Cheers! Portland, the Strip Club Capital of America - Lilith Likes to Watch Documentary December 2025
Title: Cheers! Portland, the Strip Club Capital of America
Year: 2024
Starring: Maggie Magnolia, Phoenix Rising, Axel
Director: Megan Ashley Alan
Synopsis: Portland, Oregon has the most strip clubs per capita of any major U.S. city. Through interviews with strippers, regulars, and industry experts, viewers are invited to leave their preconceived notions at the door and step into a highly misunderstood world. - via Amazon Prime
Lilith's Notes: Oh my god why are my eyes wet??
"So, I was working at a different club and I got in trouble for doing the robot."
Some time during the pandemic, I remember reading a tweet that said something along the lines of “We’ve reached the neon cyberpunk portion of the dystopia”. Attached to the tweet was a link to a news story about a strip club in Oregon who invented a drive-thru strip club experience. Five years later, maybe you’re wondering what happened to those sexy entrepreneurs? Or maybe you forgot all about them.
I had, until I spotted them in the trailer for Cheers! Portland: The Stripper Capitol of America.
This documentary does so, so many things right. One thing, for sure, is serving as a tourism commercial. The world is currently a cesspool, so it’s shocking when I find something that makes me wish I could crawl out of my little dungeon and once more visit this big, wide, wild world. I would absolutely do a strip-club crawl thanks to this film, but unfortunately, there is no way I’m stepping one stinking foot inside the States right now. The States doesn’t deserve my grace.
Anyway, Cheers! plays a combination role of fly on the wall experience and seated one-on-one interviews with various people within the walls of various strip clubs. From dancers, to owners, to the spouses of dancers, to patrons and regulars, we see all sorts of connections between everybody, ranging from the employer/employee dynamic to the found family camaraderie between the dancers.
So here I was, watching a documentary about how Portland is the Strip Club capitol of the USA, and suddenly I’m blindsided by… feelings?
I am not exaggerating when I say I got choked up at least three times. There is such a humanity to the stories portrayed in this documentary, from having to move from a historic venue, to fundraising for a fellow dancer’s cancer treatment, and the dark moments these women and men go through, the toll it takes on their psyche.
This is a startlingly precious story and one I didn’t expect to affect me so deeply. I just thought I’d be sitting down to watch a bunch of sexy women slide around a pole and discuss their stereotypical poor-me traumas. Why are my eyes wet?!
Back to our Neon Cyberpunk Dystopia. Yes, they touch on ways that the clubs had to pivot during Covid, and they found ways, from drive-thru dancers, to sexy food delivery. One can’t help but admire the good they tried to do, while also staying afloat in those unprecedented times. It’s all kind of amazing.
Just this month, strippers raised an impressive $60,000 for a local Children’s Hospital, making them the largest donor in Portland. The show sold out, but you can watch it on Twitch right now!
I want to leave you with this message: If you go to a strip club, any strip club, make that dancer's day. Be the best customer you can be.
Highlight:The true heart of this documentary is contained in the heart of Mary's, the oldest club in Oregon. The through line of Maggie and Mary's is a heartfelt tale, the humanization of a scene that from the outside people just think of butts and boobs.
Lowlight: Now I really want to go on a Portland Strip club Tour but like I said, not going anywhere near the USA for quite a while. You've fucked your tourism, you poor bastards.
LILITH'S SCORE: 5/5
Until next time, my voracious voyeurs. I’m Lilith, and I’m always watching.
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