Jumbo's Clown Room

34°06′07″N 118°18′08″W / 34.10207°N 118.30235°W / 34.10207; -118.30235

Jumbo's Clown Room
Jumbo's
Map
Location5153 Hollywood Boulevard, Los Angeles, California 90027-6113
Coordinates34°06′07″N 118°18′08″W / 34.10207°N 118.30235°W / 34.10207; -118.30235
TypeBikini bar
Seating typecounter, table, stage
Construction
Opened 1970 (1970-06 23)
Renovated1980 (renovated and converted into a strip club)[1]
Website
jumbos.com

Jumbo's Clown Room, often shorthanded to Jumbo's, is a "bikini bar" (non-nude strip club) located on Hollywood Boulevard in the East Hollywood neighborhood of Los Angeles, California. The bar opened on July 27, 1970. It became a strip club in 1982.[2]

Overview

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Jumbo's Clown Room has been described as embodying the burlesque dance spirit more than its counterparts in Hollywood and farther west.[3] It has also been described as being "infamous"[4] and as somewhat of a dive bar with unusual clown images hung on the walls that provides some inexpensive beer options while also hosting exotic dancers that perform striptease and pole dancing.[5] Some of the workers there also perform lap dances.[6] Rather than having an on-premises disk jockey, the dancers choose their own songs using a jukebox.[6] Jumbo's serves beer and cocktails.[4][6] Today, it is a family-owned and operated business.[7]

The Cyber Clown Girls show

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After the COVID-19 pandemic began in California in early 2020, Jumbo's had to temporarily close its doors to the public in March 2020 due to the State of California mandating the closure of indoor restaurants and bars across the state.[7] The club's exotic dancers could not perform, and as an alternative to this, some of the dancers at the club created an internet-based performance show named the "Cyber Clown Girls".[7] The website enabled the dancers to realize revenue and to expand their reach outside of the Los Angeles area.[7] An admission ticket purchase is required, and dancer tips are paid by customers using payment applications such as Cash App and Venmo.[8] As of March 2022, the Cyber Clown Girls were continuing to perform and broadcast shows.[9]

Some of the dancers on the website donated some of their earnings to various LGBTQ+ and reproductive justice organizations.[7] By March 2021, the Cyber Clown Girls had donated over $25,000 to various causes, non-profits and organizations.[10] Charity recipients have included the Los Angeles Food Bank, Black Lives Matter groups, Gender Justice L.A. and Reform L.A. Jails, among others.[4]

In March 2021, in response to increased violence toward Asian-Americans occurring in the United States, the Cyber Clown Girls presented an all-Asian online show in support of the National Asian Pacific American Women's Forum chapter in the U.S. state of Georgia, which works "to empower AAPI women and girls" and the Butterfly Asian and Migrant SW Network, an organization that works to assist Asian and migrant sex workers.[10]

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Musician and actress Courtney Love once worked as a dancer at Jumbo's Clown Room.[11] Musician Lemmy of Motörhead sometimes patronized the establishment.[6] Anthony Bourdain had described himself as a "fan" of the club and had stated that it was one of his favorite bars.[12][13] In 2017, Ellen DeGeneres performed a skit at Jumbo's for The Ellen DeGeneres Show as "Karla Kardashian", a fictional character that has been described as "a lesser-known fourth Kardashian sister".[14] The heavy metal band Rusty Eye filmed two music videos at Jumbo's in 2020.[15] Circa 2020, country musician Jaime Wyatt filmed the video for the song "Neon Cross" at Jumbo's.[16] In the 1985 film Walking The Edge, Robert Forster's character is a regular at the Clown Room.[17] On the late-night show Conan, Johnny Five tells Aziz Ansari "I'll meet you at Jumbo's Clown Room" and host Conan O'Brien adds "that's a great joke if you know what Jumbo's Clown Room is".[18] It's rumored that a dancer named 'Jinx' from the Clown Room, appears on the cover of Tom Waits album 'Small Change'.[19]

See also

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References

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  1. ^ "Jumbo's Clown Room And Coolhaus Created A New Ice Cream Treat". LAist. November 18, 2015. Archived from the original on March 13, 2022. Retrieved March 11, 2022.
  2. ^ "History". Jumbo's Clown Room. January 1, 2010. Archived from the original on March 11, 2022. Retrieved March 11, 2022.
  3. ^ "LA.com Nightlife". Archived from the original on 2008-05-16. Retrieved 2008-05-04.
  4. ^ a b c "Lust For Life: Female-Created Virtual Cabaret and Strip Shows Heat up in Pandemic Times". LA Weekly. August 27, 2020. Archived from the original on April 21, 2021. Retrieved March 11, 2022.
  5. ^ Tourists, N.F. (2019). Not For Tourists Guide to Los Angeles 2020. Not For Tourists. p. 45. ISBN 978-1-5107-4712-8. Archived from the original on March 13, 2022. Retrieved March 11, 2022.
  6. ^ a b c d Dinsdale, Emily (July 13, 2021). "@therealbitchyoustrippin chronicles life inside a legendary LA strip club" Archived 2021-07-23 at the Wayback Machine. Dazed. Retrieved March 11, 2022.
  7. ^ a b c d e Kalish, Lil (September 14, 2021). "The Strip Club Boss Who Said: "Dancers Are Like Cockroaches. They’re Drawn to the Sugar." Archived 2022-01-29 at the Wayback Machine. Mother Jones.
  8. ^ Easter, Makeda (October 5, 2020). "How out-of-work strippers made their show virtual and are 'taking the power back'". Yahoo Lifestyle Canada. Archived from the original on October 12, 2020. Retrieved March 11, 2022.
  9. ^ "CCG X The Stripper Co-Op Present: $PRING BREAK - A Hybrid IRL/Virtual Show!". Eventbrite. Archived from the original on March 13, 2022. Retrieved March 11, 2022.
  10. ^ a b Lecaro, Lina (March 20, 2021). "Cyber Clown Girls Host All-Asian Online Show to Combat AAPI Hate". LA Weekly. Archived from the original on June 8, 2021. Retrieved March 11, 2022.
  11. ^ Luerssen, J.D. (2014). Nirvana FAQ: All That's Left to Know About the Most Important Band of the 1990s. FAQ. Backbeat. p. 284. ISBN 978-1-61713-589-7. Archived from the original on March 13, 2022. Retrieved March 11, 2022.
  12. ^ Elliott, Farley (September 23, 2016). "Bourdain hits Jumbo's Clown Room, Danny Meyer loves Bludso's, and more". Eater LA. Archived from the original on October 30, 2016. Retrieved March 11, 2022.
  13. ^ "From In-N-Out to Chateau Marmont, Anthony Bourdain understood what makes L.A. great" Archived 2022-02-17 at the Wayback Machine. Los Angeles Times. Retrieved March 11, 2022.
  14. ^ Tenreyro, Tatiana (September 29, 2017). "Ellen DeGeneres' 'Karla Kardashian' Character Returns to 'The Ellen Show' in Fake 'Keeping Up' Trailer". Billboard. Archived from the original on March 11, 2022. Retrieved March 11, 2022.
  15. ^ Fadroski, Kelli Skye (October 30, 2020). "How Rusty Eye made COVID-safe music videos at LA's legendary Jumbo's Clown Room". Los Angeles Daily News. Archived from the original on January 25, 2021. Retrieved March 13, 2022. Retrieved March 11, 2022.
  16. ^ Cooper, Leonie (June 5, 2020). "Country star Jaime Wyatt on the road to new album 'Neon Cross': "I'm lucky to be alive at this point"". NME. Archived from the original on March 11, 2022. Retrieved March 11, 2022.
  17. ^ Walking the Edge (1985) - IMDb, retrieved 2023-04-29
  18. ^ Aziz Ansari Settles His “Short Circuit” Beef With Johnny Five - CONAN on TBS, retrieved 2023-12-29
  19. ^ Cassandra Peterson
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