Moose Call Off Burlesque Benefit Show

The Loyal Order of the Moose No. 652 billed the show as a “hilarious and tantalizing evening of classic vaudeville and old-fashioned striptease.”

Patrons would pay $15 to hear 100-year-old jokes and watch 20-year-old women dance in pasties and G-strings.

But after a visit from a Burbank police vice officer and a city license and code inspector, lodge members decided to close the show even before it opened last weekend.

“This is an old-time burlesque show that would have been perfect for the lodge,” Andy Davis, a Moose member, said Wednesday. “We had no idea that this would bring out the vice squad.”

Hoping to raise money for a Mooseheart home for needy children in Illinois, lodge members had hired Baggy Pants Burlesque to put on a show of comedy, variety acts and scantily clad women, organizers said.

Pink Pussycat Productions promoted the show with fliers and an Internet ad, Davis said.

About 100 people were expected to attend the two performances scheduled for last Friday and Saturday at the lodge’s Burbank Boulevard headquarters, said Stanley Bucklein, lodge administrator.

But before one showgirl strutted her stuff on stage, Bucklein said a vice officer and inspector told him that the lodge needed an adult entertainment license and a permit to charge admission if they wanted to put on the revue.