LAS VEGAS: Tempest Storm is fuming. Her fingers tremble with frustration. They are aged, knotted by arthritis and speckled with purple spots under paper skin.

But the manicure of orange polish is flawless and new, and matches her signature tousled mane. She brushes orange curls out of her face as she explains how she's been slighted. She is the headliner, you know. She is a star. She is classy. "I don't just get up there and rip my clothes off," she says.

Indeed, the 80-year-old burlesque queen takes her clothes off very slowly. More than 50 years ago she was dubbed the 'Girl with the Fabulous Front' and told by famous men she had the 'Best Two Props in Hollywood.' Since then, Storm saw the art that made her famous on the brink of extinction. Her contemporaries Blaze Starr, Bettie Page, Lili St Cyr have died or hung up the pasties.

But not Storm. She kept performing. Las Vegas, Reno, Palm Springs, Miami, Carnegie Hall. Her act is a time capsule. She knows nothing of poles. She would never put her derriere in some man's face. Her prop of choice is a boa, perhaps the occasional divan.