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Question of the Day - 24 June 2006

Q:
On the series "Las Vegas," there was a scene where Ed Deline (James Caan) treated his distant relative to breakfast after his break-up with a sly con artist of a fiance. At this restaurant the wait staff consisted of topless and almost bottomless (un)dressed women. Does any such establishment exist in Las Vegas or is this purely Hollywood fantasy?
A:

Purely Hollywood fantasy.

A topless Las Vegas coffee shop does not now exist and to our knowledge has never existed in Las Vegas. We checked with the Clark County Health District, who had also had this question posed to them, and they confirmed that there's a regulation requiring that "outer clothing of all food handlers must be clean and well-maintained," which, by extension, implies that outer clothing must be present.

For that matter, no cocktail waitresses at Las Vegas casinos are topless. Completely undressing parts of food and beverage servers' bodies (women's and men's) is forbidden in the nightclubs and ultralounges in town (though the outfits are, admittedly, getting skimpier and skimpier). Only recently has topless sunbathing been allowed at a handful of Las Vegas pools. The only place where topless women have been tolerated for long is the showroom.

And, if you don't mind us saying so, topless waitressing in Las Vegas restaurants is not only an utterly gratuitous fantasy, but it's ridiculous as well. We saw that scene and even the actresses seemed like they were thinking that the whole idea was stupid.

Update 02 March 2009
So, the bad news is that Sexxpresso is no more. The good news, however, is that we learned today of a new topless coffee shop that just opened not in Vegas, but in Vassalboro, Maine. Here's the story, courtesy of AP: "Servers are topless at the Grand View Topless Coffee Shop, which opened its doors Monday on a busy road in Vassalboro. A sign outside says, 'Over 18 only.' Another says, 'No cameras, no touching, cash only.'On Tuesday, two men sipped coffee at a booth while three topless waitresses and a bare-chested waiter stood nearby." 09/04/2008 LATEST UPDATE: Check out the QoD for 11/15/2007 for a more recent QoD on the topic of a former almost-topless Las Vegas hair salon and a still operating lingerie-attired coffee shop... 06/21/2006 Thanks to a couple of different readers who wrote in to inform us about a former topless coffee shop in Fort Collins, Colorado, which opened in the late '80s and delighted in the name "Debbie Duz Donuts." Apparently, the joint was popular with truckers but not with many of the good citizens of Ft. Collins, and was reportedly eventually shut down when the owner was caught dealing drugs in the parking lot. Not before it had been featured on the "Geraldo" show, however, so you might be able to track that down somewhere, if you're interested. And thanks to Dave Adams of San Diego for the following: "I was stationed at Lake Mead Base in North LV in the early '60s and we used to play blackjack at the Silver Dollar, where all the woman dealers were topless. Just wondering if you were aware of that." (Jessica: I'll check with Anthony and Deke on that, but I certainly wasn't. Wow!) MORE UPDATES 06/22/2006: Apparently topless donut joints are far more popular than we'd hitherto been aware. Here's some more feedback: "There is a topless donut shop in South Portland, Maine. It's adjacent to a topless nightclub and has been open for quite some time." "Ft. Lauderdale, Florida had a topless donut store for many years, located close to the airport. It was called R Donuts."
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