Wearing 7-inch neon heels and translucent yellow bell-bottoms, Mary Serritella was defying gravity and expectations on a latest Wednesday night time at Hollywood’s Bourbon Room.
Spinning gracefully round a silver pole to a disco medley, she contorted her physique right into a collection of inconceivable positions with much more inconceivable names like “The Chopstick,” “The Jade Split” and “The Black Sun split” — a showstopper through which she gripped the pole between her stomach and thigh and hung the wrong way up holding a foot with every hand.
It was a stunning show of flexibility and sensual athleticism and the gang liked it. However when Serritella, who performs beneath the title Mary Caryl, revealed after the September efficiency that she had simply celebrated her 71st birthday, the room exploded. A younger girl within the entrance row pumped her fist within the air. One other made a bow, paying homage to the “we’re not worthy” bit from “Wayne’s World.”
“You never lose it if you never let it go,” Serritella informed the viewers. “And five years ago I had a hip replacement. I’m a bionic woman!”
The gang roared once more.
Christina Calph, who booked Serritella to carry out that night on the Comedy Pole Present she hosts, mentioned Serritella is an inspiration.
“I see her and I believe, ‘Oh my God, I can be beautiful for the rest of my life,” Calph said.
In a city where, in some neighborhoods, de-aging procedures can be as routine as dental cleanings, Serritella’s pole dancing prowess serves as an embodied reminder that getting older doesn’t must imply forfeiting magnificence, sexuality, power or the actions you like.
Serritella nonetheless wears excessive heels, performs in bikinis and posts movies of herself on Instagram. She works out not less than 5 occasions per week to keep up the higher physique power and suppleness required to climb a pole and bend, twist and coil herself into positions that appear inconceivable for most girls a number of a long time her junior.
Serritella on the stitching machine in her dwelling in Northridge. She usually sews her personal pole dancing costumes.
(Marcus Ubungen / Los Angeles Instances)
She nonetheless offers with sure inconveniences of age — arthritis makes gripping the pole tough, and there was that hip alternative.
“When I wake up in the morning, I’m a little stiffer than I used to be, and early on I sprained a knee,” she mentioned. “But it’s like that old serenity prayer: Accept the things you can’t change, and change the things you can.”
Serritella, who lives in Northridge, began pole dancing in 2010 when she was 57, the identical yr the youngest of her three youngsters graduated from faculty. A good friend from the fundraising committee at her children’ college talked about that she’d began taking pole dancing lessons at a health club. On a whim, Serritella requested if she might come. She was solely capable of be taught a number of strikes earlier than the health club disbanded the category, however she was hooked.
“I wasn’t good. I couldn’t climb the pole. I couldn’t do anything,” she mentioned. “But I wanted to.”
Serritella stretches at dwelling. She workout routines not less than 5 occasions per week to keep up the higher physique power and suppleness required to climb a pole.
(Marcus Ubungen / Los Angeles Instances)
She discovered different studios to coach at together with the Vertitude L.A. in Canoga Park and Choreography Home in North Hollywood (now closed), typically sticking round for 3 classes in a single night.
“Both of them had incredible owners and instructors and they would bring in other incredible instructors from around the world, so I feel like I had the best training,” she mentioned.
Fashionable pole dancing originated in strip golf equipment within the Fifties however turned extra mainstream in the previous few a long time as gyms and boutique studios that taught the exercise sprang up across the nation. Since 2009, the Worldwide Pole Sports activities Federation and different organizations have pushed to get pole dancing included within the Olympics. (In brief, they’re on an uphill climb.)
As pole dancing has grown extra well-liked as an train and sport, quite a lot of types have emerged. Some performers emphasize athleticism and aerial tips, others storytelling and emotional resonance. Uncooked sexuality stays a pillar in lots of routines. Serritella embraced all of them.
“I remember taking a class with a parole officer who was teaching all these trashy moves on the pole and the chair,” she mentioned. “I was like, ‘OK this is me at 57 years old and I’m learning all this fun stuff.’”
Serritella has received many awards for pole dancing through the years.
(Marcus Ubungen / Los Angeles Instances)
In 2011, she entered her first pole dance competitors within the 40-and-over masters class simply three months after she began taking lessons. The organizers of the competitors, the Pole Sport Group, known as her on a Tuesday to ask if she would compete the approaching Saturday. It was a ridiculous deadline, however she had a dressing up in thoughts and had been engaged on a routine, so she mentioned sure.
“I was like, ‘Am I crazy?’” she mentioned. “But it’s always been my personality to do things and not be afraid.”
Her first solo efficiency was at a showcase placed on by the Vertitude. She dressed up as Mrs. Claus and danced to “Santa Baby.” Extra not too long ago, in 2023 she took first place in her division at Pole Artwork Italy, a global competitors for a rustic “dancin’ and romancin’” themed efficiency to a medley of “These Boots Are Made for Walking,” “I Only Date Cowboys” and “Lady.” She wore pink cowboy boots, a beaded pink cowboy hat, a tie-front sports activities bra and denim pole shorts.
“Burlesque and comedy are my favorite styles,” she mentioned. “Some dancers really love dramatic music. That’s not me.”
Serritella has maintained her flexibility via aggressive pole dancing.
(Marcus Ubungen / Los Angeles Instances)
Her household has principally been supportive of her dancing. Tony, her husband of 33 years, recalled that his spouse hosted a neighborhood public entry tv present known as “Images With Mary Caryl” within the ‘90s and in 2012 appeared on “Alt for Norge,” a reality television show that brings Americans of Norwegian ancestry to Norway to compete in cultural challenges.
“Nothing she does surprises me,” he said.
As for her kids, Serritella said her daughter loved it when she started pole dancing, but it took her sons longer to come around.
“I think they were shocked that I had this fun side to me,” she said. Still, her middle son and his wife were in the audience when she performed at the Bourbon Room.
“I’ve realized to roll with it,” he mentioned.
Amongst her youthful pole dancing mates, Serritella is a hero. Teresa Fischer, a instructor at Luscious Maven, the North Hollywood studio the place Serritella dances now, described her as “a legend in the industry.” Stephanie Pozos, one other good friend from the studio, mentioned you may’t take your eyes off her.
“She has incredible flow, and she really knows how to show off what she’s good at and play to her strengths,” Pozos mentioned.
Angelina Medina, who began pole dancing 2½ years in the past, mentioned Serritella’s type is so much like her character: bubbly and entrancing.
“I love that she’s defying society’s narrative,” she mentioned. “I just turned 33 and society tells us as women that life is over after 30. It’s really not.”
Serritella has a background in magnificence. She sells make-up out of her dwelling, designs and sells a line of pole dancing garments, and labored as a picture marketing consultant, serving to ladies with their hair, make-up and wardrobes. When her mates and purchasers ask her for magnificence ideas, she’s joyful to oblige.
Serritella performs in entrance of a dwell viewers throughout the Comedy Pole Present on the Bourbon Room in Hollywood in September.
(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Instances)
“My two big ones are drink water and keep moving to help you flush out everything you take in,” she mentioned. “A lot of times you see people who are my age and they are puffy-eyed and they have bloat. That’s what it is — lack of water, lack of mobility.”
Different ideas embody put on basis each day to lock your moisturizer in and defend your pores and skin from the weather. Eat wholesome, however don’t fear about being good. And indulgence is a crucial a part of life, whether or not it’s a brand new lipstick, a slice of birthday cake, or espresso with a good friend.
It’s all useful (and I did begin placing collagen in my espresso after she informed me she’s been doing it for 10 years), however Serritella’s actual superpower is her capacity to buck society’s ingrained worry of ageing and dwell the life she needs.
“So often through the years women would say things to me like, ‘I can’t wear heels anymore’ or whatever it was, and I would put a psychological bubble around myself,” she mentioned. “I just didn’t want to absorb that ‘I can’t’ attitude.”
It would take extra work than it as soon as did for an older girl to really feel lovely and powerful, however that doesn’t imply it’s not potential, she mentioned. If there’s one thing you need to do, strive it.
“We say our children are our future, and that’s true, but we’re their future too,” she mentioned.
Serritella backstage earlier than performing throughout the Comedy Pole Present on the Bourbon Room in September.
(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Instances)
Again on the Bourbon Room, Serritella crept into the viewers after her efficiency, wanting much less like a bombshell and extra like a scorching mother in denims and a grey tank high. She was nonetheless sporting her 7-inch heels. She couldn’t discover her tennis footwear within the inexperienced room. When the lights went down and the subsequent act got here on, she dropped to her palms and knees and crawled via the gang to her seat. She didn’t need to disturb anybody’s view.
The subsequent performer was a comic book named Annie Lederman who’s three a long time Serritella’s junior. She stepped up onstage and surveyed the gang.
“I have to follow Mary?” she mentioned, despondent.
The viewers laughed in sympathy.