Gig review from the Soho Theatre

What a powerhouse show from a phenomenal performer: a glorious comedy cabaret that’s by turns funny, poignant and political – and never less than fabulously executed.

Reuben Kaye has the voice of an angel and morals of a demon, a wit as sharp and deadly as a switchblade and a stage presence of such dazzling luminosity you never forget you’re in the company of a star.

He starts in full-on glamour mode – in an over-the-top frock and leaning into the raucous, punchy attitude that the world’s screwed, so we might as well party. With a six-piece band to back him, he belts through anthems such as Pynk and Sympathy For The Devil, given a gutsy, glitzy twist. The show’s full musical repertoire spans The Cure to Stormzy.

With a brisk commentary on everything from climate change to the Tory leadership challenge to the dangerously corrosive spread of corporate and religious power, especially in his native Australia, he’s a harbinger for the end time – ‘the only horseman of the apocalypse to ride side saddle,’ in his own words.

He’s imperious and withering, able to get laughs with a mean side-eye but with an arsenal of impactful jokes ready to seemingly pluck from the air. He also has a grounding sense of self-parody, so he can be the butt of a joke as much as whatever poor shmuck in the audience gets his unwanted attention.

Just over half an hour in, he starts ‘the show’ – as if what preceded didn’t have more showmanship than you’d have any right to expect. 

This bulk of the show is a narrative about his favourite subject, himself – from the eclectic line of Eastern European Jews from whom he’s descended to his coming-out story. While accepting there should be no need for people to assert their sexuality publicly, he frames the moment more personally – as a proud turning point of teenage self-determination. Though he didn’t universally get the reaction he had hoped for.

Acceptance is, to no great surprise, a theme of the 90-minute show, best illustrated with an anecdote about buying shoes that allowed him to unleash all his biting sass on a shop assistant fixed in her gender binary ways.

In a beat, he’ll switch from the melodramatic to the slapstick; from an affecting moment to a spicy insult, as he projects a persona that’s variously waspish, filthy, tender, obscene, hilarious, bullet-proof and vulnerable.

Occasionally the show is at risk of trying to cram too much in, or of switching these gears too quickly. But Kaye’s supernova-level star power sees us through, and gives enough space for the sentimental moments to resonate and the pointed gags to land. 

An artful, mesmerising callback about his father’s funeral is genuinely emotive – but showbiz is too rich in his blood to end on that, and a glorious showstopping number brings the audience to their feet as one, moved and entertained in equal, fabulous, measure.

• Reuben Kaye: The Butch is Back is at Soho Theatre, London, at 9.30pm until Saturday.

Review date: 6 Sep 2022
Reviewed by: Steve Bennett