Scale Sequined Priestess: Interview With a Cornstar

By: Smutstrutter
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Not all Carnies look like an overweight pervert with a smelly cigar and five o’clock shadow. Nor do they all look like midget bodybuilders with double joints. One particular, hauntingly beautiful “Corny” possesses enough clever perversion to stare up the shirts of upside down midgets on roller coasters, while shaking her god-given shell pasties below them. Bambi The Mermaid isn’t the only human prodigy nowadays, but she certainly is the most original without any piercings, tattoos or scarification. By day, Bambi is a makeup artist for commercials, Comedy Central and Nickelodeon. By night, she’s a mind-blowing, torso-tantalizing delicious array of scaled skin delight. Bambi’s visions of an aquatic Burlesque strip tease came to her at a very early age. At age five she even answered, “a Hooker” when asked what she wanted to become when she grew older. It all started back at the County Fairs in her birthplace of Indianapolis. It was when her fathered moved to Miami, that she cracked out of her husk, grew some scales, and found herself afloat on the shores of Coney Island. The corn-fed, midwestern mermaid (whose acts include snake charming, baby role-playing, Chicken Girl and goldfish consumption) has been performing there for over ten years now. The same amusement park/boardwalk in which she performed with her late husband, a daredevil/bike builder extraordinaire named, Indian Larry.

The Discovery Channel’s undefeated motorcycle fabricator, who longed and ultimately apprenticed under “Big Daddy” Eddy Roth, tragically found his way in New York Times Obituary on August 30^th of 2004. I’d assume they needed an entire page to pay enough contribution to the fearless legend. It was just as normal to find this tattooed shaman behind a hammer weld and gas torch, as it was to find him surfing on top of his custom Bobbers. In my eyes, Larry’s spirit had been lifted long before his last appearance at The Steel Liquid Classics and Custom Bike Series in Concord, NC. Through the love of Burlesque, in which she took up after stripping, Bambi has overcome the loss of her best friend and adorned husband. Besides her family clan of Carnies at Coney, Bambi has also been known to work with Kembra Phaler, Queen of the underground freak scene and lead vocalist to The Voluptuous Horror of Karen Black. Although the independent fetish film will go unnamed, we’ll imagine it only gives a new definition to the term “Stage Fright”. In the eye of a freak, the real freaks are often depicted as an audience of onlookers afraid to attempt, follow through, and even die for their dreams. ____________________________________________________________________________________

Are the dominatrix days behind you?

Yeah, I’ve pretty much retired from it. I still know a lot of professional Doms in New York and every once and awhile when they need help for really obscure roles, such as infantilism, I’ll come along. They have play pins in some of their dungeons, and I’ll play little baby sister in a really huge crib or something. I never really thought S&M was really all that healthy for someone else or even me. I believe it tends to drain a lot of psyche energy. It’s really not my bag at all, but I don’t mind the more mild manner roles, like shoe and foot fetishes.

Are you still snake charming on Coney Island?

Yes! We hold Burlesque On The Beach every Friday night from May to October, so I’ll be finishing up with that this Friday.

Are these snakes your pets, or do they belong on the island?

I use to own two albino Burmese pythons but I gave them up a few years back. They get really big, really fast and if you don’t have a house or somewhere big enough you’ll run out of space for them. Plus, reptiles are extremely stinky! I use to volunteer for a foster care program for exotic pets that would rescue snakes from drug dealer’s basements. I would work with them for two years, and then they would be sent to homes or habitat reserves in California or Texas. At one point I had two cats, two dogs, a ferret and the pythons, therefore the place just got out of hand. (laughs)

Were you ever bitten by any of them?

I did get bit, yes! Before burlesque was a really big scene, and more along the lines of generic performance art, I did this Cabaret show in New York, where I was mermaid, but didn’t have much of an act going, yet. My friend suggested snakes, in which I was extremely afraid of them, but not naturally or anything. I was more or less, uncomfortable around them. I was feeding an albino python, which are completely blind and rely on heat and smelling for senses. I was feeding it a frozen guinea pigs, because I was too grossed out with live ones. I had the snake wrapped around me and laid the guinea pig in the sink to fill a bowl of water.

Bambi-chicken!

The snake smelled the guinea pig but went straight for the heat, which happened to be my leg. She clamped down with this enormous pressure, and because their jaws lock, it’s teeth did not automatically retract. I had to remain completely still until it figured out for it’s own, that I wasn’t the guinea pig. It left this whopper bruise, but helped me to get over my fear of them. Now I know what to expect, and it isn’t the bite that’s startling. It’s the actual striking.

The last time I attempted to call you, you were on the road. Where did you go?

I go out with this Carnival, The Warthog Circus Sideshow. It’s the last of the last original traveling sideshows. Warthog’s over 70 years old and I love him to death. They go out all summer long, and I wish I could accompany them for that long, but usually only ride with them for a week or so. They use to a bunch, of what we call, ten in one acts, where I would climb a ladder of swords or walk on broken glass. Now, they specialize in illusion, and turn me into a little mermaid in fish bowl. People don’t realize the giant fishbowl with me in it above them, that is then projected into a little one on stage before them. You can tell it’s phony, but it’s really funny, though.

Do you have any stripper/burlesque icons?

Well, I’ve always admired Jane Mansfield. She was never really into Burlesque, but I always looked up to her sensibility, and of course, Betty Page’s tongue and cheekiness persona. I try to attend The Exotic World Museum (that originated back in the 70’s for stripper’s rights) once a year. It was originally built in Hillandale, CA but not resides in Las Vegas. All the old, old legends that were doing burlesque back in the 30’s come out of the woodworks and have a reunion. Dixie Evans, who paradoxes all of Marilyn Monroe, makes an appearance. A bunch of strippers form the 40’s and actresses from Russ Meyers’ movies attend it. We all gather around and worship these legends.

Can you tell us how you and Gasoline Alley are still recovering from Larry’s accident?

As you know, Gasoline Alley is now Indian Larry Legacy, and everybody is doing well. There for a while, I wanted nothing more to do with motorcycles. I couldn’t even stand to hear or be around one, but I’m coming back around. I don’t know how I could have made it without Burlesque and all of my pals. It is something that truly makes me happy, and Larry supported me in that. We held the annual Grease Monkey Block Party in which everyone paid respect. A lot of families show up, but eventually, I’d like to get together and choreograph something with the girls. They’re bikers, and they need tits, you know.

More: www.cornstar.com

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