THEATRE REVIEW

JUNE 2025 | Volume 252

 

A mini-Cirque du Soleil at about half the price, Haus of Yolocombines spectacular acrobatics with a somewhat tacky but entertaining burlesque framework in a 90-minute show without intermission. The result: big fun from Down Under.

The three women and a man from New Zealand’s Dust Palace come onstage to pounding disco music, wearing little but flesh-coloured coverings and pasties. They’re fashionistas, waiting for Vogue to arrive. All take turns as the narrator, referred to as Welt Couture--whoever dons a many-coloured coat. The other three are Sexy Meat Puppets who perform for us, as Welt Couture sits at a sewing machine and creates their costumes. on the spot.

The flashing lights and pounding music continue throughout the show as an onstage videographer records the action, played on a large upstage screen. The costumes created are pretty modest, and the patter, the flirtation, the sexy dancing sometimes seem more strip show than Cirque. But the acrobatics are wonderful: handstands on piles of teetering chairs, high-flying body-bending routines on silks and a rope, a whip number, a crazy thing with hula hoops. Audience members are brought into the action, too, in a funny contest as runway models.

All credit to the tireless performers: Eve Gordon, Lizzie Tollemache, Jaine Mieke and Luis Meirelles, who remind us of what remarkable feats the human body is capable.

 

 

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