For every festival there must be a fringe; it is a symbiotic relationship that nourishes the host.
The Cabaret Fringe Festival launched this year with a three-day variety gala, hosted by local glitterati Amelia Ryan and Hans.
The Cabaret Fringe, like any fringe festival, performs a number of vital functions. Emerging local artists can use the forum to plant roots with the aim of growing from a sapling into a mighty oak. Previous Cabaret Fringe artists have gone on to grace the Cabaret Festival.
The Fringe is also an outlet for boundary-pushing visionaries who purvey an artistic vision the mainstream is not yet ready for. It serves as an open door, imposing no restriction upon entry; this allows the passionate to pursue dreams and the hobbyists to demonstrate their toil. With cabaret being essentially an artform designed around audience interaction, the intimate confines of venues such as La Boheme fit this genre like a glove.
Also fitting like a glove is the bedazzling attire of MC for the night, Hans. The serpent-tongued squeezebox tickler was in a particularly vicious mood, perhaps suffering from the ills of jet lag stemming from his sojourn to the motherland. His taunts towards unsuspecting audience members are always taken in jest, even when they cut like a scalpel.
The evening had a tinge of Eurovision about it, with flamenco from ‘Marduk Flamenco presents Vidorra!’, Gallic guitar from ‘The Sights & Sounds of Paris’ and Cabaret Italiano from Carla Anita (‘Evolution’). Not every act was suited to the variety format which takes the full shows out of their native context. There was also the odd technical difficulty, particularly during ‘The Sights and Sounds of Paris’.
The bespectacled music trivia tragics behind 'Geek Pop Quiz Night', and the pert and limber sirens behind 'The Redhead Cabaret', were undoubtedly the biggest crowd pleasers – yet the assortment on offer had the capacity to satiate the broadest array of tastes.
With a diverse programme traversing every inch of the cabaret spectrum, the Cabaret Fringe Festival simply adds more incentive to brave the Adelaide winter and venture into the city. Layer yourself in clothing, crank the heating in the car and then strip off like a burlesque dancer once you are cosily inside a venue sipping mulled wine; easy.
★★★1/2
