Inspired by Sisterhood: Anarchy In High Heels
In the 1970s and early ‘80s I was a member of an all-female troupe of performers. This group, Les Nickelettes, occupied a defining place in my life story. Based in San Francisco, Les Nickelettes was a bit too radical for the mainstream of the time, but received a lot of attention in the underground counterculture. We dared to get up on stage and defy the age old axiom that women aren’t funny. Not only that, we took up the mantle of the most dangerous form of humor: satire.
And even more brazenly, we conjured up bawdy comedy from our shared female experiences and added a salacious feminist kick to it. Even the second-wave feminists didn’t know what to make of us. Les Nickelettes also rejected the accepted model of the time that women’s groups, by nature, were competitive and combative. We supported, promoted, and advocated for one another. We were collaborators. No cat-fights, no trying to steal boyfriends, no backstabbing.
Before Les Nickelettes I never imagined myself as a director or organizer of anything. I was quite content to leave the producing stuff to men. I was a follower with no responsibilities, as free as a bird, but also with very little power. In Les Nickelettes I took charge, I solved problems, and found strength and confidence in guiding my own destiny. The experience transformed me into a champion for women doing things on their own terms.
In the mid-eighties, the group stopped performing, but many of us remained good friends and continued to support each other and maintained a bond through a shared sense of humor. As I went on to pursue other endeavors, the skills I had developed as a director and producer in Les Nickelettes helped me to take on other leadership roles. But, I and others in the group noticed that out in the big bad world there wasn’t the same equality and communal affinity in other work groups that we experienced in Les Nickelettes. It made me reflect that this experience in an all-female group; where we set the rules, was special and unique.
As time went by, I would read with dismay, stories or chronicles of events written about those heady times in San Francisco, where Les Nickelettes were mentioned only briefly, or facts were skewed, or Les Nickelettes were left out entirely. This increasingly irritated me. We were dismissed in history just as we had been in real time as not seriously important.
The further I got from the events that occurred, the more I realized how significant they were. Funny feminists in a time when that was considered an oxymoron? Women cooperating and growing together when extreme competitiveness was the benchmark? Making wacky fun of patriarchal norms? I also noted the lack of stories told from the “chicks” point of view of that San Francisco counterculture era. I came to the conclusion that this story mustn’t be swept into the dustbin of history – as with so many other tales of female trailblazers. I had to write of the adventures, of the lessons, of the fun, of Les Nickelettes.
So, nearly thirty years ago (yes, it really took that long), I started to write a non-fiction account of this group of bawdy all-female feminist performers who dared to step out of the confines of conventional pigeonholes. But as I finished the first draft, friends who read the accounts commented that I wasn’t including how I felt about these adventures. They’d say, “Surely, these worldview changing events had an impact on your life?”
“And what about the other women involved? What were the relationships between you and the other members of the group like?” They insisted that a non-fiction telling of the events was insufficient; “Make it more like a memoir.” This became my inspiration stew. The sisterhood that, in my youth, inspired personal growth and development, now inspired my matured reflection on the meaning of it all.–
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ABOUT DENISE LARSON
Denise Larson is a native Californian: she went to elementary school in the Los Angeles suburb town of Torrance and high school in the San Joaquin Valley city of Manteca, and finally, after college, she put down roots in San Francisco. With a BA in theater from San Francisco State University, she pinned her dreams on becoming an experimental theater artist in the ’70s counterculture milieu of the Bay Area. Along that path she founded Les Nickelettes.
For thirteen years, she helmed the feminist theater company and assumed the role of actress, playwright, producer, stage director, and administrative/artistic director. Then she gave it all up to become a mother and teacher. After a twenty-year career in early childhood education, she retired and took up writing. Denise still lives in San Francisco with her husband and their cat. She has also returned to her first love: theater. She is taking an improv class, and collaborating with other performers to form a new theatre group: Cosmic Elders. The author resides in San Francisco, CA.
ANARCHY IN HIGH HEELS
“This is a delightfully nostalgic peek into the Baby Boomer-era of funny, feminist Americana.” ―Anna Fields, author of The Girl in the Show – Three Generations of Comedy, Culture, and Feminism
“Denise Larson proves a wise and witty guide to the taboo-busting, iconoclastic underground scene of ’70s San Francisco, charting the development of her own artistic growth and confidence through spearheading the subversive, ground-breaking ensemble Les Nickelettes, who served notice that women could be outspoken, raunchy, and above all funny.” ―Ellin Stein, author of That’s Not Funny, That’s Sick: The National Lampoon and the Comedy Insurgents Who Captured the Mainstream
Anarchy in High Heels is not a state of dress; it’s a state of mind.
A San Francisco porno theater might be the last place you’d expect to plant the seed of a feminist troupe, but truth is stranger than fiction.
In 1972, access to birth control and a burn-your-bra ethos were leading young women to repudiate their 1950s conservative upbringing and embrace a new liberation. Denise Larson was a timid twenty-four-year-old actress wannabe when, at an after-hours countercultural event, The People’s Nickelodeon, she accidentally created Les Nickelettes. This banding together of like-minded women with an anything-goes spirit unlocked a deeply hidden female humor. For the first time, Denise allowed the suppressed satirical thoughts dancing through her head to come out in the open. In 1980, The Bay Guardian described the group as “nutty, messy, flashy, trashy, and very funny.”
With sisterhood providing the moxie, Denise took on leadership positions not common for women at the time: playwright, stage director, producer, and administrative/artistic director. But, in the end, the most important thing she learned was the power of female friendship.
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Category: On Writing
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