Original subtitles

[dramatic music playing]

[man 1 speaking]

[man 2 speaking]

[man 1 speaking]

[man 2 speaking]

[man 1 speaking]

- [man 2 speaking] - [man 1 speaking]

In July of 1991,

an individual walked into the FBI office in Las Vegas

and began to tell this tale

of how he had just flown back in from London, England

where he was contracted to kill two members

of a male exotic dance group.

[women cheering]

[Scott] He said that the plan

was to inject a fatal dose of cyanide

into these two individuals.

The plot was apparently to pay $25,000

for the death of each victim.

The story sounded kind of far-fetched,

but as we dug into it a little bit more,

you realize that this story had a lot more layers to it.

[man 1] She was 20 years old and Playboy Magazine's Playmate of the Year.

[man 2] The key witness may be

an alleged co-conspirator, prosecutors...

And right in the middle of this investigation

was this multi-million dollar

business known as Chippendales.

[rock music playing]

[man] There's a lot of chirping about Chippendales.

It's a nightclub designed to delight women

featuring male performers.

[woman speaking]

[man speaking]

[laughter]

[Nancy] It felt like we were in control,

that they were there to serve us.

[Michael] There was something about stepping out

on that stage that made all my worries,

all my problems go away.

Here they are, the most exciting guys in America,

The Chippendales.

[audience cheering]

[Scott] But then all that changed.

It became more of a wild ride in paranoia land.

Satan is the great deceiver

and he is the one that is trying to deceive you

into believing it's wonderful and good.

[Scott] It was just getting darker and weirder.

[Michael] All of a sudden,

I started losing the real person

and becoming the stage person.

[woman] After a while,

I wanted to burn the place down.

I hated it. I hated it.

[broadcaster] The explosive allegations of murder-for-hire

now have investigators digging into

an old unsolved case back in New York.

[reporter] Were you in the house when the bodies were discovered?

- Yes. - [reporter] You were?

- Yes. - As we dug deeper and deeper

into this case, what we uncovered was

one of the most bizarre murder

and murder-for-hire plots

in the history of the FBI.

[dramatic music playing]

[man] Good evening, ladies. Welcome to Chippendales.

-[woman 1] Ooh, I'd take you home... -[woman 2] Oh, my God.

[woman 3] What did I tell you?

[woman 2] Look at all these beautiful men.

[singer] ♪ Hmm, oh yeah ♪

♪ What a night ♪

♪ Oh, yes It's ladies' night ♪

♪ And the feeling's right ♪

[women cheering]

[singer] ♪ Oh, yes It's ladies' night ♪

♪ And the feeling's right ♪

♪ Oh, yes It's ladies' night ♪

♪ Oh, what a night ♪

♪ Oh, what a night ♪

♪ Oh, yes It's ladies' night ♪

♪ And the feeling's right ♪

[man] You guys can leave now...

[singer] ♪ Oh, yes It's ladies' night ♪

♪ Oh, what a night ♪

[Nancy] Chippendales was our place.

You felt free, you felt free

to just be who you wanna be.

It was like living in a fantasy for one night.

It made me feel like a star.

It made me feel like I could do anything.

At Chippendales, you know, I'm untamed, I'm wild.

I'm lustful.

I'm all the things that I wanna be.

Chippendales was a place where I could be onstage,

be myself, be a sex symbol.

And be a part of this huge phenomenon.

I mean, men strip in front of women.

Uh, I thought it was the stupidest idea I've ever heard.

But I had no conception of what women want.

[singer] ♪ Oh, it's ladies' night ♪

♪ And the feeling's right ♪

[singers] ♪ Come on Let's all celebrate ♪

[singer] ♪ Lady, lady, lady ♪

[tape stops]

[man] Okay. So tell me,

how did you first get involved in Chippendales?

Okay. So, uh, let me go back to 1975.

[tape rewinds]

[disco music playing]

[Roger] The 70s were just wild years.

I had just turned 18, I got a fake ID.

I started going out,

dancing in various clubs around town.

Mainly in Beverly Hills

when disco dancing was at its peak.

[Sondra] The 70s was very sexual.

The music, the dress,

peoples' attitudes.

Everybody was flirting with everybody.

Everybody was sleeping with everybody.

I don't know how anything ever got done.

[laughs]

[Bruce] There was a lot of drinking, lots of drugs.

The pill had been invented just a few years earlier.

AIDS hadn't been discovered yet.

It was the era to express yourself sexually

and do whatever you want.

Years before that, women weren't supposed to do that,

so it was a time to be wild.

I would go to these clubs,

just building the nerve up

to, you know... Standing there, standing there,

trying to pick out the right girl, who would say yes?

You know, I just wanted someone to say yes.

[singer] ♪ Listen, everyone here ♪

[Roger] I was on the floor all night long,

sweating my heart out.

And if you were a hardcore dancer,

you would be going to Destiny II.

The only club in town

that was open until 4:00 in the morning.

[singer] ♪ I'm making it ♪

♪ I got the chance I'm taking it ♪

[Bruce] I was living just a few blocks from Destiny II,

so it became my main hangout.

I was 24 years old

and I was studying for the bar exam in California.

Going to Destiny II as often as I did,

I got to know the club's owner,

Steve Banerjee.

Steve was a very well-dressed man

who spoke with a stutter.

He seemed very friendly and was personable,

a very accommodating host.

I later learned he was from India.

[man speaking]

[man] Uh-huh.

Steve wasn't very flamboyant or...

He was a quiet man.

Uh, he kept to himself.

But he was always a businessman.

He had a vision

to make his club really big.

[man speaking]

[Bruce] Over time, we developed a friendship.

So when I passed the bar exam,

I became Steve's lawyer.

By 1978,

the club was very busy on Wednesdays,

Fridays, and Saturdays.

But it was dead the rest of the week.

So Steve was looking for anything

that would draw people to the club.

We stumbled on the idea

of having female mud wrestling,

and it was very popular.

But we still hadn't found that special something

that would make us a destination place.

But in early 1979,

our lives changed forever.

Steve called me in for a meeting at the club

and that's where I met Paul Snider.

[upbeat music playing]

[Bruce] Paul was from Canada and he was trying to

make a name for himself

as a promoter in LA.

But to me, he was a grifter,

coming up with one idea or another con

to make money.

Paul just seemed sleazy and oily,

the kind of guy you'd need to take a shower

after you left him.

You're bringing up my serious dislike of the guy.

Is it coming through? [laughs]

He pitched us the idea of having a strip show,

because he'd gone to a male strip club

in Canada somewhere.

It was a gay strip place.

But the show that Paul presented

was to have men strip for women,

and I didn't think women wanted that.

One can say that I was the smartest guy in the room,

but Paul insisted it would make a lot of money.

He said he was going to run the show,

and MC the show, and get the guys.

And so, Steve said,

"Let's give it a try."

[disco music playing]

[Bruce] We had gotten the word out.

And the crowd the first night was about half-full.

There was no choreography, there was no script,

but the women were there.

You know, it was all experimental art.

And people kept coming back week after week.

And the audience got bigger.

It was a total shock.

It was surreal.

[audience cheering]

We knew we had tapped into something,

but we had to take it in a new direction

to make this show work.

So first, we had to refurbish the club

and change the name.

[man] You are invited to a fashionable discotheque

in West Los Angeles.

It's called Chippendales.

[man speaking]

[man] I see.

[Bruce] At the time, Paul's girlfriend,

Dorothy Stratten, was trying to make it

as a Playboy Playmate.

- [cameras snapping] - [Bruce] She was very sweet.

Paul was her manager

and he was the one that submitted Dorothy's

pictures to Playboy.

And they started hanging out

with Hugh Hefner up at the Mansion.

[Sondra] The first time I saw Dorothy,

it was from across the room.

And she was with Paul.

And she was just so happy to be there.

She was just beaming.

She had a real innocence about her,

but it was a very sexy innocence.

Like a Marilyn type.

[camera clicks]

[Sondra] Very alluring.

Everybody loved her.

People saw her and they knew, "Okay, this girl has it."

Because I was Hugh Hefner's girlfriend,

and I watched a lot of girls

coming in and out of that mansion.

[indistinct] have you met, uh, Dick?

-Hello. -[Dick] Hi. Who's your friend?

[Sondra] So I could tell that

if she played her cards right,

she would be one of the girls

that would go somewhere with this.

[Bruce] She was skyward bound.

Your... Playboy does a wonderful job with their PR.

And at the time, they had women in bunny costume.

And that's when Paul came up

with the idea of using the cuffs and collars

with Chippendales.

[upbeat music playing]

[Bruce] We believed that this would give us

some panache and class.

Paul was our original MC,

but he wasn't worth anything.

So we needed to have

someone that can tie the acts together.

I received this phone call

from a producer friend of mine, and he said,

"Richard, what are you doing tonight?"

And I said, "Nothing right now."

And he goes, "Well, can you get down here?

I need you to come down and MC at this nightclub."

And I said, "Well, what is it?"

He goes, "Well, I'll explain it to you

when you get here."

When I got into the club,

I was told,

"This is gonna be a contest for women.

It's a strip contest."

And I said, "Oh, boy. Okay."

They said, "We need you to get the girls to scream,

to get excited and... Can you do that?"

I said, "Okay, you got it."

[women cheering]

[disco music playing]

So I went out there and I said, uh,

"There are three magic words we're gonna use tonight."

I'm gonna say, "What do you want them to do?"

And they screamed without me even telling them,

"Take it off." I went, "Oh, my God."

Take it off! All of it!

Get ready for the first dancer.

[women cheering]

[Richard] Women were driving the show.

And that's when I realized, "Boy, this has potential."

There's something here.

There's something here.

[women cheering]

[Richard] That night was spectacular.

The show was going great.

But all of a sudden,

a police officer walks out onto the stage,

and I'm looking over, and going, "What?

What the heck's going on here?"

And he comes up to me, and he grabs the microphone out of my hand,

and he says, "Everybody stay right where you are.

This is an illegal performance."

[police siren wailing]

[Bruce] It was about 10:00 at night.

I got a call from Steve saying

the boys had been arrested.

The police had raided the show.

He was as anxious as I'd ever heard him that day,

stuttering and talking too fast.

But the upshot was,

"Come down to Venice Police Station

and fix this."

We were raided for nudity and indecent exposure.

Because we allowed women to touch men

and that wasn't permitted where you serve alcohol.

We were so novice,

we didn't bother looking into the law

to see what we could or couldn't do.

So we bailed them out and we hired

an alcohol beverage commission lawyer

who understood the system much better than I did.

[Richard] So I had to write some rules.

Please don't touch the dancers.

They'll dance to you if you wave a tip,

but no putting it down their G-string.

None of that.

But, uh, it gave me an idea.

Because during the cop incident,

I saw the reaction of the crowd,

I went, "Wow! That was an amazing experience."

And I went "That's what we're missing in this show.

We're gonna have a cop

and he's gonna bust the show."

And I realized, "Boy I can take this even further."

[upbeat music playing]

[Richard] I wanted to introduce characters,

and more choreography, and a beginning,

and a middle, and an end.

And that's when I started designing it

from a dance contest to a women's fantasy.

I told Steve Banerjee, "You know what?

We're gonna call this World Famous Chippendales."

And Steve looked at me and said,

[stammering] "We're not world famous?"

I said, "Steve, we will be."

[TV commentator] Seven nights a week...

Chippendales,

just north of Venice Boulevard

and Overland Avenue in West LA.

[Sondra] The very first time I went was a bachelorette party.

This one girl was getting married,

so this is what she wanted to do.

And I'm like, "Where are we going?

Where are we going?"

We were in the car. We're checking our makeup.

We're excited.

- We pull up and... - [women giggling]

we're going past all the ladies

who were waiting in line.

It's like, "Whoa.

Where in the world would you ever find women

lined up to go into anywhere?"

I mean, this must be really fun.

The first thing I thought was, "Oh.

You know, this is not gross.

This is... This is nice."

It was intimate

and you had your waiters

that were like bunnies in the Playboy Club.

They were beautiful.

They were absolutely beautiful. [laughs]

Good evening and welcome to World Famous Chippendales.

[women cheering]

Well, there have been many, many great lovers

- throughout the... - It was incredibly intoxicating.

[Richard speaking]

[Sondra] With the dancers, they cater to

every woman's fantasy,

what would be her favorite.

[Richard speaking]

[women cheering]

[Roger] I was very pleased with idea of Zorro coming out

all in black, the cape, the black spandex,

the boots, the mask,

where I can actually peel off

one piece of clothing at a time,

and dance, and tease.

[Spanish guitar playing]

[women cheering]

[Richard speaking Spanish]

[Sondra] He was a beautiful man.

But Zorro just didn't do it for me, you know.

[laughs] I ended up inviting the cop home.

[laughs]

[upbeat music playing]

[women cheering]

[Sondra] When the shows at its peak, it's a frenzy in there.

I think that they could've lit

the whole City of Los Angeles

with the energy it generated.

It was exhilarating.

[women cheering]

[Nancy] It was just amazing

how accessible they were to you.

They talked to you.

They came up to you, they kissed you.

They made you feel beautiful.

I think every girl felt special in there.

No matter what she looked like.

That was part of what made Chippendales a great place

to make women feel good about themselves.

It just kind of felt like we were in control

and they were there to serve us.

Now, the roles were reversed,

and it just opened up a whole new world for women.

That was it. Me and my best friend went every single weekend.

We became Chippendale groupies.

[Richard speaking]

[Dan] The job of a host was basically to talk to the women.

I probably talked to 200 women a night.

And growing up in a small town,

women were moms, right?

They were housewives.

But the first night I walked in,

there were two or three birthday parties

of women over 90

that came to Chippendales with their gang.

That was definitely something I had never seen before.

It's almost Thanksgiving. We're thankful.

[laughter]

- [woman] For what? - For those men,

and those bodies.

Every night you got hit on.

There were women that would walk up to you

and propose going back to their hotel.

And I remember somebody who wanted my sperm for a baby,

they offered me $20,000. That was one of those things that you're like,

"This isn't happening to me."

[woman] I wanna know, would you like to go home

- with any of these guys? - Uh, yeah. Yeah.

Every night was different.

I didn't know what to expect.

I have to say I wasn't, uh, a priest.

I had a weakness for beautiful women.

[Sondra] I thought it was fun.

So I started doing it as my girls' night out.

I went there often. [chuckles]

[Richard] Watching the reactions of the women, it was thrilling.

I mean, your baby is working

and everybody's loving your baby.

One night, Paul Snider came up to me

and he said, "Hey, great show."

And I met Dorothy

and she was just absolutely terrific

and a sweetheart.

And I was so thrilled

to be part of this.

[Bruce] Richard took Paul Snider's idea

and turned it into something

none of us dreamed was possible.

Something that was tight, fun.

We had tapped into something big.

And it was just the beginning.

[indistinct chatter]

Chippendales is not a private club.

You don't have to have a membership card to get in.

They supposedly serve the general public.

And yet, a number of nights during the week,

they tell males that they may not enter.

I frankly don't think that's right.

Steve decided early on

not to let men into the club to watch the show.

The show is designed for women-only audience

and that is what made the show so famous.

Uh, and that is the only way we can create an atmosphere

that where ladies can have a wonderful time.

It's common practice to have ladies' nights

and the like, but it is illegal

and we got sued.

We love to perform for women only.

If men were here, the women will not react the same.

They will not yell, and scream, and tip,

and do all kind of...

Kinds of crazy things that they would normally do.

We've had people having sexual relations

on the lawn, AC, DC, and what have you.

They use it for a public bathroom.

And we resent these things.

[upbeat music playing]

[Bruce] My job as Steve's lawyer was to clean up

Chippendales' mess in the morning.

There'd be tons of neighbor complaints.

There'd be liquor bottles, and, um, abandoned condoms,

and needles.

That was a daily occurrence.

God bless people,

they all have their propensities.

My legal bill run in excess of...

Close to a million dollars a year.

[Bruce] We were on the map.

Bad boys were exciting.

And Chippendales was the bad boy.

[women cheering]

Anything that was taboo that attracted

Hef's attention.

He wanted to see what this is all about.

And he said, "Men aren't allowed

in the club for the show."

But Steve was beside himself.

There was no other answer, but, "Of course, Mr. Hefner."

He was honored. He was like,

"I must have made it if Hugh Hefner

wants to come down and check out my club.

[singer] ♪ I believe in miracles ♪

[Sondra] Hef thought it was adorable.

He just thought it was a great idea.

He didn't seem bothered at all by the fact

that they were wearing the Playboy cufflinks

and the bowtie.

He seemed kind of tickled by it.

Like, it was flattering.

And then he left, and then we continued

to come back by ourselves, and it was a lot

more fun that way.

[upbeat music playing]

Within six months, Steve had a five nights a week

club featuring male dancers.

[Dan] Every single night was packed.

There was no daylight.

You couldn't see the floor, you couldn't see anything.

That's how many people were in there.

I gotta say that the only good thing

about those spandex pants is that when you had

to get from one side to the other,

you could slide your way right through

all the way to the other side.

Intentional disregard of the law.

Um, basically, the worst overcrowding series

of events we've ever had in Los Angeles.

It's unacceptable.

[Roger] There was a sign on the wall, capacity 299.

But Steve managed to pack 500 to 600 women a night,

and he was fined by the fire marshal.

But he didn't care.

He made so much money.

[Dan] Steve stood in the shadows and he just smiled.

He was making tons of money hand over fist.

And I really think that he was in shock

every time I looked at him, just smiling at the crowd,

amazed at how many people showed up, every single night.

This is a person that comes from a different country

that's trying to succeed in the American Dream,

who fell into something that was big.

Not... it didn't grow year after, year after year.

It started, and within a year

it was pretty sizable.

It was obvious, at that point,

that he had goals

of growing it bigger, and bigger, and bigger.

[indistinct chatter on TV]

And now, your 1980 Playmate of the Year,

Dorothy Stratten.

Dorothy, you want to come up here?

[cheers and applause]

[Bruce] Paul Snider married Dorothy Stratten

just before her career started taking off.

But their marriage wasn't a happy marriage.

[crowd applauding]

[Bruce] Paul saw himself as being instrumental

in Dorothy's career.

It's when Hugh Hefner took over the mentoring

and shaping of Dorothy, Paul felt left out.

Um, I would like to thank my other half,

my photographer, Mario Caselli,

who I practically had under contract

for the last year and a half.

[crowd applauding]

And to Hef who has made me probably the happiest girl

in the world today. Thank you.

[Sondra] Hef considered himself to be the one

that discovered her, because it was his magazine

and that's just the way he rolled.

I mean, it was his girl, it was his Playmate.

And he was not gonna have Paul ruining this for him.

Hef made sure Dorothy was not going to be seen

with Paul and they really tried to keep the cameras off

the two of them, and he was not going

to be sitting at that table with her.

But he kept... Just reaching for her.

He just had to have a piece of her.

[dramatic music playing]

[Sondra] The whole time, though, she had to save face

and keep smiling.

He became such a nuisance and such a hindrance.

They tried everything to get rid of him.

I don't know if anybody can move that fast,

because I've been following the movie industry

for many years.

Playboy really misjudged Paul.

They did not know how far he could go.

[Bruce] Soon Paul became intolerable.

He was loud, he was arrogant.

He was drinking, doing too many drugs,

and really thought that he was Chippendales.

And his ego became too much for Steve,

and Steve told him to leave.

Uh, he was done, not to come back.

But it was not the last time we'd hear of Paul Snider.

[ominous music playing]

[Michael] The whole idea of building muscle

was important to me.

You know, it was the one thing that I wanted.

Well, let me be... Let me be honest here.

It was in a close tie with the second thing I wanted,

and that was women.

You know, I wanted the girls to want me.

I wanted the girls to notice me,

because I was not a... Or let me just say this,

I did not feel noticed.

[dramatic music playing]

[Michael] I grew up in East Los Angeles,

it was predominantly Mexican.

So, uh, a lot of Spanish being spoken everywhere.

I have a German last name and I have green eyes,

so I kind of stuck out like a sore thumb.

[dramatic music playing]

[Michael] We didn't come from a lot of money, so we didn't have much.

But it was a great place to grow up.

While I was going to school,

I was so shy and intimidated,

it just felt like I was less then, because I had dyslexia.

And I was just barely passing in every grade,

in every class.

When I went into a room, I was looking for the place

where I can hide the best.

But when I went to high school,

I got introduced to a weight room.

And for the first time,

I got to lift weights.

And that, to this day, was, you know,

the lightning bolt

that came down, that said, "This is where I belong."

I had this place to go to where I was somebody.

[dramatic music playing]

I'm reading the newspaper one day,

and I'm reading about this club called Chippendales

that was closed down for being overcrowded.

And these were male dancers dancing for women.

I was like, "Well, Chippendales sounded

like an exciting place."

Because the reason why I'd worked so hard putting

my body together was so I could meet girls.

So I thought this place was made for me.

So I got dressed and I'm going down

the Pomona freeway.

This is way back before there's GPS,

so, you know, you have to mark out

where you're going.

You're looking at the paper, you get off

on Overland Boulevard, you make a left.

[upbeat music playing]

So I drive in, I go down Overland,

and there it is, you know, Chippendales.

So I go inside and there's...

Who I would find out later, is Steve Banerjee.

And he's sitting behind this desk

and he just got stacks of money in front of him.

And all of a sudden, he just looks up,

and he goes, "Oh, okay. Start tomorrow."

And goes right back to whatever he was doing

on his desk.

So I get in my car,

[exhales] you know, now,

now, I'm feeling... I just did it.

I did it.

You know, I got a job at Chippendales.

So, my first night...

Steve tells me that my job is a host.

And the worst thing that you could have

possibly told me, he tells me,

"Your job is to talk to the women."

Now, I may be confident with my body,

but I cannot start a conversation.

And then he said, right before the show starts,

"You're gonna be introduced, so make sure

that women applaud for you.

Because we can hire whoever we want,

but the final say in who stays are the women."

I'm very, very nervous, because as I looked out

into the audience, these are none of the women

that I'd see in my neighborhood.

These women were dressed nice, these women, you know,

they live in big homes, they're probably smarter.

If I could just get a little bit of applause,

you know, I could maybe just get in there.

[cheers and applause]

Our next gentleman, this guy...

[Richard] I talked to Michael before he went out as a host.

I don't know why he was nervous. I mean...

Well, maybe because you got 500 women screaming at you.

That can make you a little nervous.

I said, "What do you do? What are you into?"

He says, "Well, I'm really into health, and exercise,

and all that stuff." "Oh, okay."

Please, we can get arrested for that.

[Michael] So I'm waiting for my turn, you know,

wait in line, everybody's getting introduced.

And all of a sudden, I hear Rich and,

"So the next guy right here is a nutritionist."

[Richard] And last but not the least,

our next gentleman, this guy is studying to be

a nutritionist.

Bam. That... I just... Now, I know I'm up.

[exhales] So...

This is Michael. Michael...

[Michael] I walked out and the place erupted.

[cheers and applause]

[Michael] And it's for me.

I'm thinking, "Oh, this is... uh, this is good."

You know?

[Richard] The crowd went nuts for him.

He was a star. He was a star.

[Roger] I asked myself, "Maybe this guy

could be trouble.

He could take some attention away from me."

Having that feeling of being in the back of the class,

you know, not raising my hand, trying to, you know,

stay under the radar, it was like an adrenaline shot

to the heart, because now I'm in line

with all some of the best guys in Los Angeles.

And I held my own.

You know, this kid from East LA

came in and held his own.

You know, as the weeks and months went on,

I became Chippendales.

I mean, it was all I thought about.

When I went to the gym, when I did anything,

it was to look better for the next night.

I'd been working for the club just for a few months

and I had been seeing this gorgeous girl

coming to the club, you know.

And she's tipping, you know, and...

Not just tipping the dancers, she's got, like,

the craziest ways to tip the dancers,

and everybody knows her.

I had never seen a girl like this where I come from.

Michael came across as very mysterious and quiet.

I would see him looking at me, but he never came up to me

and talked to me like the other ones.

So I became intrigued by him.

[singer] ♪ To an unknown destination ♪

[Michael] I thought she was way out of my league.

But at the end of the show one night,

she comes up, and asked me to dance,

and it was a slow song.

So I said, "Okay." I put my tray down.

[singer] ♪ I've been arrested By you, take me in ♪

[Nancy] Michael had that way of only looking at you.

He's looking into your eyes, and only your eyes

and everybody else around you disappeared.

[singer] ♪ I've been arrested By you... ♪

There was just a connection with us that night.

And then that was the beginning.

I was totally taken.

I was totally, right from the get-go,

I was in love.

[singer] ♪ Take me in ♪

[camera shutter clicking]

[man] You may kiss your bride.

[Nancy] It was like the whole package.

He was beautiful on the outside,

but he had a beautiful soul, too.

I hadn't felt like that kind of love ever.

[singer] ♪ I don't know Who I am ♪

♪ But my dilemma's Where to start ♪

[Nancy] And I became Nancy Rapp.

[singer] ♪ Something's Happening in my heart ♪

When you fall in love like that,

you think it's forever, you know, good and bad,

and whatever comes our way.

[siren wailing]

[TV reporter] ...at the urging of her husband,

Paul Snider, she was chosen the Playmate of the Year.

Friends said the couple separated two months ago,

and then Paul Snider no longer liked the idea

of his wife posing for Playboy magazine.

One day I was at the club early,

because we were gonna do some rehearsals

and I was gonna have lunch with Steve,

and some detectives came to the club.

And they said, "Can you tell us

where Steve Banerjee is, the owner of Chippendales?"

And I said, "Yes, his office is right over there."

And, uh, I heard them talking and that's when I heard

Steve say he knew nothing about it, knew nothing.

And then the detectives came up to me and said,

"What can you tell us about Paul Snider?"

[man] Okay, get you up.

Which camera?

[Dorothy] Okay. Who am I posing for?

As Dorothy got more and more popular,

Paul got more and more desperate.

He was not gonna let go of Dorothy for anything.

That was his meal ticket.

[laughs] Oh, thank you.

Please welcome Dorothy Stratten.

[cheers and applause]

[Sondra] She was the perfect package.

She oozed sexual energy, but yet she was this girl

next door, innocent, perfect, and sweet.

[man] You really are a lovely young lady.

Thank you.

[Sondra] All of a sudden, she was rising

to stardom by herself.

And he saw her slipping away.

She was driven to become an actress and become a star.

And she recognized that Paul was not the one

that was going to go that distance with her.

And so she made a decision to leave Paul.

[dramatic music playing]

Playboy Magazine's

1980 Playmate of the Year has been found shot to death,

killed apparently by her estranged husband,

who then killed himself.

[TV news broadcaster] Early today, the bodies

of the Playmate of the Year

and her estranged husband were found in his house.

Our evidence leads us to believe,

at this time, that it was a murder-suicide,

that the husband shot his wife,

and subsequently turned the weapon on himself,

and killed himself.

[Sondra] She went there to ask him to let her free,

to let her go.

She just needed to be able to walk away.

He tied her up and he tortured her for several hours.

And then he shot her face off, which was...

Taking away what really brought her there.

He didn't want anybody to have her anymore.

[woman] Were you in the house when the bodies were discovered?

- Yes. - [woman] You were?

Yes.

[woman] Were you in the house when the shooting occurred?

No.

- [woman] You were not? - No.

The illusion of Playboy was that we lived

in a perfect world and nothing bad seemed to happen.

Not in our world.

And it did, he shattered our world.

[Bruce] We were all very upset.

At the time, I had no idea that this was only

the beginning of a series of tragic misfortunes

that would come into our lives.

[upbeat music playing]

[Bruce] The success in LA gave us money to expand.

And Steve wanted New York, because you're nobody

if you don't have a club in New York.

LA was second-string to the famous clubs,

the Studio 54s and the other clubs

that you'd read about in history.

So New York became very important to us.

But first, we needed to find a partner in New York.

[upbeat music playing]

Pinocchio is a story of a puppet who wished

he were a real boy.

[Bruce] Nick De Noia was a producer from New York

who did children's television,

something called Unicorn Tales

for which he won an Emmy.

He went on many adventures, and learned a lot

that a real boy should know, and finally,

his wish was granted.

He was darn charismatic and he certainly convinced

Steve that he can put a deal together in New York.

One day I get to Chippendales,

I knock on the door to Steve's office,

and there's someone else in the room.

And Steve says, "Uh, Richard, this is Nick De Noia.

He's a producer, choreographer.

He's won some awards

and he's gonna be producing the show."

"Producing the show? It's already a show.

I mean, what is he gonna do?"

"Nick won awards for a show about unicorns."

"Uh, what does unicorns have to do anything

with what we're doing?"

Fairy tales are marvelous, wonderful stories

that was supposed to have happened a long time ago.

Here is a story...

[Richard] He promised the world to everybody,

great success, great money to the dancers, to everybody.

I felt, uh... "Steve, he...

This guy is taking you for a ride, man."

Because Steve had a tendency to believe

a lot of people who told him all sorts of stories

of what they could do for him.

When we heard that there was gonna be a new director,

I was excited about it, because I wanted

to become a dancer.

So Nick, to me, was the future

and that's what I was gonna be a part of.

I was gonna be part of the future.

[Richard] I gave him the benefit of the doubt

and I was gonna work with him.

But Nick never showed me any respect

about what I had created.

He said, "Richard, you better do it my way,

because I'm the man in charge.

This is my show now."

I kept explaining to him, "Hey, it's my show."

"No, no, no, we're changing it."

And Nick basically stopped talking to me.

He stopped asking me to do anything.

He was trying to change things around,

so when he took it to New York,

he could do his own thing.

When I told Steve, "Let's just continue do

the show the way we used to do."

There was nothing I could do to change his mind.

I... He was sold that Nick was gonna make this bigger

and better, and more exciting, and take it all over,

and then we're gonna make a fortune.

I think I went home and I was emotional

when I got home.

I'm emotional now, because I knew

there was no coming back.

There was no coming back.

Once Nick got in there, that was it.

I was out.

[sniffs]

Yeah.

I was shocked when I learned

that Richard was fired, but Steve wasn't the kind

of person that would allow anyone

to stand in his way of making a lot of money.

You know, it wasn't the first time

someone betrayed me and took advantage of me.

I'm a believer in karma.

And Nick and Steve both paid the big price

for letting themselves get away with thinking

they could rip somebody off or hurt somebody

and steal something.

They paid in the long run.

[lights buzzing]

[upbeat music playing]

[Dan] One night after the show, Steve, and I,

and Nick went to the diner down the street,

which I went with Steve probably a couple times

a week.

But this time, this was different.

Nick talked about putting together a show

that he could bring to New York.

They talked about different acts.

They talked about the music and Steve

was excited about it.

And then Nick says that if I create

this wonderful show, taking it to New York,

he goes, "That's gonna take Chippendales

to another level.

I wanna be able to take it on the road,

because I created the show and it's gonna help you."

Nick started writing on a napkin,

and it was, like, three or four lines,

it basically said, "Steve Banerjee,

owner of Chippendales gives Nick De Noia the right

to take the show Chippendales on the road in perpetuity."

Steve signed it.

And that was it.

We ate, talked more about the show.

Later, I found out that Steve didn't know

what the word perpetuity meant.

So I don't think Steve had any idea

on where this was leading.

That little napkin changed Chippendales forever.

[rock music playing]