A Coos Bay–Born Showgirl Bets on a Scrappy Corner of Old Town

Written By Cooper Alishio

“What’s happening here is gritty and authentic,
 and we’re trying to be good stewards of the spirits
and the ghosts.”

Madam Cooper, Owner of Madam Cooper’s Parlor

“It’s the funky, weird space of my dreams,” says Hays, who spent a decade in Nashville hosting burlesque shows up to seven nights a week. It also feels like a homecoming. As an undergrad studying theater at Portland State University, Hays worked service jobs in Old Town. She began her burlesque career at Dante’s, performing weekly for nearly four years at the rock club’s anything-goes Sinferno Cabaret. The neighborhood, she knows, has it rough edges. But that’s always been the case—in the late nineteenth century and into the twentieth, the area held brothels, flop houses, and gambling dens—and it’s part of what makes it special. “What’s happening here is gritty and authentic,” she says, “and we’re trying to be good stewards of the spirits and the ghosts.”

Original Article by Rebecca Jacobson

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