Cathouse

Cathouse is a reality television show featuring the employees and customers at the Moonlite Bunny Ranch, a legal brothel in Nevada located just outside Carson City. I'll make clear here that the Moonlite Bunny Ranch is not near Las Vegas, and is actually pretty much at the other end of the state from Las Vegas. If you don't know where Carson City is, get a map, and find Lake Tahoe or Reno. Carson City is near those two places.

The series grew out of a couple of special documentaries ran by HBO titled Cathouse (2002) and Cathouse: Back in the Saddle (2003). The first eleven episodes ran in 2005, the next six (the set in which in which Brooke Taylor makes her first appearance) ran in 2007, with the episode Cathouse: The Musical airing on January 1^st, 2008. Six "specials" were aired in 2008 and 2009 (it was in these episodes that featured the breakup of Bunny Ranch owner Dennis Hof and star bunny Brooke Taylor). Starting in December 2010, a set of new episodes was aired.

Dennis Hof has some sort of counting formula that he uses that he says adds up to the current season being season ten of the show. HBO calls the current season the third season of the show. I would call it the fourth (counting the six "specials" from 2008-2009 as their own season).

As some background detail: prostitution is legal in some parts of Nevada. For the record, it is not legal in Las Vegas. Nevada has an enabling statute that allows municipalities that have less than a specified total population to choose to make prostitution legal and regulate it. (The population limit essentially excludes legalizing prostitution in Las Vegas, Reno, and Carson City). Most of the other counties in Nevada permit legal prostitution under a local ordinance. In Lyon County, where the Moonlite Bunny Ranch is located, prostitution is only legal when undertaken by a licensed prostitute under the auspices of a licensed brothel. The licenses are issued by the Lyon County Sheriff's department, and basically require a pretty clean legal history, and the working girls must test negative for sexually transmitted diseases. State law requires all legal prostitutes in Nevada be regularly tested - weekly for most sexually transmitted diseases and monthly for HIV and syphilis - and makes condom use mandatory for all acts of sexual intercourse, including oral sex. The women are designated as "independent contractors" (a legal fiction that doesn't seem to really fit given the reported working conditions at most brothels) and negotiate their own prices. The series shows many of the working girls negotiating with customers, but only on rare occasions does it actually reveal how much a customer is charged.

Episode 1: What Men Don't Know
Episode 2: Anything Goes
Episode 3: Girlfriends
Episode 4: Getting It Up
Episode 5: She's Got Game
Episode 6: For Love or Money
Episode 7: No Sex Please
Episode 8: The Heat Is On
Episode 9: Catty Cats
Episode 10: Big Daddy
Episode 11: The Big "O"
Episode 12: Hot to Trot
Episode 13: Eager Beavers
Episode 14: The Pimpmaster General
Episode 15: Why They Come
Episode 16: Never Too Late to Learn
Episode 17: Superstars
Episode 18: The Musical
Episode 19: Come to the Party
Episode 20: Menage a Trois
Episode 21: What's On the Menu?
Episode 22: Three Ring Circus
Episode 23: Sex, Guys, and Videotapes
Episode 24: The Best of Cathouse
Episode 25: Cat Call
Episode 26: Welcome Aboard

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