The Los Angeles Times from Los Angeles, California • Page 252

El 2 FRIDAY, DECEMBER 2, 1994 LOS ANGELES TIMES Landmark and Its LIVE LIVE NUDE NUDES 5 4 IT 7 Ami XXI mmt UICZO LIVE letters larger and larger," until today the wavy orange letters are about six feet tall. Adding the word live was another White inspiration. Enjoying his own joke, he asks, "What would I have, dummies?" He liked the idea so much that he later changed that to LIVE LIVE NUDE NUDES. Not everyone has been amused. To circumvent a onetime city ban on the word nude.

White inserted the teensiest virtually invisible, between the towering and E. When Pope John Paul II visited L.A., a city father suggested White remove the sign so as not to offend papal eyes. He declined. The sign is the Century Lounge's better mousetrap, but the club's airport-close location is its big plus. Thousands pass by each day.

Back home in Akron or Walla Walla, they make mental notes to check it out the next time they hit L.A. That sign brings them iri; the dancers keep them coming back. The music is "Leave Your Hat On" by Joe Cocker. The dancer is Raquel. She is wearing a black velvet dress with a flamenco flounce and a black hat.

Soon, she'll shed the hat, the dress and everything underneath. She is a crowd-pleaser, a 21 -year-old brunet with an alluring smile, a come-hither wink. Her onstage philosophy: "As long as its legal, Til do it." Even though his "girls" are hired as dancers ($4.25 an hour, plus tips), "rhythm is the last thing" White looks for. Adds general manager Gene Lombardi, "Every man who walks in here has his fantasy." The music is 'Tm the Only One" by Melissa Etheridge. The dancer is Sarah.

She's poured into a floor-length white lace gown that flares at the hem. Her long lace gloves flutter at her wrists. Soon, she will take off everything except the gloves and her white high heels. At 23, she, too, is one of the Century Lounge's top draws, a blond with a Gypsy-like stripping style and an offstage manner that would endear her to your grandmother. The men come in limos and tour buses.

In bachelor parties. An international mix of voyeurs. $10 at the door, please. Or come before six for just $1. They know the dancers only by their first names.

If they telephone, the cashier will read them the names of that night's dancers-Angel, Jamie, Natasha much as a waiter recites the day's specials. Raquel (Alicia Raquel Moses), a former high school cheerleader, and Sarah who describes herself as "very spiritual" have been dancing at the Century Lounge for 2V5 years, smiling at even the creeps, ignoring the occasional shouted obscenity, flirting as they bend down to pick up the dollar bills. Their route to nude dancing can be summed up in one word: money. Raquel was working in the accounting department of a Newport Beach ad agency: "I wanted to moonlight a little. And I was curious." She hired on as a waitress at the Century Lounge.

Five months later, she danced nude one night. She was scared, then excited, so caught up in the moment that she 1 tf? 1 L. iC. LAWRENCE K. HO Los Angeles Times The letter's on Howard White's sign "kept growing, like Pinocchlo's nose.

I kept making the letters larger," until they reached about six feet. forgot to pick up the money. Sarah was a marketing researcher who had just taken a big pay cut. "I couldn't pay my rent. I was being evicted, had no food and a detective was looking for my car.

At a religious bookstore on Mel rose Avenue, she met a Century Lounge waitress who thought she'd be a good dancer. Sarah came and watched, then "went to Holyr wood to do a topless contest just to see if I could take my clothes off. was very shy." Please see TOWN, E13 Coming To Our Westminster Store irLOWEHf By 8EVERLY BEYETTE TIMEMTAFF WRITER I 09 ANGELES L.A. has its landmarks, as a world-class Eaclfy must. There are Forest UWTT, H-OrL-L-Y-W-O-O-D, Olvera Street.

And there's the NUDE NUDES sign. Hardly a day passes that, in-Irigflfd by that marquee on Century Boulevard approaching Los An-gelh International Airport, somSane doesn't stop and, just curidns, venture inside the garishly painted building. Inside is the Century Lounge, where the dancers are naked, the drinks are soft and the action is nonstop from 11 a.m. when the luneS crowd drifts in until 4 a.m., wheltthe die-hards close the place. In the cavernous showroom, with its three stages, twinkle lights play off mirrors.

Center stage, China Doll is stripping down to her thigtr-high, stiletto-heeled black patent boots. In a minute, she'll be back" to retrieve the dollar bills left the rail by the men in the front seats. i The all-male crowd is youngish and curiously emotionless; as they sip their soft drinks, they might be watching a weather report. Get the fish hooks out of those pockets, beseeches the deejay: "If these ladies don't wake you up, it's 'cause you're dead. Scantily clad dancers prowl the room: "Would you like a private dance?" That's where the big money is.

Ten dollars a dance for the dancer, $4 for the house. Plus tips, big tips. i What a difference four decades makes. Longtime Angelenos may recall that in the late '50s, this club was a 24-hour bowling alley cocktail loungecoffee shop called Carolina Pines, frequented largely by workers in nearby factories. Then, the factories moved out and name-brand hotels sprouted at the shoulders of the expanding LAX.

And jGanolina Pines fell upon hard ff.fgp they called 911 and I showed iapj-ays Howard White, a onetime agent and son of the original proprietor. He perked things up yjtjr lingerie shows. Soon, "the lingerie got skimpier and skimpi- 3y' 1977, the bowling was histo-r Jrjn its place were a nude bar where, by state law, no alcohol could, be served, and a thriving diSCSC Carolina West, where the mujic was loud and the drinks alcoholic. Then, White says, in 1987 his lawyer failed to file papers to renew his liquor license. "It killed me," he says.

His solution? To go all nude. Originally the sign said NUDES. People laughed when early in 1981 I White added that second NUDE but he did so "with malice aforethought. I thought it would be I catchy, a conversation piece." Then, "It kept growing, like I nose. I kept making the SATURDAY DEC.

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