How Burlesque Subverts What Is Sexy

The Bothered Blog by Diva Darling and Mx. Eden

August 2026

Diva Darling and Mx. Eden are burlesque performers and hosts, writers and educators. In this conversation we dive deep on the craft and creation of burlesque shows as well as what makes burlesque so culturally relevant—as a venue for self-expression and body reclamation beyond patriarchal norms.

This interview is adapted from the Bothered Stories: Smut Talks podcast episode featuring Diva Darling and Mx. Eden. 

Burlesque is a story, not just a strip tease 

Allison: For someone who's never been to a burlesque show, what should they expect? 

Eden: In general, burlesque is what happens when you let theater kids into a strip club. It’s this really beautiful combination of storytelling and costuming and using the body as self-expression. 

Diva: My favorite definition is steampunk stripping for nerds. And it's really kind of true. It’s a performance art that is very performer driven. 

One thing you’ll see in burlesque that you probably won’t see in a strip club is funny acts. I joke that I will give people confusion boners because I’m wearing weird outfits. I might have on a hoodie, or hospital scrubs, something that’s not sexy. A strip club tends to be very focused on the sexy aesthetic, and that does happen in burlesque, but it’s something we can break out of. 

Origin Stories: Reclaiming the Body, Reclaiming the Stage  

Allison: How did you get into burlesque? 

Eden: Burlesque has been my hyperfixation since I was six. It started with the movie Gypsy, which opened my mind to a whole world of possibility.

I grew up around performers, but the idea of taking off your clothes in front of people was foreign to me. I come from a very Christian, chaste environment, so I had a particular relationship with my body and bodies in general. Until I saw Gypsy and realized people could be undressed around each other and still be comfortable, still be taken seriously, still be seen as artists. 

Diva: I didn't get into burlesque until I was 39. I was classically trained in ballet and opera, and I tried to have a career in theatre. When my thyroid gave out in my late twenties, I quickly went from having a ballet body to being fat. At that time, once you were a fat woman, you almost never got cast. And if you were cast, it was as the funny, ugly best friend—you were desexualized and marginalized. 

So I walked away from theater. 

Then I started to hear about burlesque. A friend of mine was kind of nerdy and curvy and she was explaining to me what she did and I was like “hang on, you get up on stage, and you take your clothes off, and people let you do that?!” She's like, “girl, they throw money at me to do it.” 

She takes me to a show and I watch this performer, Coco Monroe, come out. She’s a black woman of size and she’s a trained dancer, and she’s bringing the house down, people are screaming at her like she's the second coming. My jaw is in my lap, not just because she’s such an amazing performer, but from seeing this kind of body celebrated in that way. And in a lot of ways her body looks like my body. People are throwing money, and they're begging for her attention, and there's thunderous applause, and my mind was blown. I was forever changed.

Burlesque and Erotica: Different Mediums, Same Why 

Allison: One of the things I love about burlesque is that it builds anticipation. Great erotica does the same thing. What are your thoughts on the parallels between erotica and burlesque?

Diva: As an author, I ask myself why is the sex a natural outcome of the story? Why does it matter to the story? Why do we care? And in burlesque, I ask myself, why is my character taking off her clothes? What's the transformation that's happening?

For instance, a while back this politician was comparing immigrants to a bowl of Skittles, where some of them were poisoned, and it was terrible. So I created an act where I was the Statue of Liberty, and as I’m taking off my clothes, I have traditional 19th century immigrant clothes underneath, and I throw skittles at the audience. It’s the element of surprise—I’m not just the Statue of Liberty being sexy. I'm making a political statement. 

Eden: It starts with the why. It starts with getting everybody bought into the question, why is this happening? Why is this person on stage? Why are they trying to communicate something with me? And then, of course, the additional layer of why is this character getting naked? 

The act of undressing has this powerful storytelling potential that happens in erotica, too, where you're brought into questions like how is this person feeling? Why do they feel connected to this other person? 

And then, am I in agreement with what is happening at the end of it? Am I going along with this storyline? Or do I want to re-evaluate my views on immigrants? 

Stripping Away the Male Gaze

Allison: Burlesque and erotica both create art outside the male gaze. For example, a lot of erotica and smut is written for women and by women. What does it mean for burlesque? 

Eden: A burlesque show is gonna have something for everyone and not just aesthetically. Think about walking through an art museum. You see paintings and think “that’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen in my life.” But you also see paintings where you can’t even tell what the artist was trying to do, but you respect the fact that someone likes it. Likewise, there are so many different ways of experiencing burlesque. 

And it’s very women-centered and very queer-affirming, so we’re not performing what you’d see on a music video or a runway or something that is specifically marketed to men. You’re really seeing creativity. You’re really seeing a story. 

Representation Matters 

Allison: I've always appreciated the diversity of body types that you see on stage. Is that representation an important part of burlesque? 

Eden: That's one of my favorite things about burlesque. If all you consume is mainstream media and mainstream porn, then the bodies you see look simple. But in burlesque there's a lot of room for a lot of different types of bodies and a lot of different ways of expressing yourself.

When you go to a burlesque show, you might see a body shape that you've never seen undressed before. Same thing where there are all sorts of stereotypes that exist about black and brown bodies, and so being able to see a black or brown performer on stage presenting themselves and showing their body in the way that they are comfortable with, allows lots of racist history to be dismantled. 

You get to see it, and witness it, and whatever preconceived notions you already had about fat people, or Black people, or disabled people, you get the opportunity to silently readjust whatever it was you came in with, because you've now had this new experience of witnessing this performer in all of their glory.

Diva: Representation is a huge part of burlesque. You get to be in a space where you are centered and celebrated, whatever it is that you look like on stage. 

I'm a fat performer, I'm over 50, and I get up on stage, and I’m gonna make you scream for me, I'm gonna make you throw dollars at me, and that's not an experience that we expect to have in mainstream society. 

So, it's incredibly powerful, and it's especially powerful for the people in the audience, or the reading audience, who have never, ever seen their body reflected back to them. They've never seen a body that looks like theirs treated like something amazing. You know, they've never heard their kind of sex described before, and for the first time they're like, oh my god, this is beautiful.

---

About the Authors

Diva Darling

Diva Darling is a sex educator, author, burlesque performer, and femme-cee of the sexy storytelling show Smut Slam in DC, Baltimore, and Philly. She has previously appeared in Best Women's Erotica of the Year Vol. 8 and edited Anonymous Sex Vol. I, the first-ever Smut Slam International book. Follow her on IG @divadarling.

Mx. Eden

Mx. Eden is a pleasure-forward, queer-affirming, consent-centered, sex educator and burlesque host out of Baltimore. Follow them on IG @yesmxeden.