KANSAS CITY, Mo. — A gentlemen's club in Kansas City has found a way to slightly skirt a 2010 Missouri law that prohibits nudity in sexually oriented businesses.
Bazooka's Showgirls, which since 1972 had featured nude dancers serving nonalcoholic drinks, is trying to gain a foothold after the 2010 law decimated business.
The strip club has added large-screen TVs behind its stages and strip poles, allowing patrons to watch the semi-nude dancer live on stage, as well as viewing the same dancer fully nude on the TV screen in pre-recorded shoots.
Bazooka's Showgirls has even coined a name for the new program — B-TV.
"The law motivated us to do this," Bazooka's Showgirls owner Dick Snow said of the new program. "but it might have happened anyway because they add to the entertainment value and we're always looking for innovative approaches."
Despite protests from so-called morality groups, the innovation apparently is legal.
Kansas City prosecutor Lowell Gard said he recently examined a city ordinance that nearly mirrors the state statute and found no violation based on what police reported.
Total nudity on a video screen, Gard said, is not the same as total nudity on stage.
The city ordinance prohibits total nudity, prohibits semi-nude dancers at clubs that serve alcohol and requires that those with semi-nude dancers close at midnight. The state law also requires all sexually oriented businesses to close at midnight.
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