We went to see this with expectations raised from people raving to us about it. I went despite not being a great fan of circus acts. The show opened with a live spine tingling operatic rendition of Puccini’s ‘O Mio Babbino Caro’ which was the main theme of the film A Room with a View. It brought a tear to my eye and excitement to my heart. Next came the tumblers. They stripped off their tops and got into it with a huge amount of energy, joy and hip-hop attitude that gave their act an edge. Then the trapeze who was a pretty girl in an 18th century corset, she obviously enjoyed herself, but failed to make the trapeze interesting or sexy for me. The Rope guy could walk up the rope like it was a staircase and with rippling muscles tied himself in and out of knots, but… I couldn’t really find this very exciting for long. I felt that they both needed an extra dimension to their acts to make them interesting, some kind of narrative or gimmick. Which brings us to the final act of part one – Ursula Martinez who did a magic trick and in a funny/naughty version of “Nothing up my sleeve” gradually stripped naked to show she had nowhere to hide anything. Was she a magician who stripped or a stripper who did magic? It was definitely the naughtiest act of the night and really, the only thing for me that could give the title “burlesque” any credibility. Miss Behave who did the filler spots wore red PVC, but was not overtly sexy in her clownish role or even while sword swallowing, which had the potential to be very suggestive.
There was a nice big break in the middle, ‘cause the toilets are quite a distance in the Arts Centre.
Part two opened with the Opera singer Camille doing “Fernando’s Hideaway” (not as well) and introduced a fully dressed Ursula telling a very amusing tale through song of growing up half Spanish in suburban England. It was interesting to have a very personal moment with one of the acts rather than the more impersonal spectacle of the rest of the show. I enjoyed hula hoop girl, she had such total control over her hoops, probably the best I’ve seen, but… The tumblers returned to skip rope, but it seemed so difficult for them, they made many errors and this was not very impressive at all. Camille did a German version of the Beatles “I want to hold your hand” which was faintly exotic, then finally the Piece de resistance: the act in all the pictures advertising the show. A large bath was brought out and the front row was given sheets of plastic to throw over themselves. The gorgeous David O’Mer wearing only tight jeans slipped into the water and then languidly took hold of two straps hanging from the ceiling and performed amazing feats of acrobatics while joyously spraying the audience with water, including spouting from his mouth in his water fountain impression. There were so many layers of enjoyment, the control and beauty of his body, the danger of his falling, the surprising moves, the sparkling of the sprays and splashes of water, the fun of being splashed and watching others being splashed. A rubber duck also makes a brief appearance. He was definitely worth waiting for – he’d transformed an acrobatic act into something sensational, if only the others could have thought of doing the same.
We did not get the popular Polish Cesear Twins who apparently also work with water. Perhaps they were ill. We felt that overall the show did not live up to the hype, but was certainly enjoyable and had a damned good ending.