A person in a blue top adjusts a red beret on their headLong Cloud Youth Theatre ensemble, under the dir­ec­tion of Brett Adam, present an enter­tain­ing show about power and gender. The script was cre­ated from their hon­est dis­cus­sions about their responses to cur­rent world events and inter­views with fam­ily, friends, and people on the street. Vari­ous scen­ari­os dis­cuss­ing sex­ism, slut sham­ing, gender ste­reo­types, peer pres­sure and sexu­al­ity are explored. The ensemble use drag in order to play with clas­sic notions about gender. The show mostly con­sists of lip-synch­ing to songs or the inter­view audio tracks. There is some audi­ence par­ti­cip­a­tion but not much – the act­ors are gen­er­ally pretty good at pick­ing up on who will answer some ques­tions. The songs are from a vari­ety of eras. They’re per­formed as an ensemble with more than one per­son tak­ing on the ‘singing’ role. This allows for nar­rat­ives to jux­ta­pose in and around the lyr­ics. This also hap­pens with the inter­views giv­ing us mul­tiple lay­ers of mean­ing. (Sit on the side fur­thest from the door to get the best view of the inter­view couch.) The Scruffy Bunny ven­ue has a small main stage and the full cast just man­age to fit on it while dan­cing. Unfor­tu­nately they dis­ap­pear into the dark when they dance onto the side cat­walks but there’s oth­er­wise plenty of oppor­tun­ity to see them up close.

A fun and thought pro­vok­ing night out.

  • TRASH GLAM DRAG SLAM by Long Cloud Youth Theatre on at Scruffy Bunny Improv Theatre to 30 June 2018 (Spe­cial $5 tick­ets for any­one in full drag)

Con­tent note: this show con­tains strong lan­guage, sim­u­lated viol­ence and sexu­al innu­endo. Not suit­able for chil­dren.