Everyone knows the queen of Russ Meyer's bombshell Faster Pussycat! Kill! Kill!, one of the greatest films ever made (and worthy of restoration for the archives, Marty....) but how many know the star Tura Satana came from the burlesque world? Well...the stripper's world. She was able to leave the dumps behind after making something of a minor stir in the soup of Hollywood! But how many have seen the shots of Satana in her stripping days?
As with many here, the story is not pretty. Tura was gang raped at age 10 and the men who did it got off. The child of a silent movie actor from Japan and a Native American mother, she was interned in the notorious Manzanar camp for a time during World War Two...Then married at age 13. By 15, she was stripping, soon including work in the mob-infested hell-hole known as Calumet City, IL. The worst of the worst.
Fortunately, Tura survived by getting tough. Motorcycle leather and strong, kick-ass tough. she put on weight and muscle. A role model. The films below are worth purchasing.
The photos come from the Lenny Burtman publication Striparama. Lenny sold out for a time to Health Knowledge, a cheap ass fly by night publisher who put this item out in the summer of 1965. Eventually his titles were "owned" by Mobster Reuben Sturman...A REAL skuz.
ORDER THE BIRTH OF ROCK AND ROLL HERE
FILMS WITH TURA SATANA.
