The S Factor: Strip Workouts for Every Woman by Sheila Kelley, Ruth Sullivan (Editor)

Product Details

Synopsis

Hipper than Taebo, sexier than Pilates, The S Factor--stripping--is the hottest new fitness trend. Created by actress Sheila Kelley (LA Law, Sisters, and a host of film and Broadway roles), S-Factor classes are wildly popular and generating an avalanche of attention from Extra, Entertainment Tonight, The Los Angeles Times, Allure, Us magazine, Fox News, and CBS's 48 Hours, which proclaimed: "Women don't even know they're working out until two months later when they say, 'I've never had a better body in my life. I'm strong, I'm limber, I feel great.'" Sheila even convinced Barbara Walters to try a pole dance on The View.

No wonder. Combining yoga, dance, and erotic movements, The S Factor is a program that tones muscle, firms the body, increases flexibility, promotes weight loss, and gives you a few new tricks for the bedroom. Illustrated in hundreds of photographs that show step by step how each move is done, the exercises are sensual yet demanding, requiring a balance of strength and finesse. There are slow, rounded warm-ups, the Spine Circles and Hip Circles. Strenuous motions, like the Rocking Cat-Cow. Peels and rolls, grinds, pounces, arches. And pole work, from the Firefly to Descending Angel.

Something else happens, too: These exercises and routines boost self-esteem and give women a new way to think about their bodies. Stripping is a liberating act, out of which comes a new look, new body, new confidence, new you.

Library Journal

Forget Gypsy Rose Lee! Modern strippers-otherwise known as pole dancers and lap dancers-get up close and personal with their audiences. Researching a film role, actress Kelley got to know these dancers and learned their routines. Impressed with both the physical improvement and the emotional high they inspired, she began teaching these routines to her friends and ultimately opened an exercise salon. Her book breaks down the basic moves, many of which are similar to yoga and/or ballet, then puts them together in a variety of routines. She compares the workout to the fertility dances of early matriarchal societies, citing the body awareness and feeling of empowerment that result. The suggested music could have included a few more bands familiar to those of us who aren't Gen-Xers, but the workouts themselves are good exercise and will be more fun for many women than a more traditional workout. A 20-city author tour is planned; buy for demand.-Susan B. Hagloch, formerly with Tuscarawas Cty. P.L., New Philadelphia, OH Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

Biography

A remarkable talent who brings experience and grace to all her projects, Sheila Kelley is a performer who embodies the very femininity actresses covet and strive for. Inspired by her role in Dancing at the Blue Iguana, a gritty, unapologetic story about women who make their living as strippers (which she also co-wrote and produced), Sheila discovered the natural sexual power of stripping. In April 2001 she began teaching her stripping technique in a class called the S Factor out of her home. So successful were these classes that Sheila was forced to hire more instructors and move the classes to a new, larger studio, which opened in June 2003 in Los Angeles. To spread the movement to women across the country Sheila has written The S Factor: Strip Workouts for Every Woman. With an acting career spanning television, film, and theater, Sheila made her mark on the entertainment industry. Her longest television stint was four years on NBC's L.A. Law; Sheila also had a recurring role in the network's cornerstone series, E.R. Ever busy, she conquered Broadway in 1995 in My Thing of Love at the same time playing long-lost sister Charlie Bennet for the final season of Sisters. Her long line of film credits includes Cameron Crowe's Singles, Neil Labute's Nurse Betty, and a co-starring role alongside Michelle Pfeiffer and George Clooney in One Fine Day. Sheila can next be seen alongside Nicholas Cage in the new Warner Brothers film Matchstick Men. Sheila Kelley lives in Los Angeles with her husband, Richard Schiff (of The West Wing) and their two children.