The Burlesque Hour locks loads and liberates Burlesque for the 21st Century, bringing together Australia's hottest and most intelligent exponents of gender in performance and contemporary burlesque. Salubrious salon meets cutting edge culture; The Burlesque Hour invites its audience into a world of pure old-fashioned burlesque/variety/music hall, layered with the work of astonishing artists who have twisted this artform until it screams for more, and have exploded the boundaries of gender in performance for over a decade.

Created by artistic collaborators Moira Finucane & Jackie Smith, renowned for their creation of intimate theatrical spectacles where variety, cabaret, burlesque, the gothic and fairy tale are melded into indelible visions of gender, power, violence and desire; The Burlesque Hour is an explosive mix of circus, vaudeville, carnival, showgirl, magic realism, text, burlesque, music hall, dance, butoh and performance art; colliding in extraordinary images of liberation and oppression. A crash curve carnival of Bearded Ladies, Japanese Serpent Warriors, Italian Stallions, spike covered Showgirls with sharp teeth, trembling Victorian spinsters, mad Hello Kitty devotees, Ecstatic Ice Queens, Bodice Ripping Adventuresses, Apocalyptic Beasts in shredded fishnets and towering stilts.

The Burlesque Hour features internationally acclaimed Queen of Cabaret Bizarre Moira Finucane, whose volcanic physical performance has turned cabaret and variety on its head and made critics from Hong Kong to London exclaim she is 'a towering inferno' and 'less of an actor more of a force of nature'; Moscow circus trained Azaria Universe - a contemporary Circus and Burlesque Star, the love child of Mad Max and Marilyn Monroe; Japanese Shock Cabaret Artiste Yumi Umiumare - from Japan's seminal butoh company DaiRakudakan, a wild-cat amongst the pigeons.

In every season, these extraordinary artists mix it up with luminous guest artistes, including - to date - the legendary Australian Variety star an original Tivoli dame, Toni Lamond; iconic gender-in-performance artist Maude Davey; British live artist and cult cabaret legend Ursula Martinez, and the all-dancing, all-dangerous nunchaku go-go girls The Town Bikes.

Described by Finucane & Smith as a 'revolution in a chocolate box' The Burlesque Hour has taken Australia's most astonishing and edgy performance around femininity and sexuality and packaged it in an accessible, sophisticated and cutting edge salon, where it has been embraced by contemporary theatregoing audiences, mainstream audiences, queer audiences and audiences that don't usually attend theatre. Selling out to standing ovations and critical acclaim in seven Australian seasons in Sydney at the Sydney Opera House, in Melbourne and in Adelaide; The Burlesque Hour's first international tour - Edinburgh 2005 under the velvet canopy of the 1930's Belgian Mirror Tent La Gayola - was hailed as "the Hottest Temptation of the Festival" (Scotland on Sunday). In just two years, The Burlesque Hour has been seen by over 15,000 people.

From theatres, to gallery and cabaret spaces, to the luscious interiors of the world's last remaining Spiegeltents, The Burlesque Hour creates an intimate music-hall-meets-oriental-salon aesthetic in a diversity of venues, wherever it goes.

Under the influence of set designer Adrienne Chisholm (Andrew Bovell's Holy Day @ Sydney Theatre Company, Keene Taylor Theatre Project, Melbourne Theatre Company), candles burn brightly on satin clash-and-match tablecloths of every colour and design; forty-four Chinese lanterns - flown in directly from Guangzhou - create a lush salon glow; fortune telling fish and colouring in competitions deck every table; and the stage is a curvaceous cacophony of candy striped red velvet, stars, hearts and a very pink Burlesque Hour sign hanging over a lush purple stage and catwalk.

Lights have been designed by Brazilian designer Alexandre Malta (dance and performance festivals in Amsterdam , Luxemburg, Rio de Janeiro, Caracas, Brazil, Tokyo); and richly detailed costuming is provided by long term collaborator, costumier David Anderson (Melbourne Theatre Company, Sydney Theatre Company, Chunky Move, Australian Ballet)