Bring On The Babes

You don't usually get a 'professional sideshow freak' with a bed of nails act as part of a burlesque revue, but Burlesque Babes, by Sydney's Black Rose Productions, departs from the traditional by including Dangerboy, familiar to TV audiences from Australia's Got Talent. Katie O'Grady, the show's choreographer and creator describes her show, involving three performers and Dangerboy, as otherwise “classical burlesque with a modern touch”. O'Grady has enjoyed a successful career as a burlesque performer for eight years and last year the time came to pull all that experience together to produce a night of 'intrigue, entertainment and comedy'. “I've been doing burlesque for ages by myself and I've always wanted to put a show together,” O'Grady explains. So she devised Burlesque Babes, handpicking her co-performers for their respective stage presences and including Dangerboy for the variety in his act and his 'burlesque flair'. It was a good move: 2012 saw Black Rose perform over 30 shows. Does O'Grady treasure any highlights from her first production? “An embarrassing moment was when we lost our gold bathtubs,” she replies. “They flew off the roof of the car when we were going along the freeway at 110 km. Of course, we had nowhere to get any more before our show that night and had to do our bath routine with buckets!”

The choreography is all O'Grady's plus she makes the costumes, paints the stage props and even makes the ostrich feather fans herself. “I've been a very busy girl.” Where does she get her performance ideas from? “I have a dance background. Most of it's inspired by the stuff I've done already, snippets and additions to shows I've done over the years. I wanted to have a bit more fun with it. We open the show with a 'welcome to burlesque' with music from the film, Burlesque, with the tiny top hats and diamante corsets. After the girls do their individual performances we have a Vegas Showgirl set when we're all on together in our big cossies.” What else can audiences expect? “We've got Sparky, who sings and Belinda who is an acrobat. I do fire eating and fire twirling. It's a quirky sort of show.”

Burlesque Babes isn't a show that takes itself too seriously given that it includes an act called 'Granny Gram'. “We get someone who's been on the burlesque circuit for a long time,” explains O'Grady. “So she gets to be Miss Burlesque 1946!” O'Grady's favourite part of the show is when they get an audience member up to take part in an amateur strip competition. “We put them in costume and give them some fun moves.” O'Grady plans to keep evolving Burlesque Babes to include performances by aerial artists, comics and vocalists, and she eventually wants to tour the country.

O'Grady herself is a certified babe: she was a finalist in the Miss Nude showgirl competition in 2005, one of the highlights of her career. And she's not alone: one of the other performers, artiste Sparky, was a Miss Nude Sydney and won Miss Burlesque Melbourne in 2012. So, talent and hotness. Who's complaining?