What happened to Chippendales? Where are the stars of Chippendales? Are they still alive or not? These types of multiple questions are asked by fans all over the internet. Welcome to the Chippendales is the latest show on Hulu, a true crime story of Steve Banerjee, the founder of Chippendales, you do not want to miss this epic series. Welcome to The Chippendales start streaming on November 22, 2022.
The episodes of the series aired every Tuesday on the Hulu platform. It shows the great rise and disastrous fall of Steve Banerjee, the founder of Chippendales. In the year 1979, Steve Banerjee established the foundation of Chippendales, the first male stripping dance group. In the U.S., for the first time, a male strippers dance club, aka Chippendales, became a successful business industry.
In the year 1975, Steve bought a dying bar, “Destiny II” in West Los Angeles and, after that, renamed it “Chippendales”, that’s how a male stripper dance group – Chippendales formed. They feature male dancers specifically for women on special nights to entertain the females and become a great hit in their time.
Also Read, How To Watch Welcome To Chippendales Episodes? Streaming Guide
What Happened To Chippendales?
In the year 1987, Chippendales hit the newspaper headlines for unbelievably horrifying explanations. Steve Banerjee hired a man named Ray Colon, who is an ex-Palm Springs police officer, and booked a lounge room for entertainers to murder the producer De Noia of Chippendales’ show.
After that, Ray Colon, in turn of him, hired a man named Gilberto Rivera Lopez, whose profession is killing and Gilberto carrying out the murder of De Noia, the Chippendales shoe producer. In the year 1987, a man acting as a messenger of his friend killed De Noia on the 7th of April 1987 at his midtown Manhattan office. At that time, he was 46 years old.
At the time in 1987, Steve Banerjee and De Noia separated their separate ways of life after frequently conflicting their creativity and making differences. De Noia had left Steve Banerjee behind to start up his own Chippendales expedition and live performing show under the association of Chippendales Universal, which was at its peak and popular in New York City at that time.
Both Steve and De Noia had agreed on a contract and wrote on the back of a napkin about their deal. Fifty percent of the earnings from the people who toured Chippendales are given to Steve Banerjee by De Noia. When Steve realized the extraordinary success of the tour, he became frustrated and became jealous.
For many years, no evidence was found that Banerjee was linked to De Noia’s murder, but in the year 1993, everything unexpectedly changed. In the years 1990 and 1991, Steve Banerjee again planned to murder Michael Fullington, an ex-dancer and choreographer of Chippendale, with two other ex-dancers of Chippendales named Read Scot and Steve White. At that time, they were part of a competitor dance company named Adonis, which was touring in the United Kingdom.
The mystery was the murder was not solved until a man named “Strawberry” came out and told the authorities and the FBI that he was hired by Steve Banerjee for the murders.
The FBI crackdown the murder mystery of De Noia, and the mystery led to Colon, who agreed to cooperate with the FBI and helped to arrest Banerjee and his confession of plotting the murders of Fullington, Scot, White, and also De Noia’s death.
Steve Banerjee was also accused of three murder attempts, and minor damage at the two rivalry bars:
- In the year 1979, at Moody’s Disco in Santa Monica.
- In the year 1985, at Red Onion Restaurant & Bar in Marina del Rey.
- He also attempted the third attempt on another competitor bar.
Steve Banerjee was found guilty of hiring a man for murder and threatening. He accepted his sin and was sentenced to 26 years of imprisonment. However, in 1994 on the 23rd of October, just before he was sentenced to 26 years in prison, Steve Banerjee hanged himself in his prison cell and took his own life at the age of 47.
After Steve’s death, Irene Banerjee, wife of Steve, owns Chippendales assets with all his money and properties reported. Irene Banerjee died in February 2001 due to some complications of breast cancer.
