The Best of Burlesque – Assembly Rooms
There are occasions at the Edinburgh Fringe when sitting in the front row feels like a privilege. There are others like, several minutes into Best of Burlesque, you begin to wonder whether you have made a serious tactical error.
You live and learn.
The problem is not burlesque. Quite the opposite. Burlesque has enormous theatrical possibilities. It can be funny, provocative, sensual, satirical, beautiful and absurd. There can be character, storytelling and invention in the simple act of appearing on stage and gradually removing what you arrived with.
But there has to be an idea.
Too often tonight, Best of Burlesque seems to consist of people taking their clothes off to music. There isn't enough artistic interpretation or theatrical imagination to turn the act of undressing ...