“Chippendales is more than just a show, it’s an experience,” we read on the official website. No kidding, it’s the wildest, sexiest and most interactive revue we’ve ever seen. And one that turns the tables on the male gaze, unabashedly celebrating women’s sexuality. The men of Chippendales have been burning up stages all over the world since 1979 (long before the Magic Mike craze), but who are they, when they aren’t donning the iconic cuffs and bowtie? How does their everyday life look like, when they aren’t wowing audiences?
We followed Alejandro Rodriguez and Shyllon Melatti from the early morning to the 8pm show at Planet Hollywood Resort & Casino (Las Vegas): the gym, lunch at Café Hollywood, an hour of relaxation by the pool, the dressing room at the world-famous Chippendales Theater…
Their sex appeal shines through no matter what they do –that’s a given; their hard bodies look oh-so-delicious at any time of the day (and night). But we didn’t expect their exuberance… and their friendliness. Shyllon jumped high on his bed like a seasoned Olympic gymnast (we took a photo). Alejandro had driven his mom to the airport at 4:30am, woke up at 7:30am for the make-up artist, patiently posed for the photographer and the videographer till 5:30pm, performed at the 8pm show, hung out with the fans, went back home, packed and flew out at midnight to the Dominican Republic, where production of La Isla: Desafio Extremo was about to start (a reality-TV show broadcast by Telemundo and streamed on Peacock). All the while flashing his infectious smile: 0 attitude, talent aplenty and a great deal of charisma.
PLAYGIRL: How long have you been dancing with Chippendales?
SHYLLON: I started in February 2020: I had two weeks of rehearsals and then COVID hit. So we transitioned to what we called ‘chipps at home’ and it was a different variation of the show. And because everybody was locked up, we did Mother’s Day, bachelorettes, birthdays, divorce parties all through Zoom. And so I was hosting parties and dancing with the girls in my living room, on my sofa. We had this cool little game called ‘what’s in my pants?’ where we would put like fruits and vegetables in our underwear and the viewers had to guess. Chippendales was the last show to come back on the Strip in 2021 and I’ve been with the show ever since. It’ll be six years by the end of the European tour.
ALEJANDRO: Four years in September and it’s been a great experience… dancing for all these people Tuesday to Sunday, I love it.
PLAYGIRL: What do you enjoy most about performing?
SHYLLON: I love being on stage in front of the audience. The cool thing about the show is that you know it’s an intimate experience and it’s a getaway from the real life, from all the problems people have in their everyday lives and so my favorite part about performing is giving everyone a different experience and a way out from their daily issues and their daily problems. For 85 minutes.
ALEJANDRO: yeah, it’s amazing how they react to everything we do on stage.
PLAYGIRL: Tell us about being a sex symbol night after night.
SHYLLON: Sooo draining [laughs]. It comes with the job, you know. You relive the same fantasy over and over again –just with a different person– and so the cool thing about the show is that yeah we do it every single night, but it feels like a different show because it does have a different audience, it does have a different crowd.
PLAYGIRL: Your audience is mostly women, of all ages. What about gay fans? Have you seen more of them over the years?
ALEJANDRO: We welcome our gay fans, we welcome women, we are open to everyone who wants to come and see the show.
SHYLLON. Absolutely. The world has changed, time has changed and being open with your sexuality is so much more accepted now. It’s 2025, who really cares anymore? It doesn’t matter who you are, who you love, what you look like. As long as you want to come and have a good time, we welcome everybody.
PLAYGIRL: The craziest thing that has ever happened to you with the fans (on stage or off stage)?
ALEJANDRO: Girls will throw bras on me. I have this routine in the shower: I’m exposed –I mean, I’m covered, but it’s close to the audience and sometimes they go really really wild and they just want to bite my leg or bite me whatever [laughs]
SHYLLON: During the show, we go into the crowd and we grind on the girls, we dance on them, you know. So I went to go grind on this girl and I was in my cowboy outfit and I put my hat on her head and I realized that her legs were up and I didn’t think anything of it –I thought she was just kind of going with the motion. But when I looked down, she was playing with herself in the middle of the room in front of everybody and it just caught me off guard –obviously that’s an issue and that’s not part of the normal routine. Every other show, somebody’s titties come out.
PLAYGIRL: What does it take to keep in shape?
ALEJANDRO: I think it’s a matter of balance. I work out, I dance and I play soccer and I do boxing, so all that activity keeps me in shape. Food is important too, but I always say ‘go with what makes you happy.’ Don’t go too hard, find that balance: Be happy and go with the flow and your body will know.
PLAYGIRL: Do you hang out with your co-stars in your everyday life?
SHYLLON: There’s a lot of camaraderie –it feels like a small fraternity in a way. We’re family, we all hang out with each other. The cool thing is that you do the show every single night, sometimes with the same people and sometimes people come and go. But you spend a lot of time together and that’s given us the opportunity to get to know each other on a more personal level and to see each other for who we are outside of the show: Hey do you want to grab a bite to eat? Do you want to grab a drink? And then you kind of build those relationships from there. The coolest thing is when we go on tour: You’re stuck with the guys the entire time, you go from the bus to the plane to the show to the hotel; you barely get enough time just alone for yourself and so, in a really positive way, it’s brought a lot of us closer, it’s given us the opportunity to develop these friendships, you know. Which actually makes the show even more enjoyable, because it’s a show for everyone out in the audience, but it’s a show on stage for us as well: We’re having a good time… if somebody messes up we laugh it off, we make fun of each other and so there’s that camaraderie on stage and I think it’s important for the show too.
PLAYGIRL: You aren’t a Chippendales fantasy 24 hours a day: Who’s the real YOU when you get off work? What are your hobbies?
ALEJANDRO: The real Alejandro likes to play soccer, he likes to go on his four wheeler quad out in the desert. He’s like a kid, because I like to go to the arcades and the movies. I like to play with my Nintendo, I’m always doing something, I can’t just be sitting on a chair. I like to cook too, I always cook my stuff: The kitchen is my one of my favorite places to be.
SHYLLON: I love working out and I love to travel. The show gave me the opportunity to see the world with all the tours we do. I love being outdoors: Vegas is actually known to be an outdoors place as well. I mean you can just about do anything outdoorsy within a 45 minute to an hour radius and so I’d go on a hike or to the lake and wakeboard out there as well.
PLAYGIRL: Where do you see yourselves five years from now?
SHYLLON: On TV honestly. I really want to get back into film and TV and I think that having so many years with Chippendales on my back has given me a lot of experience and a lot of opportunities –I’m ready to kind of take my talents to the next level.
ALEJANDRO: Whatever I do in life has to make me happy.
PLAYGIRL: Any indecent proposal… or more than one?
ALEJANDRO: Oh yes of course [grins], so many of them and not only from girls. Guys too, you know.
SHYLLON: After the show we hang out with the fans and we take photos and we sign autographs and stuff like that and we do get asked a lot if we want to go back to the hotel room or what we’re doing later in the night. The funny thing is most of these requests come from older women –for them it’s like a fantasy. It’s endearing, I take it as a compliment.
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