First off, who’s the best adult entertainer in the world? Chances are she’s a complete unknown, a house dancer, young and pretty, and a gifted athlete, but she will never make it to the ranks of the stars. Perhaps she’s got kids and feels being a mother is more important than going on the road. Or perhaps she doesn’t like to travel. Or she can care less about being well known or not. But whatever the reasons, number one is someone none of us will ever hear about.

We can only choose from the ranks of those women who have stepped away from anonymity in order to become known. Perhaps it’s for just a single pageant or a Pure Talent Feature Showcase and perhaps only for a fleeting shot at stardom, like a comet rapidly ascending only to lose its bright luster after casting its bright light for a brief glimmer.

But of the women I’ve seen on the stage, my vote goes to Denise Mulder, from Holland for entertainer of the year. Along with Serenna Star, Denise is the current holder of the Miss Nude World title. And one year earlier, I would have probably voted Denise as number one when I covered that year’s Miss Nude World for “Wood Magazine” at the Lumberyard. I didn’t know Denise at all whereas I did know most of the other contestants, some of whom I liked very much both as performers and as contestants. So whereas I wanted several of the others to win, I had no feelings whatsoever for Denise, either good or bad, simply because I didn’t know her. Yet, Denise had an outstanding repertoire of shows, each one differing from all the rest. And she looked stupendous up there on the stage, like a goddess, which is what we should come to expect from our favorite entertainers. Denise also showed she is a fabulous talent on the pole. So even though I was very partial to some of the others, I’d have had to hand it to Denise.

But you aren’t going to hear a lot about Denise, and the reason why is that the powers that be in the American adult entertainment world don’t want to have a foreigner rule as champion. For one thing, a foreigner often has problems getting work in the U.S. as a feature because of the difficulty getting work permits. So if the foreigner cannot make a profit from taking expensive flights to the U.S. to compete in American dominated events, she’s not going to come here very often. This means she will not be able to add the magic of her lustrous name and reputation to clubs she might feature at, she cannot show up for autograph appearances, she can’t M.C. at adult events, she’s unlikely to be able to show up for conventions like Exotic Dancer’s Annual Expos, etc.

So Americans have to choose a non foreigner to wear “their crown” while billing “their crown” as a world title. The powers that be of the adult entertainment world are going to choose someone who can grace the American entertainment circuit with the aura of her name, and the power of her personality and performances, not someone who’s stuck over in Europe. Thing about Denise is, she’s made it here just often enough and proven herself to be so awesome that even the powers that be could not completely ignore her.

Best Adult Entertainment Event of the Year

This one’s gotta go to Nudes-A-Poppin. With 5,000 spectators on board to watch over 100 completely naked entertainers perform on a huge outdoor stage, the event is massive and well publicized. But of even more importance is the competition is about as fair as it gets. Any entertainer whether she is a feature or house dancer can compete and win and they come in from all across the United States.

Nudes-A-Poppin is held at the Ponderosa Sun Club, a nudist retreat a little more than fifty miles from Chicago in northern Indiana. Which seems a little odd considering that there’s cornfields all around you until you pass through the gate only to find that everyone’s naked around you.

The ambience here is friendly and the event’s inexpensive both to compete in or to cover as a writer or photographer. Roselawn, Indiana is centrally located which means no one has to travel a huge distance to get here regardless of where in the U.S. they come from. The hotels in the area are relatively inexpensive. For example a plush room for two can be had at Rensselaer's Holiday Inn Express for around ninety bucks. Other accommodations go for less, and one can even camp out for a modest fee at Ponderosa itself.

From the owner, Scarlet, and her parents all the way down to the people running security, the people running this huge show are typical friendly Midwesterners so the whole atmosphere is relaxed and kind of down home in sharp contrast to what one finds in Las Vegas for many other highly publicized adult events.

A girl who’s got the right stuff can get noticed here in a hurry while totally enjoying herself while getting noticed. And this is not to even mention the more than thirty titles she can compete for. But here, such titles mean a lot more than they do practically anywhere else because of the fairness of the judging, the popularity of the event, and due to the extent its been publicized. (Eg.--It’s been on both "HBO’s Real Sex" and "The Playboy Channel").

Club Owner of the Year

Goes to Frank and Sherry Marsala of the St. Louis Metro East (see accompanying article). While publications such as Exotic Dancer are going to give their club of the year titles to well known large clubs that spend a lot of dollars advertising with them, we are giving ours to a small, relatively unknown club. Its owners, Frank and Sherry, stay clear of the limelight. They no longer go to events such as Exotic Dancer’s Expo or any others we know of either. Instead, they spend most of their time working very hard to make their club all that it can be.

And they break all the rules. When you first go into Club 64, you get the feeling you’ve just entered into a road house. It’s real laid back and relaxed in there. And the girls don’t come onto you like voracious vipers out for the quick hustle. That’s because for years now, both Frank and Sherry have admonished their entertainers to take their sweet time with the customers and to treat them with respect. Meanwhile clubs such as Deja Vu have all kinds of quotas for their girls who have to sell so many drinks and so many lap dances, etc. while requiring the girls not to spend much time with a single customer unless he’s paying big bucks from the very start.

On any night of the week Frank and Sherry sell bottled beer for just three bucks. That is except for those nights they aren’t having their one dollar bottled beer specials. Meanwhile other clubs in the area sell beer at $5.25 and upwards. Even the real dives are charging at least four dollars a bottle.

And let me assure you, Club 64 is no dive. Get past the front door and the first bar you come to and walk into the next room. There you will find a beautiful fireplace and a second bar that is far more glamorous than the first. There are little rooms upstairs including a hot tub room. Downstairs close to the fireplace are comfortable sofas to sit on with your favorite dancer or to get a private dance. There’s small synthetic trees around you, dimly lit up with these little Christmas tree like lights. There isn’t an atmosphere like it or this good in the entire St. Louis Metro East night club sector. The only place that even comes close to it is at the Platinum Club nearby in Brooklyn.

But much of the Platinum Club innards were created by Frank Marsala. Frank had been after all the Platinum Club’s General Manager for nine years. So many of the club’s lights have been put in by Frank not to mention whatever else he had put in or had inspired the club owner to have installed there. In fact, Club 64 will remind you of how the Platinum Club used to look back in the days Frank and Sherry were running the place.

Okay, I’ve said enough, especially considering there’s a whole article just about the Marsala’s and Club 64 here. Let’s just say that Frank and Sherry are a very hard working couple whose pursuit of excellence remains paramount and that they are two complete mavericks taking their club into directions the others wouldn’t dare going. The result is a truly fun, enjoyable place, one that’s affordable and that has a certain feel and look about it that no other club in the area can ever hope to achieve.

Club of the Year

It’s Club 64 and for all the same reasons that Frank and Sherry are our club owners of the year.

Club Manager of the Year

Big Daddy on left, Big Mike on the right, with famous porn star Ron Jeremy in the middle.
picture taken at Nudes-A-Poppin August, 2005   

This one’s got to go to Big Daddy up at the Iowa Playhouse in Council Bluffs, Iowa. First off during Big Daddy’s tenure in Council Bluffs, Iowa Playhouse, has recently become the largest club in the entire state in Iowa. Now that the huge addition in the rear of the club has recently been added, the Playhouse is a whopping 15,000 square feet in size while housing the equivalent of ten stages. So in size alone it has recently eclipsed even the Lumberyard over in Des Moines where Big Mike holds reign as general manager.

Of course, the wondrous location of the Playhouse and its sheer size has more to do with its owner, Ron, than with Big Daddy. But it’s Big Daddy, the man with the silver tongue, the man of the microphone, the founder of S.P.E.W., Sexy Professional Exotic Wrestling  who’s helped put the Playhouse on the Map and who’s known by so many other club owners and by practically every feature entertainer in the land who lends his own unforgettable personality or aura to this club.

An ex television professional wrestler and perhaps one of the finest night club D.J.’s to ever field a microphone, Big Daddy’s just one of these guys who’s hard not to like and who can keep you laughing over almost anything. If you misbehave in the Playhouse, chances are it’s Big Daddy who will be seeing you on your way out of the place but he will be doing it with a smile so you won’t really be faulting him for doing what he knows he’s got to do. And it’s Big Daddy who keeps the place running smoothly, who keeps the girls happy, and who deals at first hand with all the visiting feature entertainers. The man’s a living legend and he’s Alphapro’s and the Looking Glass Magazine’s manager of the year.

Best Club Marketing Manager of the Year

This one’s got to go to Big Mike, Big Daddy’s counterpart in nearby Des Moines, Iowa, the GM over there in the second largest club in Iowa.

I remember all of us being at Jaguars in Las Vegas where I was shooting pictures of a Pure Talent feature showcase during Exotic Dancer’s Expo two years ago and how afterwards Big Mike had said: “I’m not all that impressed by all these Las Vegas Clubs”.

And Big Mike had no reason to be impressed. I had heard that Club Sapphires had cost its owners more than forty million and that Club Jaguars was not that far behind. But take the case of Spearmint Rhino, a favorite club chain of Exotic Dancer’s.

Several years ago I had my exhibitor’s booth practically next door to Spearmint Rhino’s booth which served free drinks and also had a small stage its female exhibitors performed at on a pole. Everyday during Exotic Dancer’s Expo the girls in Spearmint Rhino’s Booth saw me attending my own booth just across the way. Not to mention all the Red Bull I got from the girls there. So the night my pal Mike and I took a cab to visit the Spearmint Rhino Club I felt we would encounter girls who had already seen us at the expo. But no such luck. No one at the club seemed to recognize us.

Instead we were immediately set on by first two girls, then two more, who asked us straight off if we wanted private dances from them. And then when we told them we were with the Expo we were given blank stares, before the girls stalked off looking for new victims.

There wasn’t an ounce of that Frank and Sherry Marsala touch in those girls to take their time with us. It was just “bam slam thank you mam for your money after I just gave you that three minute private dance. Now fuck off and let us go find another wallet.”

But that’s just it, Las Vegas is a city filled with tourists. And for the most part tourists wanting to spend their money gambling. So the strippers are not wanting to form long lasting relationships with their club’s patrons. In other cities such relationships can become long term profitable sources of income for the strippers. And sometimes even friendships can develop out of such relationships. But Las Vegas is a quick buck town. Here it’s all about fleecing the tourists as fast as you can before it’s time to turn to the next. Even in the hotels here, they charge you more than a buck for a local call.

And Big Mike’s not impressed. After all, he’s from Iowa, which is farm country where people know how to value a buck and where almost everybody is down home friendly. Sure, the clubs in Las Vegas are glittery, but it’s all so superficial. They are run like factories where patrons are turned in then churned out as fast as they can to make room for the next.

Well, Big Mike might be from the land of corn patches, but in the short time he’s been general manager over at the Lumberyard he’s made both himself and his club two of the most famous in the land when it comes to the world of adult entertainment. Bet you dollars to donuts that hardly anyone knows who’s in charge of Spearmint Rhino, or Cheetahs, or Club Sapphires, but they sure know who Big Mike is.

Every year he brings something like 24 girls down to Nudes-A-Poppin. And each year the Lumberyard wins the trophy for being the club to bring down the most girls. And Big Mike’s got two RV’s right off the main path there where practically everybody’s walking by where they can see him and his girls. But that costs his club something like $6,000 which is money that even people like Big Daddy often questions by asking: “What is the financial return on that investment?”

Just several years ago the Lumberyard had a Pure Talent Feature Showcase, an event that costs a lot of money, but which also puts the club hosting it out into the limelight. And right after that the Lumberyard hosted the Miss Nude World Pageant which is an even more expensive proposition. In something like one year’s time Big Mike along with the club owners backing him took the Lumberyard out of total obscurity out of the corn patch into national prominence as being one of the heaviest hitters out of all the nation’s adult clubs.

But Big Mike can care less. He’s gotten to be so well known and his club so much out into the limelight that he’s even got feature entertainers working for him as house dancers when they don’t have a booking. And he’s Big Mike. He’s about six foot six, a giant of a man, with a young face who’s often wearing a baseball cap. He’s affable and talkative. And he can be very persuasive in getting you to see things his way.

Best Makeup/hairstyling expert for feature entertainers

Gary Schultz http://www.alphapro.com/gary.htm  out of Peoria, Illinois. Why? Most of the features I know in the remote area use him. I’ve seen his work. He’s a real easy going likeable guy.

Most professional out of the adult photographers

Bob Ferguson from Cheri Magazine. Been consistently helpful to me. But he runs his shoots like a Marine Drill Sergeant while still being considerate of all those around him. Very efficient and capable.

Golden Voice of the Year

This one goes to Big Daddy, the General Manager of the Iowa Playhouse--by a mile.  There are some excellent DJ's around, especially in the adult entertainment industry.  And then there's those guys, ever so few in number, who can single handedly make a huge difference, wherever they go and whenever the opportunity awaits them to take Central Stage, and not just the adult entertainment business.

Why is S.P.E.W. so successful  whenever nude oil wrestling  takes place in a club it inevitably falls flat on its face?  The answer lies in the huge talent, knowledge of professional wrestling, and the golden voice of Big Daddy, S.P.E.W.'s founder.  There's the low and deep almost diabolical belly laugh full of underlying mischief.  And then there's that flair he has for instantly gaining the attention of the crowd as he starts off with that authoritative voice of his.  But words alone cannot describe how his voice picks up, and how his words start to come out faster and faster as he becomes so emotional that so much of that emotion spills out into practically everyone in the crowd as he makes the entire place his.   And if you don't believe us, test drive these two videos http://www.spewwrestling.com/deathmatch.WMV and http://www.spewwrestling.com/bigdaddy.WMV First one's the first S.P.E.W. Wrestling event, but it's the second video, which although it is not nearly as good as the first in most respects, that shows how Big Daddy can build his crowd up to a white hot fever.  This one, which is completely unedited, I shot myself one night Big Daddy was mcing one of his weekly wrestling matches in which a male customer goes head to toe against two of his female entertainers. 

Big Daddy's not only got the golden voice, he's also got the leadership and people skills to take over an entire room no matter how small and large anywhere he goes in the world.  Take, for example The Blues Factory here in Pattaya, Thailand.  Why is it that I can shoot video and still pictures here to my heart's content when practically no one else can?  It's because Big Daddy prepared the ground for me when our little group came into the place and Big Daddy wooed the band and brought everyone into his camp.  He's a musician too, by the way, or at least a great music lover.  And he's got a great singing voice and I have the video to prove it as he takes the stage behind the microphone singing with Mary, the Blues Factory's peerless female vocalist from the Philippeans.

Everyone in the place is watching the antics of our small group sitting at a table close to the band.  And of this group the most conspicuous by far is Big Daddy cutting a figure and personality that is larger than life. 

Best Adult Magazine out there

That’s easy. Make it "Xtreme Magazine". I wrote for "Xtreme" for four years averaging around two articles per month. Jeremy Mcteague’s idea for the gun articles featuring a different entertainer with a different gun each month I believe was very innovative as were many of his other ideas. The magazine has consistently expanded its market while improving visually throughout the years. And it always paid me on time without my having to ask.

Most consistent at bad planning major events

Exotic Dancer Magazine. The concept of both its "Club Bulletin" and Annual Directory along with its annual expos with their seminars, exhibitor’s booths, and other events was brilliant. In this day and age an organization such as Exotic Dancer is badly needed, and Exotic Dancer jumped at the opportunity to fill the void.

So far so good. But then its annual expos started to get stale. Each year the event has been held in Las Vegas. Same oh same oh. Try someplace else for a change and give us all a breath of fresh air.

And this is not to mention having it three out of the past four years at Mandalay Bay. This is on the very outskirts of the strip. Mandalay Bay also has some of the most expensive accommodations around. Consider the plight of many club owners who would like to take their wives along, as well as  key club personnel. There is the airfair that must be paid. Times how many people. Then consider how exorbitant the room rates are at Mandalay Bay. One would almost think someone’s getting a kick back here.  But who knows?  If you have to be boring and always have this thing in Vegas why not have your conventions next door at the Luxor which has a more exciting look to it than Mandalay Bay at a far lower room rate or even somewhere else such as Lake Tahoe, San Francisco, or Reno to name just three places.

And they are charging way too much for their entry fees–$319.00 And on top of all this what’s this about the Annual Awards Party and show which they are charging $89.00 for?

You would not believe how many club owners I’ve talked to who have given up on their expos because they think Exotic Dancer no longer has their interests at heart and are price gouging them. Unless Exotic Dancer gets back on track, it is in great danger of losing the support of the very people it needs the most.

Worse innovation in the entire last 100 years of Adult Entertainment

And that’s silicon. Hey guys, you have been conned for all these years into thinking that big fake tits are beautiful. Oh sure, there are a few of you out there, but for the most part men want firm natural bodies. I know, because in during the past ten years I’ve hung out in a lot of strip clubs asking questions.

And now that I’ve moved to Thailand where very few women have augmented their breasts where people eat a much less fat forming diet than we Westerners do where women’s bodies tend to be much more slender and firm, the difference is substantial. Flab is out, thin is in. And there’s hardly a man who comes here who doesn’t immediately fall in love with all the graceful, natural, bodies.

But the clubs aren’t going to tell you that breast augmentation isn’t attractive and neither will the talent agencies that tell wanna bee feature entertainers right off: “Now if you want to make money in this business you must first get a breast job.” And the adult magazines aren’t going to tell you either. After all, they are beholden to their plastic surgeon advertisers.

Even I, simply because I have so many friends, who have augmented their breasts am reluctant to call a spade a spade and tell you the way it really is for fear of offending my feature entertainer friends. Hey, sorry girls, but I like you for you. Not for your breasts. Or rather I like you in spite of what you have done to them.

But come-on–really? First thing, it’s only going to be a matter of time and the girls are going to have to have them redone. They are hard to the touch and don’t grow in a man’s hand or mouth as a woman becomes excited. They get in the way. And they look just so mechanical and contrived.

Well that's it, the Alpha Productions--Looking Glass Magazine's annual awards for both the best and the worse from Adult Entertainment today.