La Clique

It’s the twentieth anniversary of the famous bathtub, which still sits centre stage of this Olivier Award winning show. Originally created by Australian born David Bates from impromptu after-show performances at Edinburgh’s Fringe Festival, it grew from a sideshow made up of artists who aspired to something more edgy than the slick Cirque, into a globally recognised cabaret variety performance that has entertained thousands of happy (and slightly wet) people all over the world.

It's in Adelaide for a short time at the culmination of another anniversary – the 25th Adelaide Cabaret Festival, which has been so good that Artistic Director Viriginia Gay greets everyone in the waiting crowd, pointing to a sign around her neck informing us she has to rest her voice and can’t speak. Gay’s voice might be muted, but her energy more than compensates and sets the level that opens the show in the black box theatre at the Festival Centre.

Whilst the brass sounds of the William Tell Overture fill the room, stage crew unravel plastic sheeting for the front row of seats that circle the seemingly tiny stage dominated by the recognisable clawfoot bath.

Tuedon Ariri is playfully balletic on the edges of the tub and then up in the air, contorted and suspended on aerial silks, before a daring splashdown into the water, emerging with leg kicks and hair flicks to soak way beyond the protected front row. No-one minds – it’s almost an honour to feel the spray from her body spinning quickly in her finale.

Whilst the bath is removed and the water mopped up, the focus shifts to a corner of the theatre where Cabaret Décadanse move incredible puppets as disco singer Slinky, and later, with Latin lover Kiko and burlesque dancer Alma. Their three segments that punctuate the show are clever, witty, and whilst their puppets have exaggerated features, their movement is incredibly realistic, displaying the kind of dance moves I might have once wished I could achieve (and a striptease that goes much further than expected!)

Juggler Byron Hutton rolls rings around his neck whilst juggling others – throwing, snatching and twirling with immense precision, before Heather Holliday demonstrates her swallowing skills. And not just with a single sword either – indeed, it’s a theme of most circus-cabaret acts that you start simple and add more in number and complexity, but it’s no less amazing when Holliday keeps going with more swords than I could count on one hand. And just in case you think it’s some kind of trick, Holliday has a couple more ways to convince even the most obstinate crossed-arms sceptic. Her fire eating and flame throwing later in the show is also impressive to see.

The visual spectacle is a given for a show of this variety – impressive performers who can do amazing things with their bodies – but where La Clique lifts way above its aerial straps and silks is how it makes it art. The smooth movement of limbs, the perfect arcs of their torsos, balanced straight lines, and visual symmetry create sophisticated and aesthetic imagery, even before you appreciate the contortion required to create such shapes with the human body.

L J Marles works the tension straps ridiculously well: I still can’t understand how he was holding on with just one hand whilst walking horizontally above the stage – and his midair breakdancing jerks and falls had us all gasping and applauding. Tara Boom composes beauty with rose petal-filled parasols, balancing and spinning them with just her feet, set to a gentler version of Rihanna’s ‘Umbrella’.

Yet it’s fun too: Boom is just as impressive with her hula hoops; more so with a working popcorn machine strapped to her head, which throws out the expanded grain that pops as she twirls many hoops – oh, and whilst performing a striptease and doing things with butter and salt that might not wash out.

La Clique is very definitely an adult show – though Boom’s nudity isn’t that sexual, and even when David Pereira later contorts his limbs and torso dressed only in shaving foam, there are only moments of intimate provocation. It’s cheeky, yet it’s still bold and confronting, particularly if you’re seated in the front row!

The variety in this show is well-crafted with equal parts of talent, artistry, and comedy, which makes this much less predictable than the many you could see on a Friday night at a Fringe Festival. La Clique may not have invented this genre, but they have been at the forefront of its evolution. They have elevated this format that is perfectly at home in a theatre with a solid roof, to a wildly appreciative audience.

Review by Mark Wickett

Photographer: Claudio Raschella