36 MONTEREY COUNTY WEEKLY JUNE 18-24, 2026 www.montereycountynow.com FACE TO FACE By day, Elliott Bradley works in IT at Community Hospital of the Monterey Peninsula. When he isn’t behind a computer, the 39-year-old Monterey resident takes his day in an entirely different direction: He is a dance performer. Bradley has been dancing since he was a teenager. At first, however, audiences were not so appreciative. “After getting laughed at at a party, I decided to teach myself how to dance by prom,” he says. “I danced in secret.” In college, he took his dancing back into the open, participating in ballroom, B-boying and break—and kept practicing wherever he moved, from Atlanta to South Korea. Bradley says the dancing scene was not so vibrant in California when he arrived a decade ago, but he dove in. He got involved in musical theater, then started choreographing music videos and burlesque shows. Bradley performs “boylesque”— male burlesque—an art form that is theatrical, playful and seductive storytelling through dance. Locally, he works with Carmel Delights Dance Company and he co-produced a boylesque show last year called “Monterey Man” at Pearl Hour. “It was very surreal,” he says. Weekly: What do you feel when you dance? Bradley: It’s very therapeutic for me. I can escape. I can be a character. That’s part of me [that] displays confidence or creativity. I focus on different music patterns, and trying to move my body to that end. How did you get into burlesque? I kind of got into it by accident when I was doing youth theater. They had a burlesque show—Star Wars burlesque, kind of like parody, just for fun. I was just poking fun and dancing. Then one of my friends [from Carmel Delights] saw me dancing. She said, “Hey, I think you’d be really good. Your style is different from what a lot of guys do for dancing around here, especially for burlesque.” They brought me in about three, four years ago to start dancing with the company. What does burlesque mean to you? You don’t have to dance, you don’t have to take any clothes off. What burlesque really is, is an art piece—or what I like to tell them is a sexy talent show. If one of your friends knows how to be a bartender, we’ll just go on stage and make a drink to a sexy song—and that’s it. You don’t have to do anything else you don’t want to. How did “Monterey Man” turn out? The show was actually quite successful. I got a lot of positive reviews and comments. They were surprised and shocked that some [performers] were doing things outside their comfort zone. One person who has never danced before was dancing on stage for the first time and doing it really well. Do you have a favorite prop? My favorite prop is my mask. It’s a white mask that has a very big grin on it. I really, really like being called Chester the Jester. That’s the character, whenever I put that mask on, and I really like being that character because I can be dark, mysterious; I can be very playful. You said you were laughed at when you were younger. What was the hardest part of learning how to dance? Dancing in front of people. Having and knowing that I had attention on me. Stage fright. That was something that I had to get over. Are Elliot the IT guy and Elliot the dancer different? They’re quite different. My coworkers were kind of shocked, because they view me as meticulous and studious. I’m very focused, and when they see me outside of that, they see how free I can be. I’m very by the book when I work, I’m strict. But then when I’m dancing, they see how free I am, where I can break the mold between different styles. I will incorporate ballroom or salsa or Latin ballroom into break dancing and house. I don’t conform to just one style, I try to build it all together—and it kind of breaks the rules. Any advice for young dancers? Enjoy the dance, enjoy the music, find something that just makes you happy. If you’re happy, you’re going to move. It’s very cliche. How do you reward yourself after a good performance? I’m a sucker for pastry. My favorite is sticky toffee pudding. That’s like my cheat meal. A great place to get it is at Crown and Anchor [in Monterey]. Step To It Elliot Bradley went from an awkward teenage dancer to owning the stage. By Celia Jiménez Elliot Bradley performing at Pearl Hour in November 2025 during “Monterey Man,” a boylesque show that he helped produce. JEM SAN PEDRO Golden Oldies Cat Rescue www.gocatrescue.org 831•200•9232 Learn more about Priscilla on our website. Adopt•Volunteer•Foster Older Cats New Beginnings Priscilla: an affectionate 8-year-old with a big personality. Won’t you take the time to get to know her? 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