Inside a night at Sexquisite, a cabaret for and by sex workers
Sexquisite’s joyful, sex worker run cabaret will soon lose its home as the iconic Bethnal Green Working Men’s Club announces closure.
It’s a Friday night and the Bethnal Green Working Men’s Club (BGWMC) has a line stretching around the block for its pride party, Sexquisite: Slut Heaven. The crowd sports everything from slinky ballgowns and button-downs to lingerie and bondage gear. Fake lashes flutter at stern bouncers in suits, who filter the guests into the red-brick Victorian building.
Sexquisite is a cabaret show for and by sex workers. Sex workers are anyone whose work is part of a sex industry. This can range from stripping to creating online content, to full-service in-person sex. Roughly 44% of the UK’s 72,8000 sex workers are based in London.
The show platforms the manifold skills of sex workers, from full-nudity strip teases to heartfelt poetry and song. They have grown from a 2019 student project by founder Maedb Joy to a thriving collective with sell-out shows.
Inside, the BGWMC is a delightful combination of old and new. Swirling carpeted floors and handsome wood panelling in the entryway contrast the main room, which boasts a huge light-up heart on stage, pink tinsel, and a strip pole.
People are lining up to buy ‘tipping dollars,’ fake dollar bills to throw at the performers, merch, and drinks (not working club prices, but still pretty cheap for London).
Bundled in a cheetah print coat and stilettos, the effortlessly warm April Fiasco takes control of the crowd with an intro for the night. She sets some ground rules, such as how to behave with the performers (only touch when agreed) and what to do with the tipping dollars (please no more paper aeroplanes).
After founder Joy, Fiasco must be Sexquisite’s biggest creative contributor. Since the first show in 2019, she’s been the resident host, also serving as co-artistic director and currently, an associate producer.
When Sexquisite began Fiasco mainly worked as a stripper in London. After the lockdown began she was pushed towards different forms of sex work such as camming to make a living. Although initially hesitant about the stigma, Fiasco is now outspoken. ‘I never wanted my tits on the internet forever,’ she said, ‘now I’m like it’s really not a big deal. I’m not ashamed of my body or the things I’ve done on camera for money so I can live in this world.’
With clubs closed and contact limited, many other sex workers were put into similar situations to Fiasco during Covid. Through the lockdown, Fiasco and Joy ran writing workshops for sex workers, and Fiasco co-founded the unionised sex workers collective Cybertease.
Onstage, the first act of the night, a stripper, twerk instructor and ‘professional slut’ named Destiny, has the crowd going wild to Kim Petras’ ‘Treat Me Like a Slut.’ She’s followed by Nokx, an aerial/pole performer and stripper, who cuts an impressive figure as he performs acrobatics with a bald head, thong and thigh-highs.
When Fiasco comes on, she’s wearing a crown and studiously reading a book called ‘The British Empire.’ Miming to a voiceover exploring her feelings on her mixed-race heritage, bisexuality, and the Spice Girls, she strips off her coat to peel off increasingly tiny outfits with various flags, ending the show wearing just two pasties illustrated with the globe. It’s political, raunchy, and hilarious.
The crowd feels celebratory without a sleazy or demeaning edge, and in response, the performers feel completely in their element.
Tipping dollars and cheers rain on the stage. In between acts, a dedicated stage manager crawls on hands and knees to collect the crumpled bills, which are re-used for later shows.
Sexquisite has provided sex workers paid creative opportunities, support with CVs, job experiences (for example on the Sexquisite marketing team), writing and career workshops and safe spaces to gather. In an industry that is so rarely vocal, community support like this is hard to find.
Before founding Sexquisite, Joy found herself isolated from friends and family due to her secretive history of sex work. ‘When your secrets are attached to stigma, people want you to be quiet,’ she said, ‘I created a space I really needed.’ Now, performers and audience members alike often describe Sexquisite as life-changing, especially those who are sex workers themselves.
During Joy’s act, she performs deeply personal poetry. The crowd shifts from raucous to hushed. ‘I question everyone I have ever loved before. Flashback to the time he broke my heart, and I screamed ‘omg I’m like gay!’ Went from annoying straight girl, to only straight for pay.’ she reads.
Like many events at the BGWMC, Sexquisite wouldn’t exist if the venue hadn’t given them a chance – every other location had turned them down. Joy said: ‘When I said we were platforming sex workers, they would say there’s no space in the diary.’
The BGWMC is one of London’s last surviving working men’s clubs. It was founded in 1887 as a space where working-class men and their families could drink cheaply, socialise, and hold events. The ban on smoking indoors, and a squeeze on the cost of booze means that many working men’s clubs have shut down since being founded.
In 2006, club members in a tight spot took a chance on promoters Warren Dent and Charlotte West-Williams. The two brought the club back from the brink with a radical shift into a nightlife venue.
Now the club hosts queer and fringe events, including cabarets, drag shows, and at one point a gay fight club. ‘It’s been lovely for us to see people grow, we get real pleasure out of seeing things start from zero and grow from something,’ Dent said.
Dent and West-Williams said the club’s closure came as a surprise. The BGWMC is owned by its original members and run as a cooperative. This has meant the members could vote to sell it with little notice.
Outside, Nathan the club’s head doorman since 2009 is standing guard. He’s a bit of a legend in the club, and worried about its closure. ‘We went from a straight club to diversity,’ he says, referring to the club becoming a queer venue. ‘We have a duty to protect and help the LGBT community. I believe they would feel a bit vulnerable somewhere else.’
Although he’s performed music with them before, tonight trans artist Broke Boy is doing his first strip dance for Sexquisite. It’s to mark his top surgery which ironically was paid for by its targets: Broke Boy’s boobs.
‘I was basically like, I’m going to be a stripper, get my tits out for money, and use that money to get my tits off. It was sort of like drag for me,’ he says. Broke Boy’s background in sex work has also included strip, pro-domination and full-service sex work. Sexquisite has allowed him to explore his musical persona within the context of sex work but without the pressure of a typical strip venue.
Onstage, Broke Boy shifts from a softspoken guy in cargo shorts and a t-shirt to a confident rapper, singer and stripper in just a thong. He performs his popular parody of WAP, called ‘Trans Ass Pussy’ (TAP).
The mood is bittersweet as the news of BGWMC’s closure spreads. Audience members felt the club would be hard to replace for marginalised communities. Stella, from the sex worker collective ASWAC, said ‘Just seeing all the talent of sex workers gives you this ‘oomph’ when you otherwise feel isolated and stigmatised.’ Trisha, a hobbyist pole dancer said: ‘It’s that space I was trying to find, where I can show up as an ally.’
As the night goes on, the performances continue to surprise. Erica Vaughn performs burlesque while stapling tipping dollars onto her bare skin with a staple gun. Alma Groin, dressed like a raunchy little mermaid, parodies songs from the soundtrack while brandishing dildoes.
Behind the scenes, Poppy Pray (aka The Whoretographer), snaps photos. ‘It feels like this is your space, and you take ownership of it,’ they said, ‘as sex workers, and even as queer femmes and queer women, you don’t often feel like that in gay clubs.’
Two more performances close out the night: the leggy Angel Bella gives a raffle winner a lapdance and Miss Averi breathes real fire while performing a slow, dramatic dance. The stage lights go down, and a DJ comes on.
With the pole now open to newbies and performers mingling on the dance floor, the line between audience and performers blurs, and the night opens up to possibility.
Up until now, Sexquisite and the BGWMC have been symbiotic, creating a safe space for queer people and sex workers in the heart of Bethnal Green. The hope is that both the venue staff and Sexquisite find a new location, somewhere close to home.
The exact closing date of BGWMC has yet to be confirmed but July is the last month of programmed events and Sexquisite’s final night at the BGWMC is this July 25th.
If you enjoyed reading this, you might enjoy our interview with Bethnal Green Working Men’s Club’s drag star Margo Marshall.