Curse of the Chippendales: a True Crime Story Stripped Bare

Factual America

16 Nov

Written By

The Discovery+ docuseries Curse of the Chippendales chronicles the dark side of the 1980s all-male striptease dance troupe.

The muscular men of the Chippendales captured the hearts, minds, and dollars of the 1980s in their iconic cuffs and collars, but what started out as a first in women’s entertainment soon turned into a story of greed, jealousy and murder for hire.

Executive producer Suzanne Lavery and writer and director Jesse Vile discuss what drew them to the Chippendales, how they created the film and the biggest challenges they faced in bringing this outrageous story to life.

“It’s a true-crime series but it’s true crime with a heart, there’s a lot more going on than murder and mayhem.” - Jesse Vile

Time Stamps:

00:00 - The trailer for Curse of the Chippendales.
03:41 - What the docuseries is about.
04:39 - How the male stripping at Chippendales started.
07:28 - What it was like for the dancers working at the club.
10:40 - The founder of the Chippendales and how he knew what would sell.
13:55 - The dark side of the Chippendales.
16:17 - The unique themes filmmakers were able to explore when making this doc.
22:50 - The ‘napkin deal’ that changed the Chippendale organisation forever.
25:40 - The crazy unbelievable world they were all living in at the Chippendales.
27:09 - Why the creative team decided to turn the documentary into a 4-part docuseries.
28:28 - The main challenges they faced in telling the story.
32:48 - The different elements of the human spirit they show in the documentary.
37:38 - Why they decided to make a true-crime doc.
43:15 - The next project LightBox is working on.

Resources:

Curse of the Chippendales (2021)
LightBox
Pineapple Studios
MovieMaker Magazine
Innersound Audio
Alamo Pictures

Transcript for Factual America Episode 77 - Curse of the Chippendales: a True Crime Story Stripped Bare

Suzanne Lavery 00:00
Hi there. I'm Suzanne Lavery, and I am one of the exec. producers of Curse of the Chippendales.

Jesse Vile 00:06
Hi, I'm Jesse Vile. I am the writer and director of Curse of the Chippendales.

Speaker 1 00:11
Oh my God... he's been shot right through the head.

Speaker 2 00:16
What's the name of your place?

Speaker 1 00:17
This is Chippendales.

Speaker 2 00:20
Oh, wow.

Speaker 3 00:23
In the 1980s, Chippendales was so popular.

Speaker 4 00:28
There are three magic words. I'm gonna say, what do you want him to do? And they scream, 'Take it off!'

Speaker 5 00:39
From the outside, we were a hugely successful multimillion dollar business. But the bigger we got, the more the problems piled up.

Speaker 6 00:48
Nick felt he solely was behind the immense success of Chippendales.

Speaker 7 00:54
Steve didn't like all the attention that Nick was getting. Both wanted to be the chief. Steve told me that Nick had been shot and killed.

Speaker 8 01:04
I just started to scream. Flash bulbs are in your eyes, and they're asking, Do you know who did it?

Speaker 9 01:12
The puzzle pieces are all there, you just got to put 'em together.

Speaker 10 01:15
Behind it all is one megalomaniac who's eliminating the competition through arson and murder for hire.

Speaker 10 01:23
And they said, 'We've been notified that there is a plot to assassinate you.' Wh - wh- what?

Matthew 01:45
That is a trailer from the Discovery Plus docu-series, Curse of the Chippendales, and this is Factual America. We're brought to you by Alamo Pictures, an Austin and London based production company making documentaries about America for international audiences. I'm your host, Matthew Sherwood. Each week, I watch a hit documentary or series and then talk with the filmmakers and their subjects. This week, we're discussing the Discovery Plus docu-series, Curse of the Chippendales which strips off, almost literally, the facade of the iconic 1980s and 90s women's entertainment phenomenon, to reveal a little known story of greed, jealousy and murder for hire. It is my pleasure, then to welcome director and writer, Jesse Vile, and executive producer, Suzanne Lavery, Jesse, Suzanne, welcome to Factual America. Suzanne, how are things with you?

Suzanne Lavery 02:34
Very good, Matthew. Very good, indeed, thank you.

Matthew 02:37
Okay. And Jesse, how are you doing?

Jesse Vile 02:39
Yeah, great, great. Thanks for asking.

Matthew 02:43
Are you both in London? Where are you this evening?

Suzanne Lavery 02:48
Yeah, I'm in Soho, in our post-production office, working late, as usual,

Matthew 02:54
And that's with Lightbox, right?

Suzanne Lavery 02:56
Yeah.

Matthew 02:57
Yes. And Jesse, yourself?

Jesse Vile 03:00
I'm in my home in North London.

Matthew 03:02
Well, thank you so much. Again, the film is The Curse of the Chippendales, released in September on Discovery Plus. Also, from one of the most recent films from Lightbox, which was founded by Simon and Jonathan Chinn, who we've had on - the last season - to talk about the Tina doc that they did, so, it's great to have you two on. Maybe for those who haven't, in our audience, who haven't had a chance to see this docu-series yet, Jesse, maybe you can give us a little synopsis. What is Curse of the Chippendales all about?

Jesse Vile 03:43
Well, in a nutshell, it's really the story of the rise and fall of the world's most famous and successful all-male dance troupe. And so, it starts in the late 70s, about, you know, the inception, how the idea came across, what it originally was meant to be, what originally was. And then, we see the evolution of that idea, and how it just completely permeated through every facet of American popular culture in the 1980s. And then, ultimately, as you know, things do, nothing can last forever. And you know, we see it fall, and it affects people in many different ways, as you see throughout the series.

Matthew 04:25
Okay. And Suzanne, I mean, maybe you could put the whole Chippendales phenomenon in context. I mean, strikes me having now seen all four episodes, it had the most unlikeliest of beginnings, didn't it?

Suzanne Lavery 04:39
Yeah, I mean, the whole thing started out as a kind of ruse to get some bodies in a sort of club in West LA. And so, it was really just hired to build the club on a quiet night. So, they went through various things like female mud wrestling, which I gather was quite grubby. And then they hit upon the idea of a male revue, strip-show for women. So, they thought it would never work. And then, lo and behold, the women of LA came in their hundreds, every night. So, it ended up being a huge success.

Matthew 05:21
And people like Hugh Hefner, showing up, you know, all these stars. You mentioned the female mud wrestling, and that's such of an era. I'd completely forgotten about that phenomenon. Until watching this. Jesse, I mean, on the surface, this has the beginnings, it all feels like an American success story, doesn't it? A young man comes to the USA from India and makes a fortune, it would seem.

Jesse Vile 05:52
Yeah, it definitely, you know, feels like the American, you know, an American Dream story. And then, it turns into - sounds like a cliche - but it turns into an American nightmare for many people. It's, I guess a lot of it came naturally from, you know, the seedy nightclub, you know, culture and the fact that they're selling sex and, you know, nothing, I guess, it's never completely pure, is it? I mean, something's gonna go wrong. And then you throw the 80s into the mix, and all the drugs and the wild, carefree sex, you know, pre HIV. And it just becomes this cocktail of nightmarish outcomes.

Matthew 06:39
Yeah, I think, well, it's - whenever we have what - well, this is many things, your film, but it's also a true crime docu-series, as well, and always kind of throw spoiler alerts out there, because we will talk about what happened in all the four episodes, but for anyone who wants to maybe be a little bit surprised or is unaware of what the whole story is about, then, yeah, stop here and go watch the episodes. But, I mean, and Suzanne, what about the, you know, what about the dancers themselves, because you guys have traced and tracked down some of the biggest names in Chippendales's history. I mean, what struck you most about them while working on this project?

Suzanne Lavery 07:30
They're all in incredibly good shape [laughter]. It was great to - I mean, one of the interesting things about this production is that we started it right in the height of lockdown. So, actually, we filmed a lot of it remotely. So, we didn't actually, you know, it was this kind of Zoom setup for a lot of interviews. So, unfortunately, we didn't get to meet a lot of our characters in person. But we did sort of very painstaking remote filming, but the dancers all have such warm memories of the time. And they were really sort of frank and open with us about their recollections and the journeys that they went on. And one of the interesting things is something that Jesse and I discussed a lot in the production process was that the curse of the Chippendales was also when their dreams kind of came true. And then they got a bit more than they bargained for. So, I think they all went through this incredible journey that sort of really hit some very high highs in every sense of the word. But then each of them sort of had a very low point, particularly with the murders and with losing friends and colleagues. And, you know, many of them had relationships fall out. So, it was really interesting to sort of take one sort of precinct and the organization itself and really sort of unpick what happened to each character within it. And they each had some different perspective. A lot of the interesting points to us was, even though a lot of them had a very, very hard time, I think, to a man, they each said they would do it all again.

Matthew 09:28
Yeah, that was very interesting at the at the end, even Michael Rapp, who's the perfect man, I guess, who often, you know, you go into a lot of detail in terms of his rise and fall. And it was quite a fall in in many ways. But yeah, he's - right at the end says, would not change a thing, would he? Which was very interesting. And I mean, I think we were talking about this success story, but we have this Steve Banerjee and, I mean, he was actually there - I mean, he's this nightclub owner, Jesse, isn't he, but he's actually there picking the guys out of the lineup, isn't he? He's deciding who is, I mean, it's this very sort of an interesting and odd kind of situation where he, as you say, kind of, well, as we find out more and more, seedy nightclub owner of 1970s, picking young men out of audiences, and saying they're gonna be the next big stars, and that's what women like, and, you know, and going from there. That's kind of a, it was an - anyway, it was a sort of an interesting element to this.

Jesse Vile 10:34
Yeah, I mean, there was a great story that Dan Peterson told us that we couldn't fit into the series - I mean, there was so much we couldn't fit. And how Dan was discovered, he's the host, and, you know, the guy with the mustache who, sort of modeled himself after Magnum PI, you know, Tom Selleck. And he tells a story of going to the club, because after nine o'clock or ten o'clock, the show, or the club would open to men. And he recalls this story of going down with a friend and waiting in the line. And then someone pulls him out and takes him over to a car and introduces him to this guy, turns out to be Steve Banerjee, and Steve Banerjee hired him right there on the spot. And so, and then, of course, Dan went on to become the face of Chippendales on all the calendars and - I think the thing about Banerjee is that he had a really keen eye of knowing what would sell but that's because he studied American culture. He read Cosmo, he, you know, he read Elle and Vogue, he read all these magazines, and studied film, studied TV, of what women wanted. And you can see the evolution of that change throughout the decade, if you look at all the calendars, and that's something we discuss in Episode Two, and then Episode Three, it kind of gets a little dark, you know, the fact that he was just choosing basically WASPy looking men because, you know, that's what he thought would sell, and he was right at the time. I mean, the 80s wasn't the most inclusive decade. And so, yeah, I think but for - and it's another thing, we get into in Episode Two, which is, you know, Nick De Noia, the fact that he took this ragtag idea and dance troupe, and sort of made it a well oiled machine to be able to bring it to higher levels. But then Steve, his idea was kind of shaping - looking at the bigger picture. It wasn't just about a club, right, or show; it was about the merchandise, was about the brand. And I thought that was really interesting about Steve, is that he wasn't just this, I mean, he was incredibly lucky, he fell into this thing. It wasn't his idea. But he did have a certain amount of talent on how to take this idea and capitalize on it by building and creating this brand.

Matthew 12:55
I mean, I think that's - carry on with that because I think it is very interesting because he had these, like, some people say you create your own luck, whatever happened, they were on this huge winner. There was talent here. Yet, it just, I mean, they could have been fine. They could have been extremely successful. He could still be around now. But there is this, along with all the others, but what we find is that even in Episode One you've got, there's this dark side to the whole, even to the origin story behind this, isn't there. I mean, the one who even came up with the idea, Paul Snider, who's, you know, murders Dorothy Stratten, who is famous at the time; Peter Bogdanovich, his companion, you know, all these things. But no one seemed to know, or suspect, that there was this sort of dark side to Steve Banerjee, it seems.

Jesse Vile 13:53
Yeah. I mean, I, you know, growing up in the 80s, they were always on talk shows, you know, as a kid they were just ubiquitous. I mean, it was everywhere, and then making this series, it was really interesting. All the archive was just, you know, my childhood daytime TV, if I'm sick and home from school, you know, it'd be Phil Donahue or Sally Jessy Raphael, or Wheel of - or was it The Price is Right, or something? You know, and...

Matthew 14:20
So, me as a sick, playing hooky from high school or something? Yes. You know, so I'm a little older, but yes, exactly.

Jesse Vile 14:26
And, yeah, it was just all over the place. And I think it was interesting, because when Suzanne reached out to me, she says, Hey, there's this really great project, you know, are you interested? I was like, Well, yeah, what is it? And she sends me the treatment. And all I saw was Chippendales, and a guy in a bow tie. I was, like, about to write her back saying, I think you sent me the wrong treatment [laughter]. You know, I was like, why are you sending me this? Like, what about me - because we've worked together before - what about me says that I'd be the best, perfect director to make a film about men stripping for women. But then, as I read the treatment, and - I mean, I didn't know any of this stuff, even though I knew the Chippendales growing up, I had no idea about any of this stuff, and I think that they must have a great PR team. I mean, you know, to kind of keep that under wraps, because most people who go on Twitter or Facebook, they say, I had no idea about this. And so, it's pretty remarkable. You've seen that after something like this, it's the only thing they'd ever be known for, but it's rather amazing. Maybe it's just, you know, time. They have the benefit of time.

Matthew 15:36
I was going to ask about that but let's talk about it now. I mean, Suzanne, since you know, you've been on the project I mentioned from close to the beginning. I mean, why hasn't there's something been done on this? It does seem remarkable. I was aware of the news at the time. I didn't know anything about this until watching the series or doing the basic Wikipedia search or whatever. And it was all surprise to me. And also, there's not been any dramatic narrative. Well, I think there's been some made for TV stuff way back when but it's a story that seems ripe for telling and no one's been telling it.

Suzanne Lavery 16:14
Well, absolutely. I mean, when I first was told about it, we have an amazing development producer called Max Dobbyn, and this was his stroke of genius to bring this to the small screen. So, he stumbled across the story on the sort of nether reaches of the internet, and pitched it to us at Lightbox. And you know, we sort of, we go through numerous ideas before deciding which ones we'll actually take on and develop and pitch to various broadcasters. But this one, I actually thought he was joking, I didn't believe him that it was a true story, and had a bit of the same reaction as Jesse. But yeah, once we found that it was indeed true, and that there were people that, you know, were around to tell the tale, we got in touch with Bruce Nahin who was Steve Banerjee's lawyer. And Eric Gilbert, who was associate producer? Creative director?

Jesse Vile 17:26
Creative Director. Yeah, better get that right. Yeah.

Suzanne Lavery 17:30
So, once we got in touch sort of with key figures like that, and then we started reaching out and finding, you know, Michael Rapp was around, and building up the cast list we felt, God, this really has got to be made. And then it's interesting, actually, when we were actually in production, I don't know, it seems to happen sometimes in the creative industries in general, but something gets into the ether. So, you know, we were actually well into production, and we became aware of the podcast, there's a very good podcast by Pineapple Studios. So, that actually came out before us, but I think we were sort of already well underway. And then, I think, there were some other documentary companies and news reports that were coming out. So, I think things kind of seep into the public consciousness. So, all of a sudden, there's a slew of interest in this story. But we are pretty proud of our iteration of it, because we had such a talented director at the helm. Props to Jesse!

Matthew 18:40
Well...

Jesse Vile 18:40
There were a couple, you know, docs about it in the past, and the 90s, and the early 2000s, but they were really all about the true crime element. It was like FBI Files or something like that. It didn't really get into the nitty gritty of the Chippendales. And before any, or, you know, before any of that stuff, or the way that it affected people like Michael Rapp, or his ex-wife, Nancy Dineen, and for me, when I came on the project, and I was researching, and I was writing, I thought, you know, what, even if - remove the true crime element, this would be a fascinating - it wouldn't be as long - but this would be a fascinating series just on its own, and just wild and super entertaining, and then you throw the true crime into the mix. So, I think what we were doing was totally different. We wanted it all. It wasn't just - it's a true crime. It's categorized as a true crime series, but really, it's true crime with a heart, you know. There's a lot more going on than just murder and mayhem.

Jesse Vile 18:40
I mean...

Matthew 18:41
Go ahead.

Suzanne Lavery 19:43
Yeah, that's kind of what drew us, you know, as we dug into the project more and more. It just became very apparent that it was a very multi-layered story that gave us opportunity to explore lots of different elements; sort of the societal context and how... for that time was to, you know, what we're experiencing now, you know, that really sort of resonated with us. You know, in the early days when it was all free and wild, and you know, they could all express themselves, you know, you sort of watch that with a degree of sort of envy or nostalgia, you know, sort of thinking, God what a different time, that is to our COVID world where we're all sort of locked away from each other. And there's, you know, sort of all sorts of layers about sort of female expressions of desire and emancipation and, you know, was the Chippendales a sort of a feminist organization. Probably not, but were they cashing in on that idea? Very much so, you know, so they were just - as well as the crime element. There were so many different rich bands to mine, so... yeah, it gave us a lot of food for thought.

Matthew 21:07
Okay. I think that takes us to our break, actually. So, we'll be right back with Jesse Vile and Suzanne Lavery, the filmmakers behind The Curse of the Chippendales, streaming on Discovery Plus since September.

Factual America midroll 21:22
You're listening to Factual America. Subscribe to our mailing list or follow us on Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter @alamopictures, to keep up to date with new releases or upcoming shows. Check out the show notes to learn more about the program, our guests, and the team behind the production. Now back to Factual America.

Matthew 21:42
Welcome back to Factual America. I'm here with award winning filmmakers, Jesse Vile and Suzanne Lavery. Curse of the Chippendales has been streaming on Discovery Plus, since September. This has all been, you know, obviously I highly recommend people go stream it, it's well worth your time. But maybe going back to the story, and some things you were saying, Suzanne, I mean about the crazy twists and turns that you couldn't believe initially, were, you know, actual fact. But something we haven't really talked too much about yet. I mentioned this Nick De Noia, who came on board and brought Chippendales to its highest heights. But we have this thing with a deal struck literally on the back of a napkin. I mean, and that drives this story. It's just remarkable, that that had any sort of legal force, but I guess it did.

Suzanne Lavery 22:49
Yeah, I mean, there's, I mean, we sort of routinely referred to it as The Napkin Deal. And it does seem to have been the pivotal point in the history of the Chippendales as an organization. You know, it went from being sort of a successful show, and something that everyone was sort of striving in the same direction, to a point where the finances were split. Where, you know, there were two opposing camps: some people who thought that Nick De Noia was taking advantage of Steve Banerjee. And that Steve didn't actually understand what he was signing, and didn't understand the words in perpetuity, and didn't realize that he had given away such a huge part of his business in, you know, such a sort of innocuous setting on a sort of, you know, scrap of a napkin in a diner. Obviously, the fact that he did that meant that there was a great degree of bitterness. And, you know, if you watch the series, I'm not gonna spoil our own series, but, you know, if you watch it, you see how this bitterness sort of grew and had dreadful, tragic repercussions. So, yeah, it does seem again, like you wouldn't make it up. You wouldn't put it in a drama, because it seems such a ridiculous way to propel the chain of events that happened afterwards.

Matthew 24:30
Yeah. And then as you're alluding to earlier, Jesse, it's not just a true crime series, but there is this: the true crime element looms large, obviously, in the last two episodes, certainly. I mean, even Blackpool, for God's sake, looms large in this story, but, you know, we have these fire bombings. We know Nick De Noia is murdered in his office. You have this rival organization, you know, well, this rival to Chippendales, Adonis, it's subject to hits, and that's where Blackpool comes in. I mean, that's a, I mean, maybe one last thing in terms of the story itself. I mean, it's all, you know, you have characters named Strawberry and things like that. I mean, you know, it's quite a remarkable story that you - one of those, the cliche would be, you couldn't make that up and, you know, you wouldn't even sell that to Hollywood and then it actually does happen, doesn't it?

Jesse Vile 25:37
Yeah, I mean, I suppose, you know, the first two episodes sort of lays the foundation for ridiculousness, you know, it's like, of course, it's gonna get wild and crazy; of course, there's a guy named Strawberry; of course, there's Blackpool, of course, you know; it's, a crazy, wild, weird world that they're all living in, with all these various characters. And it's crazy when you think about it, but when you really get into it, it makes total sense, it makes total sense that it would go in that direction, and that you'd have these crazy, you know, Ray Colon and Strawberry. And you'd have, you know, this huge international sting, where they actually took a convict and somebody who was, you know, on parole - not parole, but he was - well, he was on bail for this, you know, this conspiracy to commit murder by cyanide, international conspiracy to commit murder, take him to the scene of the crime, essentially. I mean, it's just, it's bizarre. So, yeah, it's stranger than fiction. You couldn't write it. And that's the beauty of documentary, you know, it's fascinating.

Matthew 26:56
And Suzanne, when did you decide you had four episodes? Was this always gonna be something episodic? Or did that kind of play out as you went along?

Suzanne Lavery 27:08
Yeah, no, we were pretty clear. Definitely from the outset, that it was going to be a limited series. We thought it felt like four parts, you know, we're sort of always quite careful at Lightbox to make sure that we're not trying to extend stories beyond their comfortable limits. So, you know, we'd rather have it shorter and better than trying to drag things out. But it was actually really, it was one of the challenges, and I think we sort of pulled it off, that across the four episodes, each episode feels quite distinct. And has - it's a chapter, so they move along quite quickly. But you know, you have the sort of origin story in the first episode. The second episode is where it all just goes nuts and kind of, they essentially take over America, if not the world, then by Episode Three, things are sort of getting dark, and you're really sort of seeing that the curse come into play.

Matthew 28:17
And Jesse, when you're brought on to the project, I mean, what were the main challenges for you in trying to tell this story?

Jesse Vile 28:28
Well, I think, I mean, I had a pretty good idea of how it was all going to be structured and laid out. I mean, as Suzanne put it, you know, think we wanted them to be very distinct. Each one's a very distinct chapter where we introduce, you know, characters that live in that time, live in that chapter, in that world. And then very much because of the rise in the fall of an empire. And, you know, we wrestled with the idea of flashbacks, and, you know, and it just seemed to me, the best way to tell it was just take people on a ride and not to keep interrupting that ride. And so, to go on this roller coaster with twists and turns from the very beginning. I mean, you get from the pre-title of Episode One that, you know, shit's gonna hit fan. But we don't, you know, we don't reveal exactly how, or why, or when. And so, that was sort of the basic structure, always. And then there was an idea of, well, Episode Four is going to be so different from the first three. Is that going to be odd? And I actually really liked that. I don't think there's any rules when you make a documentary, or a series or anything. It's why not, why can't it be its own thing, and actually, it deserves to be its own thing, because it's such a - it's outside of the world of Chippendales. I mean, it's not - it's alien to that world and I, you know, we even filmed them different - those contributors - we didn't film them down the barrel, they're slightly off center. And they're not in a club atmosphere because they don't belong in the world of the first three episodes, really. And so, I guess that was the biggest challenge; it was how do you bring in the true crime? The true crime element and make it seem seamless, but also how do we make people care about stuff other than the true crime? I mean, if it's a true crime series, then are they not going to enjoy all the other stuff that we all loved, which was the emotional stuff, which was the character stuff. I guess that was the challenge. The biggest one, As Suzanne said, it really was Episode Four, I think.

Matthew 30:47
Yeah, I think, I mean, just personally, it's probably my favorite episode, but I think it's, as you say, doesn't this also, I mean, you say it's the challenge, but isn't it also doing a limited series, it provides you with the freedoms, right? You can just make Episode Four different, you know...

Jesse Vile 31:08
I think so. That's the great thing about a series. I think, you know, when you sit down, you have, oh, you have four parts. You can tell this story, and you have, you know, let's have 100 characters, and you can do this and do that. And it's not until you sit down and you plot it all out, and you write it all down, and then you actually put it on a timeline, and you're like, wow. I mean, when I wrote Episode Four, my DP read it, and he said, you've written a feature film, you know what I mean? It was probably going to be 100 minutes long. And so we had to chop it right down. And I think you feel like with a series you have limitless, you can tell all the stories, many, many different themes, you can certainly do more than you can in a feature length doc, but you really still have to be very focused with what story you're - what's the story you're telling? Who's telling it? And what are you trying to say? And I think you need to stick with that and really be focused, because otherwise it gets too lost. People watch a series and go, What the hell did I just watch? What was that about? I don't... lots of great stuff in there, but what, you know, what's it trying to say? I don't understand. So, you really still have to be very focused.

Matthew 32:22
And Suzanne, in terms of that, what, I mean, besides the rise and fall of Chippendales, and bringing this crime, true crime, to life, I mean, what was the sort of the main things you were trying to bring to our small screens? I mean, you've touched on this already, but there's so many different elements to this, it's more than a true crime. It's a showbiz doc. All kinds of elements to it.

Suzanne Lavery 32:47
Yeah. I mean, it's kind of - there are elements of social history to it, and elements of, you know, elements of entertainment, and elements of exploring some sort of deeper, darker stuff, you know, sort of not, you know, that, of course, it's how do women see themselves, how do women see it as acceptable to behave and to express themselves. And, you know, it sort of captured that point in time where, you know, I'm sure it wasn't just the Chippendales, but that was a very specific place where this kind of explosion happen. But as well as all that stuff, you know, there's a lot to explore about the human spirit. And, you know, what happens when you actually get everything that you want? And, you know, you have success. You have, you know, in Steve's case, you know, he wanted to build a massive business empire, he wanted to be Walt Disney, you know, he wanted to sort of have money sort of coming from all directions, and he achieved that. But he also, you know, sort of had the sad, psychotic tendencies, which were rather unfortunate for everyone around him. For the dancers, you know, they achieved, you know, some of them wanted women, some of them wanted adulation, some, you know, Michael talked very eloquently about wanting applause and feeling wanted and overcoming a sort of feeling of inferiority that he had in his youth. But it's just fascinating to see how everyone was striving for certain things in the early parts of their careers and in the early films of the series, but then just looking at how those paid off. They were very interesting for us and something that we sort of worked hard as a team to sort of really tease out and get the balance right between, you know, we didn't want it to ever feel like, you know, here comes the Social History bit... and look at how... you know, it sort of all feel very fluid and say those things, but in a sort of subtle way that, you know, it just takes you on a ride. Jesse and Kevin Konak, who was our lead editor, once they kind of immersed themselves in the material, and really just started to enjoy it and stop, you know, because it's, a tricky ask, you know, we want to make a premium series, we are Lightbox, we win Oscars, we, you know, we've got, you know, the sort of track record, you know, really great films, and now we're doing a series about the Chippendales, and it's ridiculous, you know, it was a daunting task for all of us, you know, how do we make this feel premium, and how do we make this, you know, a sort of really classy exposition of a story that could be done in a million different ways, and could become something that just kind of cheesy and salacious. So, and, you know, we wanted to be respectful to all the characters who spoke to us, and also to the people who lost their lives in the process. So, a lot of sort of balancing to do sort of come out and that we all felt good about.

Matthew 36:23
Yeah. Well, I think you've indeed, achieved that. I think it's - because as you say, you could take this way too seriously. But then not seriously enough, given the tragedies that have happened, and we won't go into those details. But, yeah, I think, well, well done. Thank you for bringing that to our attention, because I think you definitely have achieved that, and it makes for a very enjoyable series. I want us, because we're coming up on the end of our time together, actually, but - a question for both of you, looking through, you know, and given that there is a murder at the heart of this story, and looking at your filmography, do you guys have an obsession with death and murder? I've got The Ripper. We've got Jason, we've got A Murder in West Cork, we got Till Death Do Us Part, Death by Delivery. I know that you're 30 for 30 series, Jesse, has a murder in it, was this all planned, this sort of stream of - in looking at your back catalogue?

Jesse Vile 37:38
It definitely wasn't planned on my side. I mean, my first film was a story of a musician battling Lou Gehrig's disease. And my 30 for 30 was a story that I grew up with, because it happened 45 minutes from where I grew up. I grew up just outside Philly, and very close to Foxcatcher Farm. And so, that was a story that always resonated with me, and I always wanted to tell that story. And no, not for me, and then but - I guess in the last seven, eight years, true crime has just completely taken over, and it seems like that is the thing that everyone wants. And so, I mean, I try and not dwell too much on true crime. But for me, it's really about the story, you know, and it's not the crime, it's not the murder, or whatever happened, it's really the story behind it. Or, you know, why are we telling this story? And not dwelling on the, you know, the true crime aspect.

Matthew 38:45
Suzanne, is that similar for you?

Suzanne Lavery 38:47
Yeah, I mean, I've been a sort of earnest documentary maker for many years. I've done a lot of sort of more investigative stuff, and, you know, sort of, kind of hard-hitting international affairs and things like, you know, very much, you know, television with a purpose and things with stories that have really something to say, and to be honest, you know, initially when we started to look at True Crime, actually my first was with Jesse, so he and I sort of went hand in hand into that together, which was Gypsy's Revenge for Discovery as well. But actually, I think there are two things. I think there is a huge appetite for it and a huge public fascination. And, as, you know, producers, you know, we want to bring people content that they are going to watch and enjoy, but also as filmmakers and as story tellers, there is - crime stories really do allow you to sort of penetrate into the sort of deeper reaches of the human psyche. And it is fascinating. You know, I don't think we would ever do sort of salacious stories that are just, you know, there's been a murder look how shocking it is. But it's, you know, a crime has happened. Why does it happen? What has driven someone to take action? What's the fallout? What context did it happen in? And what does it tell us about ourselves? How might we ourselves act given a similar scenario? So, actually, I think as sort of serious filmmakers, you do sometimes enter these things with a degree of trepidation because you don't ever want to be seen as taking advantage of horrific events. But many true crime stories just have so much more to say. So, yeah, it is something that I'm sure we will continue to be fascinated by.

Matthew 41:07
Yeah. And I think that's a good point. I mean, yeah. I mean, I know, even just among friends and family, people are very, very interested in these stories. Especially when they're told as well as you have done them. I think as you've already alluded to it that can be abused, and we won't go down cases of where that's happened. But yeah, I think it's, or, well, let's face it, some of these things get drawn out into multi-season episodic pieces that seem to go on forever, trying to maybe exploit this interest, but I think this is all - but it is, it's great literature is full of these stories, aren't they? So, you know, it's all part of that. I mean, with that all in mind, now that I've tried to typecast you, and that wasn't my intention, what's next for both of you? Jesse, can you share with us? Usually, our filmmakers tell us, 'I can't tell you. But I've got all this stuff in the works'. But do you have anything you can share with us in terms of what's next for you?

Jesse Vile 42:17
It's interesting, because normally that's exactly what I have to say is, like, I can't tell you, but I can this time, I'm taking just a bit of time off, you know, taking a bit of time and looking at various projects, and, you know, really thinking carefully of what I want to do next but yeah, it's just nice to take time off. I mean, making a four-part series is a lot of work. It takes over your life, and it's just nice to, when it's finished, just recalibrate and, you know, claw back a bit of the time that, you know, that you put into it. So, yeah, that's what I'm doing right now. I'm enjoying my time off.

Matthew 43:02
Well, do enjoy it. I would love to have - I think we all would love to have a little time off. Suzanne, are you getting any time off? What's next for you? Or maybe even what's in the works for Lightbox?

Suzanne Lavery 43:14
Well, we have lots of things cooking at Lightbox. Some in production and some in development. So, yeah, we have a lot of good things coming down the pipeline. So, you know, we're sort of working very excitedly for sort of lots of the big streamers with more limited series, some very premium content, but I can't remember what has been announced and what hasn't, so I won't go into too much detail. But one of my main objectives is to, we have a particular project that we want to tempt Jesse out of retirement [laughs], out of holiday from, and bring him back to Lightbox, so, Yeah, watch this space, there'll be plenty more collaborations with Mr. Vile here.

Matthew 44:05
And is it true crime?

Suzanne Lavery 44:09
Mhm... might be [laughter]!

Jesse Vile 44:11
Kind of! Not really, yeah...

Matthew 44:14
Kind of like this one? Either way, I'll let you carry on that conversation offline, as they say. Thank you so much. It was a joy to have you on the two of you, director and writer of The Curse of the Chippendales, Jessie Vile, and executive producer Suzanne Lavery of Lightbox. So, thank you so much for coming on to the podcast really appreciate it and wish you all the best of luck with the next steps in your careers. Just want to give another big thank you to director and writer, Jesse Vile, and executive producer, Suzanne Lavery, the filmmakers behind Curse of the Chippendales, streaming on Discovery Plus since September, and will be debuting on Amazon Prime here in the UK on November 12. Before saying thanks to others, I just want to alert you to an exciting new collaboration we have with Moviemaker magazine. You'll be hearing more from us about that in coming episodes. A shout out to Sam and Joe at Innersound Audio in Escrick, England just outside of York. And a big thanks to Nevena Paunovic, our podcast manager at Alamo Pictures who ensures we continue getting such great guests, like Jesse and Suzanne, onto the show. Finally, a big thanks to our listeners. As always, we love to hear from you. So, please keep sending us feedback and episode ideas, whether it is on YouTube, social media, or directly by email. And please remember to like us and share us with your friends and family wherever you happen to listen or watch podcasts. This is Factual America signing off.

Factual America Outro 45:53
You've been listening to Factual America. This podcast is produced by Alamo Pictures specializing in documentaries, television, and shorts about the USA for international audiences. Head on down to the show notes for more information about today's episode, our guests, and the team behind the podcast. Subscribe to our mailing list or follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, @alamopictures. Be the first to hear about new productions, festivals showing our films, and to connect with our team. Our homepage is alamopictures.co.uk

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Curse of the Chippendales: a True Crime Story Stripped Bare

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Curse of the Chippendales: a True Crime Story Stripped Bare

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