Australian Burlesque Festival @ The Tivoli Review

A festival that guarantees glamour, is sponsored by Absinthe and promises nudity ticks all the boxes for most people.

The Australian Burlesque Festival: Shake-O-Rama shoved this and more into a lacy body-hugging corset with a cheeky smile and saucy wink.

Click here for photos from the event.

The festival, in it's fifth year, boasted a line-up of burlesque's best and included a plurality of solo headlining performances by acts from home and abroad, such as Medianoche (US), Vicky Butterfly (UK), Vibrissa (Italy) and the local Lila Luxx (Brisbane).

Medianoche - Image © Lachlan Douglas

The theme of the evening was variety (in all variations of the word) as the show’s style ranged from vaudeville to Vegas lounge, from decadence to delirium, from cock-tease to comedy in an assortment of feathered hairpieces, silk stockings and slick suspenders.

Transitions were fast and frequent, the audience transported in a blur of nipple-tassels from contemporary blues to the big-band sounds of the Roaring Twenties and again from 16th Century England to the Copacabana without so much as a curtain closing.

Sina King - Image © Lachlan Douglas

The pace and character of the show was delivered with (and in) magnificent character by the talented Aurora, who punctuated each act with a comedic performance in the guise of Mistress, Madam and Master of Ceremonies.

In true burlesque fashion, the scales commonly shifted balance between tease and torment. “I may have to kill you … but that might mean I get sexually turned on,” was Aurora’s warning to flash photographers in the audience and is also, perhaps, the finest verbal representation of the festival’s leitmotif – sex and danger.

Aurora - Image © Lachlan Douglas

The bizarre, erotic and macabre burlesque traditions were ditched on occasion in favour of slapstick and song – as well as an extremely interesting and athletic LED light display from Vicky Butterfly, complete with feathered wings and white lingerie.

Vicky Butterfly - Image © Lachlan Douglas

For cultured folk intrigued by the wild, sensual and spectacular, this was a feast. Shake-O-Rama may sound like an Irish jig and, although the popular formula of charm, alcohol and nudity (which also may sound like an Irish jig) is not truly unique, the character and manner of this festival is.