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I was also pretty wild too, Like I mean, when I look back, it's like, I'm very I've always been very responsible, but you know, like, no, the same kind of thing didn't happen to me that happened in Anna Nicole Smith. But you know, I mean I was going out partying. I worked in the reeve scene, you know, and I was up all night and I was like, you know, I was just doing a different kind of drugs if I'm honest, you know, like I wasn't doing addictive drugs, but I was using mind altering drugs.
Today, on no Filter, you're going to meet a woman who's built her entire life on the art of transformation. Dieta Bontees was born here the Sweet, a ballet student from small town Michigan who fell in love with old Hollywood glamour, the idea that beauty itself could tell a story. As a teenager working in a lingerie store, she opened her first bra, a plain white cotton thing in a
plastic egg, and felt instantly disappointed. She'd imagined something romantic, something transformative, and that moment sparked her lifelong mission to make the world or at least her world more beautiful. Now known globally as the Queen of Burlesque, her shows blend theater, fantasy and precision. But behind the spectacle is a woman who's built power out of control and mystery
out of complete self possession. This is a conversation about beauty, identity, power, about desiccated coconut, and the liberation that comes from inventing yourself, reinventing yourself, and then living that invention fully. This is Dita Vontees, unfiltered. Let me just say, what a thrillities to drink you in with my own eyes as though I am a lady from a Martini glass.
Thank you very much.
Ditavontes, welcome to no filter.
Thank you.
I've noticed that in nearly all your interactions with people, they become very self conscious about what they're wearing in relation to how you present. Is that a really common thing?
I think it is about the person. Yes, you know, like a certain kind of person will say something like, oh, I didn't know we were dressing up today, you know, like right, yes, And those are like even like certain friends of mine that I'm like, oh oh yeah, I mean, how long have we known each other, you know, And it's a very particular type of like person that would
say that. In general, I think people that do feel a little like h I guess I you know, maybe I feel uncomfortable because you know, I didn't put it for the effort. I mean it's usually what I'm saying
is it says more about them than me. And I don't think even I have plenty of friends who don't dress up at all, who never say things like that, you know, So I think it's just a certain it's about that person, and it doesn't make you like a bad person that you didn't want to dress up, but like you definitely, I don't think it is like I can't remember every time turning to somebody saying like, oh god,
I'm really overdressed. I should have you know, Like I just feel like very firm and when I picked, and I've been overdressed and underdressed for things, and you know, fly undergressed if I'm honest. But you know, like for me when I feel underdressed.
Yes, Wayne, give me an example, data Vontee of ways, well you have been on to dress. I know you've been on dressed.
I think the thing is like I might feel that I could have gone further, like, oh, I really could have gone further with this. I didn't realize I could
have taken it there, you know. But I might feel like underdressed sometimes at like if there was a like a fancy dress party that I was invited to when I didn't have the right clothes or something, you know, or things like that, or I don't know, I'm trying to think of an example, but or like, for instance, I was just trying on some dresses to wear, like a package of dresses that came from a designer I love, and I was like, I put on this beautiful like
beaded dress and it's cocktail length, and I thought, oh, but you know what, like I think what I'm going to is like people were we wearing full length gowns, but this is like a beaded dress. It's just not to the floor. So I thought, like, I mean, I can, by all accounts, I could wear this dress. It's like it's amazing, it's all intricate beadwork and everything. But I had this start like, oh, I should really wear like a gown because I can at this. So maybe it's like that, do.
You know what I find fascinating. I mean, there's a lot that's fascinating about you. But now in a world where people are very tribal, and we have the Internet and people have access to any manner of accouterments from their tribe, you can get online if you decide that you're you know, rockabilly or your death metal or your you can find all those things. Yea, when you were a teenager growing up in Michigan and then later on in California, the world wasn't like that.
No, not at all. But it's real. Isn't it great when you get to the point where you're watching all these shifts in the world. I mean, I think about that all the time about you know, I don't I'm very I try to be careful of being that person. That's like in my day, we had to use a map, you know, you know, in trying to explain to people because it is funny, you think like, wow, I'm like, you know, I'm to the point where I've experienced all
this like technology and changing. But I do think like not having the internet to google pictures or other people's performances, for instance, if I relate it to what I do, that fueled me in being creative on my own, Like I didn't have anyone to look at. Like when I was first making burlesque shows, I had a book that had still photos of burlesque stars, like portraits, and I saw the movie Gypsy with Natalie Wood and maybe like one other forties movie that had burlesque, you know, like
portrayed burlesque in it. But you know, I didn't have like a real example of other burlesque dancers, like real life ones, or what burlesque was really like in the nineteen thirties and forties. So I've kind of I had to like imagine in my mind what I thought it
should be. And in fact, actually I got coached by a very like famous burlesque star and she told me what I was, Like, what do I do with these feather fans that I have, you know, because I only had portraits of Sally Rand, and she's tried to describe
to me what Sally Rand did. And so it's really funny to like think like about how much access there is to like you know, get inspiration or copy, you know, like there's so it's so easy now, but like I really had to sit there and be like, Okay, feather fans are like wings, Okay, I'm going to strike these
poses and I'm going to cover you know. I really had to like work it out on my own, and so I think like that really helped get me where I am today and made me like original because I didn't have like a you know, one thing to copy.
But it's also interesting because you know, when you're a teenage job, the compulsionies as a teenager, often you want to travel with the hoods. Yes, yeah, And so teenage girls now, like i'd see with my daughter, they the girls will wear, you know, a tracksuit pants and a crop puffer and there's like a uniform that they have.
Yeah. Yeah, which I'm actually very amused by when I see because you start to notice it. But you see it more in younger people than older people. But you see like a group of maybe like four or five girls, and I always say this. I'll turn to somebody and say, look, same shoe, same hamline, same shirt, like different color, And
it's like really astonishing when you think about it. And so when I think back to when I was a teenager, I had like one best friend and we both worked in a lingerie store, and so we had our thing but it was very different than the other girls. Like we wore like a boustier with you know, our jeans, or like a slip with a little cardigan sweater. But we definitely I didn't have like a group of girls addressed like that. It was really me and her that
cared about vintage. But it was I think because we didn't we were totally self sufficient, Like our parents didn't give us any money. So like the you know, I had friends where I grew up at, you know, in Orange County, California, Like ive, I got driven to school every day in a nineteen sixties Porsche oh by my friend. Oh you know, but those were not mine. That's not
how I grew up. So my other friend, we were both girls that worked and had to pay for our own food and school books and all of this stuff, you know. But we were hanging around a lot of like people that had a lot of money from their parents, and so they had all the designer jeans and shoes. So we were a little bit like outcasts like that, not outcasts, but like we wore vintage things and style their clothes very differently than our friends with money.
Right, and so at that time, you must have even had a saints of how you were perceived by your broader school community at the time. How did you fit into things?
Well, I feel like there was so many different types of people. It's just where I went to school in particular. There, you know, there was a lot of that. But I don't think I ever felt like I was still friends, you know, I was still part of that the friend group, and I don't really remember having like a I know, there were there were lots of other like clicks, you know, like you know, I was you know, I certainly had like was part of a clique, you know, but I
don't know, I'm not exactly sure. I feel like I noticed more of the division maybe in my early twenties or after I got out of high school, right, And I think that would be because like I really started when I when I was eighteen and first graduated. You know, I had my high school sweetheart was like a water polo player, you know, like guard all of these things,
and so they had this like surf culture. I grew up like in high school with him and as part of this like surf and swimming culture as opposed to
like sports. But anyway, so then when we kind of came of age, like after high school, I got randomly taken to a rave party and I met all these drag queens and club kids, and it really like everything changed, and it was very like WHOA, Now, I can you know, really dress how I want to dress, you know, because I was kind of, you know, I was always eccentric and like stylish and different because I always enjoyed that for myself and always loved, like, you know, pushing the envelope.
But when I met this kind of whole different world of like eccentrics, I really flourished.
So when you would be prior to that, if you were like going to watch your water polo boyfriend play, you'd presumably be getting in the pool yourself at some point.
Yeah, I was. It was kind of beach you know, like the beach.
Yeah. Yeah, And were you bringing in that ye oldie worldye nineteen fifties sort of Betty Grable in the swimsuit Louk than No.
I got actually remember getting a ticket for indecent exposure for wearing a g string bikini in the eighties, really because I remember being me and my girlfriend, she tells the story, the same friend I was talking about that I convinced her that we needed to get these thong back bathing suits, and I was like, it's going to be really great, girl, all the girls are doing at
which they were, you know. But I remember we got there and she like I just like walked down on the beach and took off my like shorts and everybody was like whoa, And she was too scared and couldn't take off her shorts and get her butt out. But yeah, I got a ticket for indecent exposure, which I think is hilarious. I would kill to have that.
Ticket to be oh, yes, frying framed.
Yes. But anyway, I don't know. I mean I was just always kind of like like doing things a little different. I wasn't really I wasn't like an exhibitionist really. I just liked the idea of this songback bikini that I was starting to see, like, you know, poster girls wearing and whatnot. It's funny to look back on that.
And then because it was always then a kind of singularity to you.
Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I think I always just really liked things that were different and rare. I grew up watching old movies with my mother and my mother is a very like natural type of woman. But I remember my girl, like certain friends of mine, I had a very eccentric aunt opal and she was, you know, more like the blue eyeshadow and the eyeliner and the nails and lots of jewelry and smoke. There's a cigarette holder.
And then I had a girlfriend whose mom had that big bouffont hairdoo like with the pink curls, and she was a show girl when she was young, and I was so so enamored with her. And so I was really enamored with the women that were kind of different from my mom that were wearing like the red lipstick and the extreme makeup. I was really obsessed with that and like how my mom was not like that, but I would see women that were like that. So I've
always had, you know, wanting to be like that. So when I was old enough to start wearing makeup and stuff, that's where I picked up the red lipstick.
And the red lipstick is in itself such a statement because it's terrifying to a lot of aimen. Yeah, it's like I remember when i'd had my first baby, for some reason, I decided, you know, when you emerge from the miasthma of you know, milk and everything. I decided for the first time in my life to wear red lipstick, and if you're not familiar with it, it's such a disaster. You make it look easy.
Well, it's like a disaster for me not wearing red lipstick. Okay, It's like it's not about putting it on, it's just how I feel, like, I feel like, where'd my mouth go? Because it's been such a big part of my life now, and like, certainly I'll some days just wear like a little bit of lip cloths if I don't plan on seeing anyone, But I really feel like weird, like my mouth is gone, you know, it just disappears. But I
get why it's hard for people. And I think the reason it's hard for some people is there is so many types of red and they really have to like learn about what they're correct red for your skin is and for your teeth, you know, because this wrong kind of red can really make your teeth go of your color and you know, so I think like some people just don't have the patience, But I do think that red can be really great on everyone. And maybe also some people don't want to emphasize their mouth and they
want to emphasize another part of their face. And I get that too, Like people are like, I want to look like I have a tiny little mouth, and I want to have huge eyes, or I want to have like, you know, big full lips with no nothing else that emphasizes them. Like I understand that. It's just that, you know, I just decided what it was for me, and for me, it was creating things that I wasn't born with and wearing things that I felt like made me feel special or different.
At this point, at what point did you become data? Vontees from yeah, from hey, that's sweet?
Well, first, I'm still Heather Sweet. I never changed my attitude, personality or my real name. I think I have a fabulous name, but I it was in first I went by just data. But in the early nineties, like nineteen ninety one, I started working in a strip club, and I used, like a lot of people do you're having fun, You're you know, using it, playing with the idea of
an alter ego. You're trying to protect your real name so people don't find out where you live, because you know, it was easier to find out where people and you know, it has always been easy to find out where people live with their real name, so I feel like I used a made up name. I used just data for that.
And then a few years later I was posing for these special editions of Playboy and they told me I had to have a last name, which I argued over and told them why couldn't I just be one name like Madonna or Cher or whatever, and they said, no, you need a last name. So I looked in the phone book and found this name, Von Trees, and then it came out in the magazine and it was wrong. It said Bonteese, and I just like, I tried to correct them again because it was like, you know, I
don't know. I wasn't like thinking, oh, strip tease Vonte's. I did not calculate that at all. It was the name Von Trees with an R in it, and so they kept type, you know, spelling it wrong, and I remember sending a fax to try to get it right and they're like yeah, yeah. And then finally I didn't care and I just left it. And then I didn't I really didn't know, you know, I was like twenty two years old.
I was so young.
And I also felt that at that time, I was just doing something fun. It was like, of course, like a lot of women, you ever, people always scare you when you're young, and that like threatened you about turning thirty. And I thought, oh, it was just like a thing I'm doing when I'm like young, and like you know, when i'm you know, when I can take pose for
pin ups and everything. So I did not anticipate that it was going to be a lifelong career, that I was going to be trademarking the name Deed of Aunties, and you know, like I didn't. It wasn't like a calculated thing. You know, if it had been, I probably would have done it differently.
But because everything seems evident in retrospect, you know, everything looks like a career in retrospect. But at the time you're just making decisions based on what's fun and the opportunity that's presented to you.
It just didn't seem like it was in the cards to be a famous burlesque star in you know, the early nineties. No, it hadn't been It hadn't been done.
No, it hadn't be No, it hadn't been done. And this is the thing about when somebody's got a vision that I'm so curious about that it just led you into places, and now the world has kind of played catch up with you because you're so at the top of your game and have been for decades and so much so. You just collaborated with Taylor Swift on her dueled clip, which is a gorgeous behind the scenes of you. She does this, She does this, she's so unself conscious
and yet conscious of what she has to learn. The clip sort of opens with her sort of thumping towards the camera like loping really while you're teaching her the delicate art of immersing yourself in a Martini glass. When you have moments like that, like, how did that feel when you're approached to collaborate.
I mean that particular time, because, like I, you know, there's been some things like that in the past, but I have to say it was very different because the way I was approached was with respect for what I do. Because you know, I can tell you even since then, I have had several emails from pop stars, people's asking, hey, can we use your glass? Can we borrow that? We want to talk to you, you know, and I definitely can see where I'm on the mood board, but they don't.
They just they just want to use it. They're just like, oh, like I'm going to use that or copy it whatever. And she approached me with something so much different, Like she was very knowledgeable about what I do, She understood what I did, and she wanted, you know, she wanted to be side by side with me in that moment. And it was it was a collaboration. Every bit of it from the shoes, you know, to the what we wore was all you know, of my world and in
collaboration with the people I work with. So that's just like an unusual thing because people usually just they just watch you and imitate, you know. And so I think it really says something about her as a performer and as a woman who is willing and happy to shine the spotlight on another woman, you know, because it could
have been could have gone all different ways. And I remember when I got the call and I was just like listening to the pitch idea and then suddenly Taylor got on the phone with me and started, you know, talking to me like a you know, like a real person instead of a pitch for a video. And so I think it's just like it's different, and it really is. I think a testament to one of the reasons I think that she's successful and why so many people like her.
I think who she really is is radiates, you know, it radiates to other people. You don't really hear You don't hear her knocking people down unless there's a real good reason.
Say that people approach you sometimes with disrespect. Yeah, what does that mean? Does that mean is it because they don't understand your body of work? Or do you think it's because of the sexual nature of the work.
No, I think it's because they want to be They don't want to credit somebody else for their idea. Well, I think it's more like, oh, that's like just like or they don't want to. They don't want to they're afraid of pay having to pay someone. You know, it happens all the time. But I think mostly it's very like, look at me, Look what I'm doing. Isn't it amazing?
But they don't want to. You know, like I collaborate with people all the time, and I'm quick to say who designed my look, who helped me with the choreography, who designed my glasses?
You know, who makes your silk? Pajamas.
Yeah, yeah, I mean I think like, certainly I have had moments where I want to do that more because I think it's a greace thing to do to say, Oh no, it's not all me, because I am a do it yourself girl like I always have. But I'm hands on like I But it's like there are other people that I like working with that are generous with their They're generous with me with what they teach me, and so I like to mention them.
And also artists are often drawn to each other. Yeah, and it doesn't necessarily even need to be in a common field or it's just there's something that they recognize. And that is what happened to you. I guess when going back to that kind of Playboy era, when you were discovered or you entered the world of or you were noticed by Gaultier the fashion world, and there was a melding of that. How did that? How did that come about?
I mean I feel like it was really like like a snowballing of events because you know, I look at the nineties is when I was doing all this Playboy stuff and like headlining strip clubs across the United States or flying you know, doing fetish parties in London or la or New York. And then in two thousand things shifted, and it there's a few like there's a few things
that like move the needle, really, you know. But the early two thousands, I was performing part as part of this big show in Hollywood that had all these guest stars from Charlie's thereon and Christina Aguilera, when Stefani, Britney Murphy is like a huge who's who of guest stars. And I was in this show every week with these stars, and I got singled out as the show was really great and so and so it's great and so, but who is this girl in the glass? And that kind
of like turned mate turned a corner for me. And then it was the same time I was on the cover of the Christmas issue of Playboy, which this is a time in Playboy history when everyone knew what was happening on the cover of Playboy, Like that was the Pam Anderson, Anna, Nicole Smith, like Drew barrymore like big stars were on the cover of Playboy. So I got a lot of attention for that because my cover was so striking and different than what was usually on it. Yes,
and then then it was I got hired. I think Mark Jacobs did a lot for me because he was currently at that time, he was at Louis Vauton, right and he brought me over to perform at several I performed did a whole string of events for Louis Vauton, including the opening of their flagship store in Paris at the Grand Peleis. It was like a huge thing. And then Jean Paul Gautier brought you know, was a fan.
He actually had my Playboy cover. So it was kind of like all these things that happened in the early two thousands, so I was very lucky about all that, well lucky my but maybe well, you know, it was just like a time. I also came out with my first book, and that really was a big made a big splash because it was a very unique book.
Yes for as time, which was kind of glamor. It was glamor, yeah, it was.
The first one was called Burlesque in the Art of the Tees, and the flip side was Fetish in the Art of the Teas, and I really spoke about like what it is about burlesque and glamour and even fetishism that I love so much. And so that book was a big, big, like four hundred page book and it was put out by HarperCollins and it was a pretty you know, it was a big deal for a huge picture book in full color to come out like that with that much like with a huge publisher behind it.
Don't go anywhere after the break Dita. She is why she had no hesitation telling her family she was working in a strip club at eighteen. When we go back to when you started in strip clubs, hers to me that that is often a conversation that you've got to have with your family. Yeah, yeah, that your life is taking that turn. And you had so there were three sisters in the family. Yes, how was that conversation when you said to your sisters and your mom or who
did you have the conversation with I've got this job. Yeah, well I'm gonna be playing in this club.
Here's the deal. And I was always kind of like a shy, quiet girl, but there's certain moments where I'm not okay, So listen, I started working when I was twelve years old. Okay, I'm working from the second I'm allowed to, like first, like cleaning toilets at a ballet studio. Then I'm like working putting tags on things and things in a store, you know, like, and by the time I was eighteen years old, I had a real job, I had credit cards that I paid for myself. I
was completely self sufficient. So by the time anybody could say a word about what I had to do, I'd be like, oh, really, like I mean, to my parents, I did not care. I was like, I'm a grown woman, and oh did I miss the part where you said that you were going to send me to college?
Right?
Yeah? I was pretty like I have to say, I felt I knew, as you can probably hear from my voice a little bit like a little like really like nobody was going to tell me as an eighteen year old woman who was totally self sufficient, not did not take a dime from my parents past the age of fifteen, So you know, I was never I wasn't. I didn't really care what anybody said.
And was there some resistance or in the face of yeah, like you said your autonomy, they kind of yeah.
I think it was kind of like I had to kind of like say like, well, you know, I'm trying to do this thing, because yeah, like they knew they found out I was working in a strip club. I was posing for pin ups and all this stuff, and on paper it looks a little weird, but I was kind of like thinking, I'm trying to be like Gypsy rose Lee and Betty Page, like my idols, and I saw it that way, and certainly the material looks that way, so you know, I felt I think I felt like, yeah,
I'm trying to explain it. And you know, it was harder for me, obviously than a lot of other people might find it today, because you know, I didn't really have any living examples of what I was trying to do. I was sort of like, well, I want to be like this person, but yeah, I know everybody's been dead for a long time, but this is what I want to do. What I believe in is I want to be the next big burlesque star like Gypsy Roselee or Lily Saint Cyr And I was doing that. But you
know it's funny, though. Is the point where my dad like accepted it was when I was on the cover play because guess what he grow he was what he was. That's where I got the magazine. Like dads of that are like age like sixty and seventy and eighty probably had a playboy hidden in the house. You know, It's like it kind of legitimized me in a way to my father especially, which is a funny thing. But yeah,
I mean I don't have a religious family. And I know, in saying all this, like I certainly could have had like a religious family, but I didn't, you know.
So yeah, but somehow as well, I mean I understand. And that's a strange form of logic that your dad would have had, was this, Yeah, look if my my daughter's yes, uh stripa and look how successful she's. Yeah, she's the beast.
I mean, he's like that. Now, it can be a little embarrassing where I'm like, oh, you know, I don't always feel totally comfortable when my family is watching, you know, my show. But I have to separate hea they're sweet, from what my job is and and you know, being at my very best for the three thousand people in the room, I have to very much be like, it's not my problem. It's not my problem, it's their problem
if they have a problem. So and I think I've thought that, you know, I've learned that a lot along the way. You know, I used to work in a lingerie store when I was a teenager, and I remember this very well, and my father, you know, I used to wash my things. I have nice laundry because I worked in a beautiful lingerie store and I was, you know, seventeen eighteen.
That's a great job at that idea.
Yeah, it's great, But look at it this way. I remember I hung you said, like, hang all my things to dry in my room, and my dad was furious and he kicked me out of the house. Wow for this lingerie. And I remember being like, oh, I get it. This is his problem. This is how he perceives lingerie.
It is for you know, it's forbidden.
It's forbidden, and it's he it's what he thinks of women who wear lingerie. So I was very like, Okay, I get it, you know, but and it is sometimes you have to think like that in terms of like, oh, this is other people's conditioning and it is not. You know, all that matters is like how I feel about it.
You know, I know who I am, but you kind of have to you know, we all experience that through life where people don't approve of what we're doing, and it's a little bit like yeah, it can be a bit of an eye roll.
But also there's something when you mention at the time, like who the other sort of Playboy covers were. There was a lot of bruised lives at that time, particularly if you say like Anna Nicole Smith or whatever. There was a certain degree of dysfunction external internal, whereas you seem to have a wholesomeness Oh well, I mean it's at your core stability, at your CoA. Well you like that at the time.
I guess. But I was also pretty wild too, Like I mean, when I look back, it's like, I'm very I've always been very responsible, but you know, like, no, the same kind of thing didn't happen to me that happened in Anna Nicole Smith. But you know, I was going out partying. I worked in the rave scene, you
know who. I worked in the rave scene. I was out all night, and I was up all night, and I was like, you know, I was just doing a different kind of drugs if I'm honest, you know, like I wasn't doing addictive drugs, but I was using mind altering drugs, you know. And I think, like I don't think it was like a bad path at all. It's part of like, hey, what are the ways you come up with all this creative stuff? You know, I think like I don't know, I just don't like to say, oh,
ann Nicole Smith, you know. Or I mentioned Pam Anderson as another person that was a big playboy mom at that time, like look at her. She's not like she partied, she had fun, but like she's a super responsible, lovely woman and did not come out of that like scathed, you know.
So, but she also had that really bruising episode with the release of the Type with Tommy Lee. Do you know what I mean? Like, yeah, but did she Oh okay, well I guess.
Yeah, I mean it wasn't Maybe it wasn't great, but I'm sure now looking back, she's like, you know, it's truth and it probably wasn't great. Like we I listen, you know, I'm friends with Pam. I'm friends with her. I don't think like I think she had a sense of humor about everything, and I think that she looks back and like, yeah, it wasn't all great, but it isn't tragic, Like who showed me one person that doesn't have some stuff that you're like, oh that was not great.
You know, we all have that, and I think I think it would be like to make an example of that. It's you know, I never saw the tape.
But oh that I saw the type. And do you know what? The type was so spectacular. It was so spectacular that even in her most unguarded moments, she was magnificent.
That's what I'm saying.
It's like, I get it.
Do we really think she looks back and sees that as something horrible? I mean, it was not great, right, but by what happened, And of course she should have been the one to make money off of it. But and there was more of the one tape right right, right.
But the thing is someone's always making money of it off it. Yes, And as I guess we've learned recently, more recently with Kim Kardashian, it's like her family decision was, well, it may as well be us.
Yeah, she had a sex tape. Parasitalt had a sex tape. Yeah, I think I keep under light I might, but guess what, nobody's gonna see it?
Well, everybody thinks nobody's gonna say it.
Yeah, you know, I'll save it from my autobiography.
Is there going to be one?
Yeah? But not until I feel very liberated and free to say everything I want to say. I don't want to hurt anybody's feelings.
You know, you know when you speak about the past, and I'm actually well a significant lover from your past, which is Marilyn Manson, you always speak so graciously about him.
Well not always. If you were to talk to me twenty years ago, I would not I have gotten a gracious version. And also it goes up and down. It's like very like periods of that, like knowing him that I've been like, I've said things that are not very nice too.
Right when you met each other, because I saw you on a British show, I think it was Loose Women, and you said this thing that was so amazing. I wrote it down. You said that, and I think they were talking about your look, and you said, a strong look weeds out the week. And then you said and by week, I mean mean I don't want to hit on me.
Yeah, I mean that's a funny lesson I learned. When you know, a few times on Halloween, I dress up as like I wear like a blonde or a brown wig, and I wear a beige makeup and take off the red nail polish and wear like normal, normal clothes.
That's your halloween.
Yeah, that's my halloween. And I do notice it's a very it's a psychological experiment for me because you know, I get treated very differently when I'm dressed like that, and I noticed, I get you know, I'm going to use the word preyed upon by men who normally would not approach me. So it's just a funny thing. It's like a funny experiment that.
You say, more accessible, more available.
Yeah, or less high maintenance, because I've also heard from men they're like afraid of me because they think I'm high maintenance.
And I'm like, okay, but when you meet Marilyn Manson, obviously he was not intimidated by the look.
I mean I have lots of I had lots of friends who were not intimidated by the look, and lots of partners who were not intimidated by my look. Well, I mean never never did I do I really have like a relationship that was a significant one that somebody was not you know, didn't like my look?
No, of course, I mean that's an integral part of having a relationship with someone, is it you have to did you like his look, because I found that contacts in the Laala. It was a lot.
I mean, I don't like to just talk about that relationship because first of all, I was twenty five years ago, but secondly, like it becomes like a part of my identity that I don't think is fair, because it's just becomes like a little bit dismissive of me as a person instead of like one of many famous people, because I don't advertise the famous people that I've dated in the last thirty years.
But well, you know, you could always put Burley in the water by mentioning the other famous people as well.
Yeah, and do that now. I'm saving that for myself, my own clickbait, maybe even a book or something. But do you you know what I mean? It just feels like I've been asked about this since I've been divorced for over twenty years now, and so people ask me about it and or but yeah, it's twenty years. It's crazy to talk about it. Nobody wants to talk about their boyfriend from twenty five years ago, do they?
Yeah, I guess that's true. But I think the reason that it's still gone as so much interest is that it brought you to the world in a different light, like a lot of people came to know you through that era.
Right. Well, again, like I've been doing, you know, doing what I do longer than that. But you know, I just kind of keep my relationships as quiet as I can because it's really like I've felt how hard it can be because it is fun for people to talk about it, but then you have to remember I'm a real person with real feelings, that does, you know, and
people forget that. They're like, it's not that easy always for me to talk about you know, no, and like he's married to somebody else and I'm with somebody else. It just this is like a little bit like, oh, why does this have to be at this stage of my life, Like this big thing that I'm forced to talk about.
Well, it's part of the journey, I guess of you. But we don't have to talk about it. I mean it's it's yeah, we've established Yeah.
I just want, as we're having a very open conversation, I just like to explain why it's a weird thing to talk about, because I think it's a little I had a journalist say to me the other day and she actually said, I want to apologize to you. And I said, well for what And she said, I interviewed you ten years ago and I kept asking you why you didn't have children and hammering you about this, and I was like oh, And she's like, I was really
wrong to ask you about that. And I keep waiting wondering when people are going to think realize it's wrong to ask me about like the demise of a marriage.
You know, did you remember that conversation when the journalist apologize.
Because it gets asked all the time. People have been asking me that for as long as I've been famous, you know, Like so it's like one of the questions and you just think, oh, what a weird thing to ask someone. And now now the question instead of being about having children, now people are asking me, which is crazy too, about like perimenopause. And I'm like, oh, are you asking me about my Now you're gonna now you're gonna ask me about the state of my reproductive organs
and what they're doing. That's so crazy. I'd like to talk about my work.
You know, well, I think also because your work is I don't know what the right word is. It's not sexual. I don't think it's sexual. It's sexy, but it's not sexual. It's anyway.
I mean, it's a complicated I guess because it is like very female forward and I have a big queer audience, and it's like it is very it's not like sexy under the male gaze. So I think, like that's what for me and for what I know about my audience, there is interest in talking to me about beauty and exercise and health and stuff like that. And I wrote a beauty book. But yeah, it's just like a funny thing. How like it's interesting to see what the questions like
that that you go, oh wow. I wasn't ready to talk about that today. I was just thinking about Feathers and rain Stars.
Coming up. After the break, Dita talks about the difference between performing for her fans and performing for the male games. I think it resonates with women because I think particularly now, you know, we were talking earlier about how these are kind of a flattening of how particularly young women look, you know, the hoodies and the thing, and that it's
almost asexual in a way. And because you have presented this these age old manifestations of what beauty and femininity and grace can look like in a very stylized way. I think there's a real appetite from women. Forget the male gaze. I don't actually when I watch your work, it's not that men cannot appre as we know.
Right, Like, it's not something I think about. And there's been times, like in the recently where I've been like performing in a different atmosphere than usual and then like, oh wow, I didn't. It's a total shift, you know, like it happens so sometimes and I go, oh wow, I forgot how this How different this is.
You when you say the shift, is it with the male audience.
Or yeah, Like maybe sometime in the last like few years, there's two occasions I was like, oh, and I was one of them was performing in like Hong Kong at a private members club and it was definitely male, and I was like, oh wow, I forgot about this.
You know that weed silence, that weed silence that when the men alive.
Yeah, like it's just different. Oh, this is sexy, And so I remember being like, well, shift into sexy for men, you know, like I remember how it feels, and it's kind of fun, right because it's just a different feeling than going on stage in a historic theater with like, you know, thirty five hundred like fans, and then as opposed to you know, performing my glass act in front of like a men's a private high members club for men.
I was like, oh, this is so different, but it's funny, you know, it's just a funny shift where you can you can always feel the energy of an audience, and it just reminded me of when I was, you know, much younger in the nineties when I was doing that in strip clubs. But yeah, it was like, it's an interesting mindset where you're like, oh, it's different, this is different.
And then the women, because you're beloved of women, the energy from that feels like what in comparison.
There's just a different like feeling. I think part of it is because I do have the knowledge of no, you know, interacting with my fans verbally or the letters they send me, and I do have an understanding of where a lot of the like meaning for people comes from, whether it's watching me or just watching the show that I'm presenting, which tends to be you know, the best bur lesqued performers in the world that are different types of people than me. I don't it's not like a
just a girly show. I've always tried to cast like the show with regard for people who I think are really interesting and different and unique. So I feel like it's you can feel that there is like something, there's a reason people are coming to a show like this, and it's not just to like watch, you know, me do a striptease. I think it does have like the backstory of the books I've written, or my lingerie brand, or the things that I say that maybe resonate with
other people. Me giving permission for people to embrace their erotic side, their sensual side, to permission to wear cat I eyeliner and red lipstick in a world where it's not altogether been always acceptable. You know, sometimes you get made fun of for those things. So I think there's things different things resonate for different people, you know. So it's definitely I think it's part of the key to my longevity is that it's more than just you know, a burlesque show.
Yes, and I think people also love that about you. You know, women particularly get the message that these are used by date or that you know, after a certain date, we sort of shrivel up like a piece of desiccated coconut, you know, and then to see you now in your like third decade of bringing this, it's quite inspirational.
Well, first of all, let me say, dried coconut is tastier than we all know that. It's tastier dehydrated with a little bit of sweetener on it. Anyway, I'm a big coconut fan. Yeah, I mean I think like when I was first creating my shows and casting other formers around me, I definitely, you know, I didn't really think about diversity and inclusion. I certainly didn't think about age diversity at that time, like you know, two decades ago.
You don't have to when you're young.
Right, right, You don't think about it all when you're young until you're in it and you're like, oh, this is matters and yeah, and I you know, I have definitely been guilty of conditioning when it comes to myself. Like I said, not that long ago, I said to my bosses and Las Vegas, the Venetian, I said, for you know, my show is going on two years there, and I said, oh, maybe this show could be like a standalone and we can hire other, like, you know, younger dancers to do my parts and then they can
just be a beautiful, like sexy, standalone show. And they were like, no, yes, people want to see you, and I was like they do, you know, So I'm kind of always like checking myself to make sure, you know, like I but it is. It is an interesting thing, and I feel very lucky to be performing through this like different phases of life, and definitely lucky to see, like, you know, what it means for people to see I'm
fifty three, what it means for people. But you know, when I look out into the audience and I see people of all ages and younger people who are just learning about burlesque, and you know, my show is the you know, there's not another show like mine anywhere else. So a lot of young people come to see it. And then the people who are are older or my age or you know that have been watching me for twenty five years, and so I just think, like it does matter, like I have to when it comes to
like diversity. I've had a choice, and I have retired myself a couple times. And then one day I thought like, oh, what if you just keep like evolving your art and keep evolving and learning new things and becoming better and making the show bigger and bigger and bigger. And that's
kind of what my goal has been. Like a few years ago, I put in like a you know, a big ballroom dance number strip tease after I did Dancing with the Stars, and I was like, let's do this with the clothes cut flying off and you know, or like with infusing the grand illusions into my show, with putting magic in the show, it's learning magic tricks is
very difficult. So I thought, I'm going to challenge myself and I'm going to bring together new things and new elements into my show because I don't think it's just about like looking a certain way, like I mean, I think, you know, I feel strong. I think I feel confident on stage. I don't feel like, of course, if I don't feel like I want to be taking my clothes off on stage, I won't. But I keep thinking like, oh wow, okay, why was I so afraid of forty?
Why was I so afraid of fifty? Now? You know, like it just is I get it, Like, you know, I do not think I'm going to be like parading around on stage wearing with a sixty five pound Swarowski crystallized costume. When I'm, you know, seventy eighty, I don't think that's going up to the boy. How would I know? You know, don't I don't. I've always been wrong, you know. We put this idea in young women's heads from when we are seventeen years old. They always say, oh, you're
going to be twenty. Oh, you're going to be twenty five, you're halfway to thirty, you're going to be thirty, you're getting older. What are you going to do when you're forty? Oh, it's all going to be over That's how we are trained to think. And I wish we could get rid of that. I wish we could stop teaching women, especially that they're over the hill as soon as they turn thirty, and getting us afraid of every decade, you know, And so it is my I feel like it's kind of
my job to be up there going here. I am at fifty, I'm wearing a gee string and pasties. Don't be afraid, you know, Like it's just like a thing where you're taught to be afraid. And I would like that not for the way to be.
Where do you think that comes from? Because it's not you know, we were talking about the male gaze before and actually saying that doesn't necessarily align with the truth of what you do or who appreciates you. I don't think that fear of aging comes from men either necessarily. I think women also do it to each other.
Well you know what, I was just thinking, Yes, I think it's women, but also please know And I had this conversation this morning when I was looking through like a book of like I get this beauty magazine and it had all these like clastic surgery before and afters, and there's a lot of men that have facelifts. And my partner said, oh, yeah, but it's like a lot of gay meen. And I was like, okay, wait, let's talk about that for a second. It is a lot of gay men that are getting work done. What does
that say about the being male driven? Because I don't hear about any lesbians. Kid, you don't hear about many but lesbians getting right. Yeah, that's interesting. I'm just spitballing again I had today. I have not like researched it before I talked about him, But do you know what I'm saying, It's like, we don't really talk about like one of my best friends in the world is a butcher lesbian, and it would never occur to her or any of her friends that they are going to get
a facelift. However, I have a lot of gay male friends who are getting facelifts, yes, who feel that sign. What is this is it? Maybe? Could it maybe be men in general that are a little more youth obsessed than anybody else? I don't know. I don't know the answer, and I know it could be is a generalization always, but I'm just just a thought.
So the conversation, this is what we're going to take a while, and this is going to be the headline. Dejavonte says, be more lesbian.
No, if only we could. We can't. We can't. We don't get to decide who we're with, right.
Yeah, Hey, you're coming to Australia next g Yes, I am, which is very thrilling.
I'm excited. It's been seven years since I've been there with my.
Show and you're playing big venues. Yes, what is the the theme of these shows? So you don't really talk in your shows?
No, I don't, and you know I've been I get pressured sometimes too, but I always think like, oh, you know what though it's kind of like in Las Vegas, I don't have a host at all, but on the tours I have a host because it is like a big there are big crowds, and I like the host,
like holding things together. Yes, but I do think it's a little bit like going to a ballet performance or it's a dance performance, and I like the feeling and the idea of like telling a story without talking, you know, I don't know, It's like I like it also because it is a unique perspective and you can go to a show from a singer and they'll talk to you and tell you some stories and stuff. But I don't know.
I like that you love it when they tell the story, Yes.
Totally, but I don't. I don't know. I feel like I like the idea of I have a tendency to pivot whenever I see what everybody else is doing. And I just like a variety show, like a fun variety show. When the curtains close, they open again on a new story. Then that story's over, they open again on another new story. Right. Yeah, So like the only times I've really talked in my show is like you hear my voiceover, like all the voiceovers are my voice, or there's songs that have my
voice in them. But yeah, generally, I don't know. I guess I just like that it's a different, different perspective and a different different thing, like I don't see myself like putting out a microphone and talking.
You know, I don't know people would love it.
Well, we'll see.
And I actually think you would. I think you would love it.
Maybe that'll be my next phase of life. I mean maybe because even when I see like magicians, I really like who do talk through the illusions? I actually because I've been studying magic, the magic world. I really love actually the ones who come out and do it to music and they don't say anything, do you know the ones they have a beautiful music and it's all like it's is dance and like you can read the thoughts
on their face. Like I love this. I like disappearing into this like fantasy that isn't like somebody talking and waking you up and telling you what they're going to do.
What magic are you learning?
Well, I don't want to spoil it the surprises because.
Okay, are you getting swored in half?
No? No, I'm kind of like, you know, I can tell you this When you mentioned like the magician sawing somebody in half, I've taken these kind of old tropes like that and I'm flipping the script on them. So we've all seen the show girl getting sawed in half. Well, I'm gonna saw somebody else in half. Maybe you know I'm not going to. I'm just telling you, like I've put I put a lot of thought into like what
do I how do I make this different? Like? And I've even asked magician friends of mine, like, we've seen the male magician doing this to the show girl, but have we seen a woman doing this to the show boy? And They're like no. So this is kind of my perspective of where I'm taking things is like just a little bit like different, you know, a little bit.
Do you know what? I'm not surprised data you were taking things in a different direction.
Yeah. I just thought it would be fun to try something new. And I love to make like a themed variety show. And I like the challenge of magic because it is like it's really complicated and hard, but really fun to work on it with these I've befriended a lot of different magicians. I live near the Magic Castle, which is here in Hollywood, And of course.
I know it's amazing, isn't it great? It's incredible? Yeah, And so it's so magical, it's so perfect a castle.
Yeah. And I'm friends with many of those magicians, and I'm friends with magicians in Vegas, so it's it's like a fun little thing for me to talk to all of them about like what they think I should do and how I should do it. And some of the illusions are a lot more complicated and difficult than some of the others.
Is it protected knowledge? Like how do you learn from a magician because they raise that?
Yeah. I mean, I've been lucky enough that like two of the illusions I'm doing, I was taught by some master magicians who I saw actually perform at the Magic Castle, and I start and I found out they were following me, and then I started working with them, right, and they taught me two of their illusions, you know, or you can kind of say like I and I don't want to spoil any surprises, but I said, I have this idea that I want to do this, and then they go, hmm,
let me think about that and come back to you. And then they'll come back with like it's like detective work, like they go, here's the three different ways we can maybe do it. And so that's kind of how it works. It's like you come up with fantastical ideas and then somebody says, like you could do it, but it's you
need this, that and the other. Some of it is like you know, equipment, some of it is just practicing and like you know it's smoking mirrors, right, But yeah, Like so I just kind of came up with a few different things that I wanted to do, and I've consult consulted with six or seven different magicians. Some people build these illusions and some people perform them, and some people are the ones that used to perform that maybe
just coach people. So I have. Yeah, it's like a combo of like maybe uh probably like in general for magicians who are really coaching me on.
This, I think this is your next incarnation. This is like it could be.
I did say that. I said one day, I go, should I be a magician in my into my sixties? And they're like you already are, but yes, why don't you feel? Yeah? I feel free?
And also right costume, yeah, data Vonte as magician magnificent costumes.
Yeah, I mean I like that, you know it. A lot of things are about how you present them, you know, so I love.
That everything nearly everything is about how you present it. Really, I mean it has to have a heart, but everything is Shakespeare's seed is entrances and exits.
Yeah, I like that. Well, this could be my next ye, my next thing. But I do keep saying to people, don't worry, I'm not quitting my day job. This is a burlesque show with some punchlines of magic in it, so I'm still people are still going to see me do the best of what I do. It's just a little moments that are extra magical.
And also, don't forget your day job is a night job.
Yeah, exactly, Well it is really a day job because you can't see it. But I have a whole table full of to do lists that are my day job, which leads to the night.
Job, I'm sure. And even just your if your day job was nothing more than your beautiful house, which I think our produce A Bree was has been Architectural Digest's most popular video that they've made.
Oh really, yeah, it's still the most popular.
Spectacular thank you and a true kind of fusion of your artistry and your sweet self. Thank you, thank you as you have been and I thank you for sharing yourself within you no filter, and we can't wait to see you in Australia. Will you bring your partner with you? Will Adam come with you?
Oh no, he probably won't come. It's so far and he works, and I don't know. I always think, like, I mean, he's never been to Australia or New Zealand. And I know it is really exciting for people, but it is. It's like a big long haul, as you know.
All the more reason to bring company.
I know it's true. We'll see, we'll see. I'll check with him.
And when you do come. There's an Australian delicacy. It's as called a Lamington, which she is a beautiful sponge rolled in chocolate icing and then rolled in desiccated coconut.
We love.
We love it. Thank you so much, Thank you very much. I've interviewed a lot of women on this show. Very few live their lives with the kind of intention and focus that Dita Vontees does. Like every choice she makes, from the color of her lipstick to the way she arranges a vintage lamp shade feels like an act of self respect, or of reclaiming control over how she moves through the world. And what I love most about her isn't just the glamour or the feathers or the fantasy.
It's the discipline. It's that she's built her power quietly with that discipline, and with patients, and with total authorship over her own story. I hope you loved this conversation as much as I did. Dita Vonteza's news show is coming to Australia next year. Will include information on where you can see her in the show notes, Thanks for listening to No Filter. The executive producer of No Filter
is Nama Brown, The senior producer is Bree Player. Audio production is by Tina Mattloff and video editing is by Josh Green. This episode was recorded at Castaway Studios and I am your host Kate Langbrook and I will see you next Monday.