Have you ever wanted to see Seattle’s famed mobsters dance, jive, and sing in bellbottoms? Well, you’re in luck.

The newest show at the Triple Door, Seattle Vice ’76: The Saga of Sin, is a cabaret musical focusing on the seediest of Seattle’s history: Seattle crime godfather, Frank Colacurcio, and his strip-club monopoly. The show—the brain child of Triple Door producers Mark Siano and Opal Peachey—features a variety of performances, from burlesque and jaw-dropping pole dance to aerial rope acts. 

Colacurcio, you’ll recall, operated strip clubs all over Washington including Rick’s in Lake City. He and his son, Frank Colacurcio Jr., were big players in the Strippergate scandal of 2003 where three Seattle City Council members got caught up in a zoning war of strip club parking lot spots and may have taken some bribe money. 

Nothing is more Seattle than making a weird variety show about niche local history. Any Seattleite who knows a thing or two about our city will get a kick out of the references. Come for the “fuck Tacoma” shout outs and stay for the late-second-act former-mayor Jenny Durkan reveal. (Durkan, of course, was the U.S. Attorney who prosecuted Colacurcio.) I loved it. 

Seattle Vice takes place in 1976, a year after the Liquor Control Board banned liquor licenses anywhere employees flashed their areolas. So, strip clubs. Our narrator for the evening, who we are first introduced to as he croons soulfully on the mic, is Gil Conte, Colacurcio’s bag man played by a delightful Mark Siano. Siano’s Conte sets the scene and guides us through the history. “If you saw a girl dance with no clothes on, chances are Frank Colacurcio was in the picture,” Conte says. Soon, a swaggering fresh-from-the-clink Colacurcio, played by a charismatic Ray Tagavilla, enters and the plot gets moving.

Interspersed with steamy burlesque acts from the likes of local performer Nox Falls, and head-spinning pole routines from performers Meg Austin and Akrasia Arbogast, Conte tells the story of the changing strip-club scene (“Everyone was slutty in the ’70s!”) and Colacurcio’s imminent downfall. The story isn’t the strongest part of the show, but it’s enough to get us to enjoy the sense of place, and a moment in time we’ve forgotten. 

“It's our history, but it's the seedy side, not a part of the underground tour,” Peachey said. “It's fun for audiences to see just how wild this city used to be.”

Seattle Vice centers us squarely in the city. The song “Pike Pine Zipper” shows the characters partying and downing Olympia Beer through familiar streets. They bop from Belltown to Lake City (there’s a fun debate about taking Aurora Avenue vs. I-5). One of the clubs, the New Paris Theater, is centered in Pioneer Square, which used to be a gay neighborhood in the times before the Kingdome. Plus, who can make a joke like the fake headline “Parking Pervs Ruin Lake Shitty Way” other than a plugged-in local? And who else would find it funny other than us, territorial and proud Seattleites? It’s refreshing to see art about Seattle by Seattleites in a time when a not-quite-right version of Seattle is depicted in the zeitgeist more and more. (Looking at you The Last of Us and also that Valentine’s Day slasher movie Heart Eyes.)

“Seeing that history is a joy for audiences,” Peachey says. “And it makes for a sexy night out on the town,” she said. “Who doesn't need that right now?” 

This isn’t the first Seattle Vice show Siano and Peachey have produced. They’re hoping it isn’t the last, either—there’s still a lot of ground to cover.

Siano first got the idea while working at ACT Theatre when his boss gave him the 2010 book Seattle Vice by Seattle Weekly reporter Rick Anderson and suggested Siano adapt it. “Opal Peachey and I went and met Rick Anderson and he loved the idea of a cabaret musical, gave us his blessing, and he really enjoyed the show that came out of it,” Siano said. The first iteration was set in the 1960s and ran in 2014 and 2016. A decade later for Siano and Peachey (and for the cabaret version of Colacurcio), Siano and Peachey wanted to focus more on the dancer experience. “The pole came into prominence in the ’70s so we wanted to feature that,” Peachey said. They worked in other ’70s staples like rampant Godfather references, and songs by Heart and Led Zeppelin. If the show is a hit, they’ll work on a 1980s version—which could be interesting since the strip-club moratorium hit in that decade. 

That moratorium (which prevented the opening of new strip clubs from 1988–2007), spawned by the strip-club boom Colacurcio contributed to, stagnated the club scene in Seattle for a generation Only in the last year are strip clubs in Seattle shaking off the effects of Colacurcio’s influence thanks to the “Strippers Bill of Rights” legislation former-Gov. Jay Inslee signed into law last year, which effectively allows alcohol in strip clubs and repeals lewd conduct codes. 

That timing resonates. Seattle Vice asks us to sit back and enjoy, but also to think about whether the show as it is would exist today without the strip club moratorium or the strip-club alcohol ban. Burlesque and circus, artforms pivotal to Seattle Vice, may not have boomed locally if strip clubs weren’t so sanitized. It’s mostly a silly time, but also surprisingly educational. 

Seattle Vice ’76: The Saga of Sin runs May 8–May 18 at the Triple Door.