Don’t be fooled: while there is some circus in here, ‘Blanc de Blanc’ is more burlesque than big top. This show, with its spray of nudity, revels in the single entrende, the filthiness of a popping Champagne cork.
With choreography by Kevin Maher, who worked on Madonna’s Rebel Heart tour, it’s slickly done. The look is art deco caught in a hotel bedroom with Baz Luhrmann. There are some eye-popping bits, not least the shameless publicity grab of briefly lifting a ban on photos to invite us to hashtag selfies with the performers.
The sheer cheekiness of it all, the larger-than-life trashiness of guys in gimp suits and pimped up nakedness backed by a mash-up of musical styles, is often fun – the show blowing us a kiss while dancing skilfully on the edge of awfulness and arching an eyebrow at ‘taste’.
At its best, Scott Maidment’s production is a clever kaleidoscope of high and low. It’s the show’s maitre d’, Monsieur Romeo, who starts in a dinner suit, ending up in his pants and splashing us from a Jacuzzi. It’s performer Emma Maye Gibson’s firework lit from a butt-plug.
But, sometimes, stripping is just stripping and ‘Blanc de Blanc’s bubble pops when shock value is its only currency, when it’s just about baying at boobs. And the weightless splash of the pool-party ending is a damp conclusion to its more imaginative moments.
Nonetheless, the show offers a rollicking ride that’ll undoubtedly pull in the punters. And the Hippodrome’s cabaret theatre, right next to the cavernous casino, feels just right for its brand of knowingly seedy swagger.