Kabarett

Despite getting lumped in with burlesque nights in a recent cabaret round-up, Dee Itsy has always maintained that Kabarett is not a burlesque show. Ironically, given the current backlash, the line up is relatively burlesque heavy by Dee's standards, with a double dose of Katrina Darling, a version of the classic Isis from Hettie Heartache and a finale from Cat Aclysmic.

Between these acts, Kabarett features a typically broad range. It's heartening to see an Edinburgh-based acrobatic duo who can compete with Circus Trick Tease, a couple of sketches from Dog Eared Collective that mock Englishness without resorting to complete cliche and Japan's bizarre Gaga Heads: Dee's compering is refreshingly free of show business posturing. She may be one of the few hosts who can square up to an audience member and still charm.

Kabarett is cunningly curated. The burlesque is contextualised by the other acts. The shiny glamour of Heartache's glistening costume is countered by a confrontational interlude from Brooklyn raconteur and singer Scout Durwood, who baits the crowd through a number about menstruation.  Kabarett is aggressive, still counter-cultural. Darling's queen striptease is one of those routines that has a sardonic point and nudity.

The debate around burlesque - with apologies to Dee for using this review as a soap-box - is cast into sharp relief by a night like Kabarett. Questions about how the audience receive burlesque are countered by both the intentions of individual acts and the community that supports them. It's undeniable that there is an erotic element to all three stripteases.

Yet Darling's God Save The Queen is iconoclastic, witty; Heartache's Isis operates as a parody of the rather wonderful contemporary dance of Loie Fuller - even if the artists don't know it, it looks as if the Isis wings originally parodied the type of work that Time Lapse have lovingly recreated at Dance Base. The question of exploitation worryingly focuses on partial nudity and whether its very presence is anti-feminist. Yet this ignores both context and quality, substituting an unstable morality for aesthetic discussion. The sting of striptease is clearly moderated in a variety bill: dialogue about its cultural significance is irrelevant without a knowledge of the current burlesque scene, its history and the broader social environment.

Cat Aclysmic's appropriately named Man's Ruin concludes the evening. Harking back to film noir and bump'n'grind, it toys with objectification and cliche, never resolving the contradictions it unearths. A series of spectacular burlesque set-pieces, it is a connoisseur's routine, firmly referencing the past. Like many of Cat Aclysmic's routines, it asks more questions than it answers yet its raw glamour makes it a fitting finale to Kabarett's awkward, anarchic variety.