As my first show of Fringe 2014, The Vaudevillians was a great choice to break the ice and warm me up to the arty world of Fringe! Set in the 1920s, the show is based around a married cocaine-selling duo who travelled around the world performing their Vaudeville-style Broadway show. That is, until they were unfortunately frozen alive on a trip to Antarctica along with all of their ‘original songs’ including the loved ones we know now like 'Girls Just Wanna Have Fun' and 'Survive'.

From start to finish I had a smile on my face, clever historical jokes from the era opened the performance and an upbeat and catchy duet sung by the couple showed the audience what they were in for. The wife, Kitten, played by Jinkx Monsoon, was dressed so well it took me at least 20 minutes to realise she was a man in drag let alone her beautiful and what I thought – feminine voice-. I loved the simplicity of the set, just a key board and lounge chair decorated the stage and with just one costume change it was obvious the show was about the characters –not their gimmicks.

The chemistry was perfectly balanced between the two with their cheeky remarks to one another and tense fighting that they attempted to disguise. Without giving too much away about the show I’d like to comment on the superb execution of audience interaction, comedy was not too risky but raunchy enough to be entertaining and the original and cover music they performed was accomplished perfectly. Some notable songs to look out for if you decide to see it are Britney Spears' 'Toxic' and M.I.A’s 'Paper Planes'. All their songs sounded nothing like the originals which made it exciting and enjoyable to try and guess what song they were reinventing.

In whole, the performance was great, the audience interaction was incorporated very well, and the discussion of misogyny, homosexuality and women’s rights were great! The only fault I could suggest was the running time, about 15 minutes too much for me as it went for about 90 minutes. However ample seating and a relatively air-conditioned venue made it more bearable. For $30.00 I see no reason for people to give this one a miss, there is something humorous for everyone to enjoy and they’ve definitely worked hard to get where they are, they deserve full credit and I recommend the show to anyone that enjoys music, cabaret, humour or drag.

I give it 3.75 out of 5 for Fringe.

The Vaudevillians runs on 24-26 and the 29-31 January, at 9PM in the Teatro tent!

-Neve Pearce

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