Deuce is Wild

The cool little L.A. club that introduced the world to Dita Von Teese and reveled the art of the tease to a new generation of horny hipsters is branching out to Vegas, London, and, with any luck, New York. Hang on to your pasties.
By Donnell Alexander
Photos by Jeff Vogeding

It’s a small room for L.A. Squeeze more than a hundred people inside Forty Deuce and the fire marshal might have a strong case. That’s why it’s so overwhelming when a New York bred Latina called Dakota steps into the spotlight wearing a blue feather boa and a flash of fringe across her crotch. She makes her elegant way across the club’s narrow stage to the sound of a three-piece band, losing her clothing, seemingly, step by step. Her dance is a close but-no-nudity provocation that reduces your average strip club get-down to playground hokey-pokey. Amazingly, the crowd is made up of more chicks than dudes, and when Dakota lets loose, you can almost hear the panties moistening.

Ivan Kane’s Forty Deuce is a rare slice of gritty Hollywood glamour, the kind of spot where the deejay flits between bursts of “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun” and classic hip-hop, and the folks in the V.I.P. section are unshaven and possibly sporting sweats. Very L.A. “Part of what makes Forty Deuce great is that we mix the swells with that different demographic,” Kane says. “Any one demographic in a room is going to be kind of boring. What makes it interesting is to get a diverse kind of crowd that wants to get a little bit down and dirty in an elegant setting. That’s what makes the night achieve its magic.”

Kane, who opened Forty Deuce in 2002, had hoped his creation would fly in his native New York. The screen writer turned-entrepreneur had Sting and David Bowie as financial backers, but that failed to sway neighborhood opponents. In September, Kane thought the local community board protest would be a minor irritant, a predictable hurtle to any New York club opening. “It’s just part of the process,” he said. But by October the entrepreneur had become frustrated that months of hearings and diplomacy had failed to win him the liquor license he needed to set up shop. In the gentrified flanks of Little Italy, he’d run up against the kind of outrage he’d never encountered in Hollywood.

Luckily, there’s always Vegas. In the desert, at the club Kane opened in 2004, the Forty Deuce dancers perform bigger and project more broadly than in L.A. There, Kane strived to appeal to industry people who work in other nightclubs, casinos, and bars. “Man doesn’t live on Friday and Saturday alone,” he says.

If Kane ever gets New York’s version off the ground, it will break from what his other clubs have done so far-changes which remain, in part, a secret. The trick is recognizing how every market is like a snowflake-or a woman. “There are subtle differences,” Kane says, “but those differences will make or break you.”

Kane is planning on opening a Forty Deuce in London and one in San Diego next year, and is confident his formula can transcend borders. “I don’t care if I’m on the moon, hot women are hot women,” Kane said while in New York on a day when it was crawling with even more models than usual. “I’ve seen a lot of long legs this week, because it’s fashion week, and I don’t think these women are from the same planet that I am. I think there are gorgeous women on both coasts. I fly between two magnificent cities and complete the triangle in Las Vegas; it certainly is a visual feast. I don’t think I can take two steps and not see gorgeous, talented, fabulous women.” Just like his dancers can’t take two steps without causing arousal.