No burlesque dancer on The Block, Baltimore’s legendary downtown strip of debauchery and Adult Entertainment, has risen to more fame and notoriety than Blaze Starr. She brought flair, playful humor, and an outsized personality to the stage, where she charmed patrons for decades. And, she also charmed a Louisiana governor in the 1950s, having an affair that inspired the 1989 film, “Blaze”. Blaze Starr died in June at the age of 83.
Writer Margo Christie began stripping on The Block in 1978 at the age of 16. She heard stories about the legendary Blaze Starr and recently wrote about the influence Starr had in The Baltimore Sun. In 2013, Christie published a novel set on The Block in the 1970s. It’s called These Days. It tells the story of a starry-eyed teenager, Becky Shelling, who dreams of being a movie star, and who loves the music and films of her parent’s generation. A relationship with a smooth-talking older man leads her to working as a stripper on “The Block”. Tom spoke with Margo Christie about the book in January.
