Life is a Cabaret

by afatpurplefig

For someone who really isn’t fond of musicals, choosing a Broadway show is a tough gig. I got lucky on my last trip, with the fabulous ‘The Band’s Visit’, which almost had me in tears during a standing ovation between a couple of forthright New Yorkers, but that was owing more to good fortune than anything else. With Kitty in mind, I was after a crowd-pleasing classic (Chicago? Hamilton? Wicked?), but no matter where I looked, all roads led to Cabaret at the Kit Kat Club.

The deal was sealed one weekend in Sydney. Initially disappointed to discover that Eddie Redmayne’s run as Emcee was ending before our arrival in New York, I bolted into Eva’s room shrieking, ‘…but guess who is replacing him?‘

Dramatic pause (during which Eva, who is accustomed to handling my outbursts, appeared suitably intrigued)…

‘…ADAM LAMBERT!‘

I love Adam Lambert. At the 2010 Mardi Gras party, I followed the voice of an angel belting ‘For Your Entertainment’ as though his life depended on it, and spent the rest of the track gazing adoringly at his studded shoulders and enormous, silver-buckled boots. Adam’s a Performer, with an Edge, which is my most-favourite kind. I snapped up stage-side tickets, and prayed they would be worth it.

Kitty and I arrive right on time and, after a short wait in a long queue, we are ushered into a darkened hallway, lined with bins and bags of rubbish, towards an attendant, who covers the cameras on our phones with stickers. A shot of peach schnapps later (because we never learn), we follow the crowd, frowning and gagging, into a vestibule, where performers are dotted amongst the guests.

‘I love how different they are,‘ Kitty whispers. Diversity is wonderful thing. A bald woman clutches her cleavage and blows kisses to a love-struck man perched on the bar, to the strains of a piano accordion and violin duelling on a small stage. The styling is circus-burlesque-carnival, but it’s the musicians that really make the difference, with their layering, as opposed to blending, of sound. I’m never quite sure what to listen to, or where to look.

The diners are called in early, and I enjoy how much Kitty loves being seated stage-side. Our server is golden, and brings us stacked, silver bento boxes, filled with delicious morsels; pretzels and hummus, charcuterie and cheese, falafel and pickles, and fresh berries. We sip champagne and smile at our neighbours, one of whom whispers to me, excitedly, ‘This is my favourite musical of all time.‘

My anticipation is at fever pitch when the lights dim, and when Adam arrives, in his brown leather shorts and lace shirt, I almost start crying. The show is played in the round, so the vista is ever-changing, and each of the performers is, at varying stages, almost close enough to touch. ‘Willkommen’ is wonderfully-lascivious, with its bucking and spanking and flexing. And the costumes…oh-the costumes!…are to-die-for. They include all that I adore; suspenders and bloomers, tap pants and finger-waves, and all manner of gender-bending goodness.

The performers are top-notch. Clifford is admirably straight-yet-queer, and I truly believe the fruit-fuelled love story that blossoms between Herr Schultz and Fräulein Schneider. I’m uncertain about Auliʻi Cravalho as Sally Bowles, right up until she demands admiration by singing her guts out in the final refrain of ‘Maybe This Time’. For me, though, it’s all about Adam’s Emcee and his perverse kaleidoscope of glorious fringe-dwellers.

‘I didn’t think it was going to be about nazis,‘ Kitty says during the interval, over cheesecake and sorbet.

Act II is a disturbing affair, with its gorilla number and abortion and violence, but its Herr Schultz’s certainty that all will be well, because ‘after all, I am German‘, that hangs miserably in air. The growing discord is encapsulated in the transformation of Emcee, once resplendent in gloves and pearls and pussy bows, into a shadow, clad in a drab, brown suit and blonde wig, sucking all that is vibrant and living from the atmosphere.

When the lights go down, my cup is full. We stand for the ovation, and clap so hard that Kitty leans over and says with a smile, ‘My arms are actually hurting from clapping.‘

Mine too.

Later, we catch a pedicab from Times Square to Penn Station, laughing as the rider weaves in circles around the cars during the red lights, listening to pop favourites blasting from his iPhone, and thumbing our metaphorical noses at all our glance our way.

Worth. Every. Penny.