History Film / Striptease

* FeatherBoaConstrictor: One stripper's entire shtick is this. [[SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome And then she gets an untrained snake...]]

* NoodleIncident: As an alternative to another drunken night out, Crandall calls a pair of strippers to give Dilbeck a private show at his home. The show is cut short when one of the dancers punches Dilbeck between the eyes and then runs out to the limousine, ''"scared shitless."'' Crandall asks what Dilbeck did to provoke her, and the dancer tells him. The details are not spelled out for the reader, but Crandall and Moldowsky are both thoroughly disgusted (Moldowsky later tells Dilbeck that he should consider himself lucky the woman didn't stomp on his testicles).

* LustMakesYouDumb: From the moment he sets eyes on Erin, Dilbeck becomes obsessed with ''"possessing"'' her, and refuses to continue with his re-election campaign until he can. The fact that he's risking torpedoing his own career by chasing a woman in the middle of said campaign does not cross his mind, until well after he has passed the point of no return.

* WomanAreWiser: Erin enters a state of TranquilFury towards Dilbeck, because his stalking is a threat to her daughter, and because under normal circumstances he will [[KarmaHoudini escape justice]] for his corrupt politics and his role in Jerry Killian's murder:

* WomanScorned: Inverted with Erin; she enters a state of TranquilFury towards Dilbeck, not because she's been rejected by him, but because he won't leave her alone, and under normal circumstances will [[KarmaHoudini escape justice]] for his corrupt politics and his role in Jerry Killian's murder:

-->''"See, people have this concept of justice. They talk about 'the system' - meaning cops, judges, juries and prisons. 'If only the system worked,' they say, 'there wouldn't be a crime problem. The streets would be safe, the bad guys would be locked up for life!'... Your average taxpayer can't understand. See, the system is a game and that's all... so what I do then, I try and set things in motion. Make the shit fly and see where it sticks."

--> ''...it was the same game of tease, the same basic equation. Use what you've got to get what you want.''

--->Nobody touches me 'less I wanna be touched, especially down there. I don't care who it is, or how shitfaced they are, or how much money they got, I won't stand for it. That little shit's lucky to get out with a sprained neck, because if it was me, I'd rip his damn balls off with my bare hands, just like this... and don't think I can't!

--->''"See, people have this concept of justice. They talk about 'the system' - meaning cops, judges, juries and prisons. 'If only the system worked,' they say, 'there wouldn't be a crime problem. The streets would be safe, the bad guys would be locked up for life!'... Your average taxpayer can't understand. See, the system is a game and that's all... so what I do then, I try and set things in motion. Make the shit fly and see where it sticks."

** Whenever Dilbeck uses the word "love", he's talking about his obsessive desire to have sex with Erin; beyond the fact that she's physically attractive and works as a stripper, he doesn't know the first thing about her, and could care less about learning (indeed, if he knew ''anything'' else about her, the fact that she used to work for the F.B.I. and is still on very good terms with her old boss, might convince a CorruptPolitician like him to look elsewhere to get laid).

* FluffyFashionFeathers: At one point, Erin wears a black feather boa scarf as part of one of her routines. Combined with her [[EverythingsSparklyWithJewelry diamond earrings]], black UsefulNotes/OperaGloves and her hair done in a PrimAndProperBun, she's apparently going for a "classy and glamourous" theme.

* FluffyFashionFeathers: At one point, Erin wears a black feather boa scarf as part of one of her routines. Combined with her diamond earrings, UsefulNotes/OperaGloves and her hair done in a PrimAndProperBun, she's apparently going for a "classy and glamourous" theme.

* FluffyFashionFeathers: At one point, Erin wears a black feather boa scarf as part of one of her routines. Combined with her diamond earrings and her hair done in a PrimAndProperBun, she's apparently going for a "classy and glamourous" theme.

** He brings a Bible during his regular visits to Erin's strip club (balancing it on his knee to cover his hand's [[ADateWithRosiePalms activity with his crotch]]) and claims that the justification for his actions is in there, ''"plain as day"'';

** Urbana Sprawl, endowed with GagBoobs, eventually quits the Eager Beaver and becomes a premed student in Atlanta;

* {{Inherent in the System}}: Al Garcia, Hiaasen's [[RecurringCharacter recurring]] {{Knight in Sour Armor}}, delivers a fine monologue:

* SingleWomanSeeksGoodMan: Erin becomes strongly attracted to Al Garcia (and even has an EroticDream about him) precisely because he is HappilyMarried, shows no romantic interest in her at all, and is just a [[KnightInSourArmor tired professional trying to do an ugly job as best he can.]] The fact that nothing actually happens between them just makes her feelings that much more understandable.
** [[InvertedTrope Inverted]] (i.e., Single Man Seeks Good Woman): Erin's GoldDigger mother scorns the idea that her daughter could make a living as a stripper (primarily because her natural breasts are, in her mother's opinion, much too small), but as Orly attests, she quickly becomes one of the Eager Beaver's biggest draws, largely because her dancing skills are much better than the other performers, who rely primarily on their GagBoobs or other gimmicks; lampshaded by Urbana Sprawl's advice to Erin to get a favorable reaction from customers: ''"A smile beats forty-inch jugs any day."''

* TakeThat: Most of Hiaasen's novels go after those who went after the Florida Everglades, but he has a few specific targets as well: in ''Strip Tease'' he includes the U.S. Congress in his list of targets, for renewing government subsidies to Florida's sugar industry every year, portraying these [[ConspicuousConsumption obnoxiously rich people]] as ''"struggling family farmer[s]."''

* UndignifiedDeath: The hypocritical judge who separated Erin from her daughter dies of a massive stroke at the Eager Beaver's rival strip club, at the precise moment when one of the dangers drapes her bustier over his head; at the moment of his death, his hand (presumably his right) is [[ADateWithRosiePalms clamped so intractably to his crotch]] that it remains attached throughout the paramedics' efforts to resuscitate him.

* {{Viewers Are Morons}}: InUniverse. Dilbeck secured his election to Congress by delivering a eulogy at his precedessor's funeral; the TV stations didn't run the whole speech, just the first few seconds of it, and that was enough to cement his place in viewers' memories over all the other hopefuls: ''"Hands down, Dilbeck had given the best damn sound bite at the funeral."''

* GagBoobs: Urbana Sprawl, which name is indicative of her bust size, is rumored to have accidentally smothered a man to death on a convertible sofa. No one at the club has trouble believing it. When Mr. Orly introduces topless wrestling at the club, she specializes ''"in pinning opponents without using her arms."''
** In the film, she is played, fittingly, by Pandora Peaks.

* FeatherBoaConstrictor: One stripper's entire shtick is this.
[[SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome And then she gets an untrained snake...]]

* ThisIsADrill: Shad's WeaponOfChoice when intimidating his attorney is a battery-powered hand drill.

* {{Manchild}}: Dilbeck, UpToEleven. Despite being [[CorruptPolitician egregiously corrupt]], Dilbeck is less a BigBad than a sixty-something arrested adolescent who honestly doesn't see anything wrong with his obsessive, single-minded pursuit of sex, money, and other forms of personal gratification. He never bothers to understand any of the issues he parrots about in his campaign, or the murderous lengths to which his patrons will go to keep him in office. For him, life is simple: do what the smart, powerful people (Moldowsky and the Rojos) tell him to do, and he will receive all manner of rewards and nothing really bad will ever happen to him, no matter how idiotically he behaves.

* SocietyIsToBlame: subverted, UpToEleven. In nearly all of Hiaasen's novels, there is at least one villainous or criminal character whose backstory makes clear that they started out with affectionate parents, good teachers, and no obvious trauma or temptation towards criminality, and yet they become criminals anyway, largely because they are too lazy to pay attention in school or hold legitimate jobs:

* CorruptPolitician: Dilbeck, UpToEleven.

--->'''Here's this arrogant old fart who thinks he's God's gift to pussy, but all he wants in the whole wide world is the love of this one gorgeous dancer. I mean, he'd be in heaven if this girl just smiled in the general direction of his dick... and Erin, she's got thirty I.Q. points on him, easy.

* IAteWhat: Shad puts a cockroach in a yogurt pot in order to file a phony lawsuit against the manufacturer. The lawyer's temporary secretary accidentally eats the thing.
** In the film, despite the "CRUNCH!" sound, she remains unfazed.
** In the novel, Mordecai is crestfallen, and instead of firing her, he says he will take ''"great pleasure"'' in telling her exactly what she ate.
** Also in the novel, Erin's divorce judge decides that being a stripper makes Erin unfit to raise a child, but [[{{Hypocrite}} nevertheless becomes a regular customer at the Eager Beaver]]. He realizes that several of the dancers despise him (since they refuse to perform table dances for him), but remains unaware that Shad, the club's bouncer, makes a point of [[UrineTrouble pissing in every glass of Jack Daniel's served to him]].

** Lampshaded with the line: ''"Most of the women who slept with him did so mainly because he was a member of the House of Representatives, and therefore he qualified (marginally) as a power fuck."''

** Lampshaded in the climax, when he expects the F.B.I. agents arresting him to recognize him right away, but ''"memorizing the faces of all 535 members of Congress"'' is not standard training for such agents.

* SmallNameBigEgo: Dilbeck, who ''"thinks he's adored by the masses"'' and ''"God's gift to [women]"'', not to mention the sugar industry's most favored ''"fixer"''. During his second "date" with Erin Grant, his overwhelming lust is (temporarily) eclipsed by his outrage that Erin is so unimpressed by his title or his "achievements."
** In the novel, he is also blissfully unaware that his irresponsible idiocy has finally become too much for Moldowsky and the Rojo brothers, who plan to replace him as chairman of the Congressional agricultural committee the day after the latest subsidies are approved:
--->''Other Congressmen would be elated to assume Dilbeck's special role. Surely not all of them were so conspicuously deranged.''

-->''The idea of the arrogant old drooler going scot-free was unacceptable, so Erin had made up her mind to destroy him. Dilbeck wouldn't be harmed, crippled, or killed, just destroyed. It seemed the least she could do, and it had to be done alone. Women's work.''

* UnusuallyUninterestingSight: after eleven years of working in strip joints, the Eager Beaver's bouncer, Shad, honestly doesn't notice when a woman has her breasts bared, which he is increasingly concerned about;