FATALE @ Shambles
Tuesday, January 22, 2019
Australian burlesque royalty Jacqueline Furey’s debut solo show set FRINGE WORLD on fire. Furey is as dangerous as her name suggests, aflame in her feminine glory, while she ultimately retains her feminist ire. And she is here to remind you that feminism does not exclude being feminine, and never has.
The living embodiment of Jessica Rabbit stalks onstage in all her blaze-haired glory and captures the audience from the outset in her feminist net, drawing them in slowly over the next hour of extravagant highbrow burlesque as she kindles passions by dallying with fire. She is fatale danger at its pinnacle and is utterly unapologetic as she teases and draws the audience into her web, her apparently delicate beauty belying her deadly talents. Furey is ferocious.
There is something inherently sexy about flirting with the flame. It is beguiling and terrifying, but it takes a very talented artist to completely engage an audience in that tryst. Furey knows all too well how to intertwine storytelling with that delicious dread of danger. She is a one-woman powerhouse, who fondles the audience in her gloved hand before delivering her death blows and dropping some unexpected truth bombs in the final act.
The climax is a death knell for men’s assumptions about women everywhere, delivered with aplomb and grace, defying anyone to deny her place in the world as a woman and a consummate performer. Perhaps she would appear to be a woman of contradictions to the untrained eye. Maybe her gentle footsteps as she approaches the subject matter seem soft, as she removes her clothing, but nobody knows better than a burlesque performer or stripper just how much power lies in choosing bodily autonomy, and Furey stomps that out onstage. It might seem to be subversive feminism but look closer, spend some time with it, and you will soon see the power for women within these art forms.
Furey is anathema to this age of men’s right activists and incels. She dares them to merely crawl meekly into her space, because she is not about to tolerate any foolishness. Women are tired of being scared, and Furey is here to let you know that women’s space is sacred, as she claims hers wholeheartedly. As she states in closing, the most dangerous thing a woman can do in this day is to simply exist. That devastating truth is something that everyone should rest with for a while.
Jacqueline Furey is a wildfire, and should not be contained. She is sassy and hilarious as heck, the show itself is a damn good time, and it is truly dumbfounding that FRINGE WORLD missed giving an award to Fatale. Here’s hoping this show goes global so folks everywhere can revel and bathe in the devastating beauty of womanhood.
NATALIE GILES
