MATT BAUME
“I am excited and terrified and everything at the same time,” Gino said as he prepared to strip down to his underwear before strangers, friends, and his boss.
A quiet nerd hiding a shy smile behind a scruffy beard, Gino recently moved from New Orleans to Seattle. He does data entry for a legal company by day, and by night, he’s been a student in the Boylesque 101 class at Seattle’s Academy of Burlesque. (Boylesque is burlesque with boys.)
At the conclusion of the six-week class, Gino would be expected to perform a striptease at a public graduation recital, twirling tassels and baring his flesh. He’d never been on stage before, and he was doing his best to contain his jitters…
