Zombie burlesque!

Zombie Strippers: We promise they won’t show up in person.

By Scott Dickensheets

Thursday, March 12, 2009 | midnight

Of all the things that phrase could denote—a new album by The Vermin; a chapbook by a desperately hip poet; a display of mildly taboo art in a gallery you’re not cool enough to know about—perhaps the most surprising is this: a zombie-themed burlesque show. After all, isn’t live flesh, teasingly presented, sort of the point, the attraction, of burlesque?

See for yourself when the local chapter of Zombie Squad (more about them in a sec) stages some undead cha-cha-cha at the Erotic Heritage Museum to raise funds for the Susan G. Komen breast cancer foundation. There will be a screening of Zombie Strippers, starring Jenna Jameson and Robert Englund, and a zombie makeup artist on hand. And, of course, burlesque. Billed performers include Anabelle, Roxy Rouge, Cha Cha Velour and Betty Page—that’s Betty with a Y, not an IE, which would require the presence of an actual zombie.

And the metaphorical undead is what Zombie Squad is really all about. It’s a volunteer community-service organization—think Elks gone goth, with a sense of humor—that focuses on disaster preparedness. Getting people ready for earthquakes, floods, acts of terrorism. From the ZS website: “We hold fast to the belief that if you are prepared for a scenario where the walking corpses of your family and neighbors are trying to eat you alive, you will be prepared for almost anything.” To that end the organization holds training seminars (with law-enforcement agencies, businesses, schools and universities, neighborhood watch groups) and does charity work (food drives, fundraising). For more, check out Zombiehunters.org.