986.
Suzie's was headquartered in Oakridge Mall. They cordoned off an area in front of the store, sold tickets, and served wine and cheese for regular customers. Two models walked around wearing items from her line. The show was a great success. The owner was a great client, but later unfortunately her business failed when she moved to Robson Street, where the rent was too high.
1986 was the best year of my career but it would never happen again.
