9 1/2 Years Behind the Green Door: A Mitchell Brothers Stripper Remembers Her Lover Artie Mitchell, Hunter S. Thompson, and the Killing That Rocked Sa
Brothers Jim and Artie Mitchell are sex-industry legends. They're best known for producing several porn films (includingBehind the Green Door) and running the infamous strip club, the O'Farrell Theater. Opened in 1969, the O'Farrell occupied a unique place at the center of a burgeoning San Francisco sexual subculture. It featured rooms with different themes, live girl/girl action, and stage shows, some of which were less standard striptease and more avant-garde performance art. Behind the scenes, the brothers hosted outrageous private parties where special guests were treated to fisting, bondage shows, and orgies. The theater attracted celebrities, rock stars, politicians, artists, and writers, including Hunter S. Thompson, who spent a great deal of time there researching a book calledThe Night Managerthat was never published.In 1991, Jim shot Artie to death. The story has been told in two books--but there has never been a firsthand account of the decade leading to Artie's murder by an insider who had intimate knowledge of the brothers, the club, and their world. In her memoir, Simone Corday shares her story of a decade with an infamous sex mogul.Corday's book is a delicious page-turner that captures her incredibly stormy relationship with Artie from 1981 to 1991, and the frenetic, rambunctious, rebellious world he built. With vivid stories based on her journals from the time, she paints the picture of a strip club like no other: one that nurtured her creative spirit, inspiring political and satirical performances. Not only is her tale an important piece of sex-industry history, but it's refreshing to read a memoir of stripping in which sex work is neither romanticized nor demonized. She tells it like she saw it, period.--From The Village Voice, Tristan TaorminoDiablo Cody may be the ex-stripper-turned-writer It Girl of the moment, but Simone Corday is our local version: a former dancer at the O'Farrell Theater (with a master's in English) and the sometime girlfriend of Artie Mitchell, the club's flamboyant co-owner. Her self-published memoir is unpolished at times, although the prosaic rough patches, coupled with Corday's deadpan insouciance while relating sensational details of the sex industry, add to its authenticity. In addition to its main tragic element--not Mitchell's infamous 1991 murder at the hands of his brother, Jim, but Corday's unwavering love for Mitchell, despite his being a philandering, substance-abusing, all-around asshole--the book offers a wealth of lurid and surreal anecdotes. Shame over wearing a gorilla mask during a threesome? Apprehension about having sex with a dwarf? Check and check; Corday covers it all. Surprisingly, the cameo appearances by Hunter S. Thompson (at one point the club's "night manager") prove disappointingly tame. In what other setting could Thompson turn out to be the most levelheaded character? (Mill City Press)--From San Francisco Magazine, Henry JonesIf there's such a thing as a typical stripper, Simone Corday wasn't one. When she first went to work at the Mitchell Brothers O'Farrell Theater in 1981, she was in her 30s with a master's degree in English from UC Berkeley. By the time she left that world behind, a decade later, she had become a longtime lover of Art Mitchell, who was shot and killed by his brother Jim in 1991.Corday writes near the beginning of her book that she doesn't regret being part of a sexually uninhibited place at a sexually uninhibited time. "Of course, it is unrealistic to claim that women never experience inequities and abuses when they experiment with sex. Sometimes, even I did. . . . I live in a different century and place now, but to say I regret my experience during this turbulent time would be false to who I am, and to the spirit of this book."So, what, exactly did go down at that Tenderloin establishment in the `80's? Not much suitable for a family newspaper. Orgies, drugs, politicians and, of course, Hunter S. Thompson play roles in Corday's story, although no figure looms larger than Art Mitchell. While he was an inexcusable jerk, Corday says she couldn't help loving him. She is still incensed at the sentence the now-deceased Jim Mitchell got after his manslaughter, not murder conviction.There are many times in the book when one would like to shake some sense into Corday regarding Art Mitchell's behavior. But in recounting that tumultuous time, she doesn't aim to impart many lessons. "I'm a bit of an outlaw. I got to live through a very exciting time," she says, and it gave me tremendous material."--From the San Francisco Chronicle, Rehan HarmanciIn9 ½ Years Behind the Green Door, readers are taken back to 1980s San Francisco and into the world of Simone Corday, a stripper working during the heyday of the infamous Mitchell Brothers O'Farrell Theater. Opened as an X-rated movie theater by brothers Jim and Artie Mitchell, the O'Farrell was and remains one of America's oldest, most notorious adult-entertainment establishments. This nightspot was the major force behind the normalization of lap dancing in strip clubs nationwide. Corday's memoir is a lengthy peek at the lives of the theater's management and employees, most notably her lover of ten years, Artie Mitchell.Cool recollections of porn star Marilyn Chambers and an early Missy (the star ofBehind the Green Door, the Sequel) feel much like the blase recital of the latest Katie Holmes sighting from your favorite jaded New York friend--gossipy and entertaining for their ordinary, unpolished delivery.9 ½ Years Behind the Green Doorfalls into the long and illustrious tradition of stripper memoirs. Just as much of the great Gypsy Rose Lee's writing was centered on her mother, Rose,Behind the Green Door'sheart is Artie Mitchell. That said, the detailed descriptions of Corday's novelty acts will entertain and nourish those interested in strip performance, just as the intimate tidbits about the production of several of the brothers' films will intrigue the porn history enthusiast. Finally, current and former strippers will find the nuances of the strip club and the interactions among dancers to be interesting, warm, and familiar. Overall, while9 1/2 Years Behind the Green Doorprobably won't leave the reader sharing Corday's interest for Artie, it certainly will leave them with a deep respect for what a tough badge of honor being an O'Farrell girl in the 80s truly was.--From $pread Magazine, Shakti ZillerYou've probably imagined her in your Hunter S. Thompson dreams: a sexy, unpredictable, brainy absurdist able to keep up with the drug-fueled antics of pornographers while also maintaining a serene humanity. Simone Corday is this woman. In her memoir,9 1/2 Years Behind the Green Door, she describes life with the infamous Mitchell brothers when she danced and caroused at their peepshow theater in the 1980s. In the book, which is largely dedicated to describing her relationship with lover Artie Mitchell, she's often naked or making regular visitor Thompson giggle by chasing men around the strip joint in a gorilla suit. She also pontificates hilariously on hypocritical moralists and the pain they feel because of the success of the theater and those famous films. At a recent reading, her complete lack of bitterness, heartbreak, or regret were evident, and her genuine love of San Francisco, sex, and honesty made the stories even funnier. In the end, she writes on her Web site, "I bought the ticket, and it was a spectacular ride."--From San Francisco Weekly, Hiya Swanhuyser, 2008, sfweekly.com