We at NBT endeavour to encourage innovative neo burlesque performers and Cha Cha Boom Boom is clearly one of those. Here she talks about herself and her unique aproach to performance.

Cha Cha Boom Boom...

 Photos by Churchill Studios

I am from the lovely green county of Hampshire. I lived in London for 12 years but I’m back in Hampshire at the moment. My background is extremely eclectic! I played bass in bands for 8 years, touring and recording, I also toured with an Indie band as a dancer. In between that I’ve had stints working as a freelance journalist, make-up artist, a pop video extra, a Reiki and massage practitioner and a celebrity sandwich maker at Air studios where I made food for recording artists. That was the best job ever! Over the last 5 years I’ve completed a BA and an MA in Performance. It’s fair to say I can’t stay still for very long and always have to be doing something new!

I actually devised and performed my first burlesque show for my BA final performance at university back in 2005. It was really a one-woman cabaret show with elements of burlesque, comedy, grotesque and physical theatre. It went down a storm and I received amazing feedback and a lot of encouragement to tour the show. For my dissertation I was researching into female performance and gender issues and I’d become really interested in the resurgence of New Burlesque that was happening at clubs like The Whoopee. It seemed very female driven and on the brink of doing something really exciting.

I had to be forced into it actually! I’d become a bit disheartened by burlesque, as it seemed to have lost the subversive edge that I’d originally been attracted to. Burlesque seems have become viewed as the new pole dancing and for me that’s not what new burlesque has the potential to be. I believe that it’s an art form using narrative, comedy, and satirical observation. I’m not so interested in stripping for the sake of just stripping. The strip for me has to be a part of the narrative, there has to be a greater reason for it and I like to use it to make a bit of a statement. Anyway, I received a message on my Myspace site from the Whoopee Club saying that the scene needed more performers like me, which was a real compliment and gave me a bit of hope so I thought “what the hell” and entered their 2007 Tournament of the Tease which I won in December and from there I entered the London Burlesque Festival, newcomers contest 2008. The reactions I’ve had to my acts have really encouraged me, a lot of the audience come up to me afterwards and say they really enjoy the comedy and satire and appreciate the amount of thought that has gone into my act.

I’m not really for dictators, but I guess a good dictator is someone you can parody and send up. I love the scene in the film Cabaret where the dancers at the Kitty Kat Club rip off the peaks of their hats to make German soldiers helmets and start goose-stepping around the stage. That for me is what summarizes the potential power of new burlesque. 

The Nivea show show is called Swan Fake and is a commentary on the cult of celebrity where I start out as a beautiful swan and end up as an ugly duckling all tarred and feathered. My ideas stem from one general theme and then I push those ideas as far as they can go hence my costume and props are really an important part of the show and why I dress up as Paris Hilton complete with the little pug dog handbag! I try to use my props as an inventive extension of that theme so my pasties are cut out pictures from celebrity magazines of Posh Spice. The use of pots of Nivea crème that get bigger and bigger is based on the rule of comedy, to repeat something three times before the audience gets bored with it, anymore than that and they’ve got the joke really!

I won’t give too much away, suffice to say that my new show involves rabbits, a ticking clock and the western world’s paranoia about the threat of terrorism!

I haven’t been specifically trained as a burlesque dancer, although I do find that ‘dancer’ bit strange as I don’t really dance in my performances although it is a very physical art form that involves movement. I guess my training comes from an amalgamation of my general performing background as a dancer for bands, a band member and my performing arts training.

The best thing about performing burlesque for me is the opportunity to get up on stage and say a lot in a short and sweet amount of time. It’s also great to be allowed to be sexy, glamorous and funny all in one go, what girl could resist? 

It’s not as glamorous as some would think, the backstage areas are non-existent or extremely cramped at best and you have to pull your own suitcase! I really need my own roadie to cart my props around. There’s also a lot of competition about now with so many performers so you have to have an edge by having something a bit unique about you but most of the other performers are really friendly and encouraging.

I haven’t been around long enough to really say that the industry is nepotistic but I suppose it’s like any other entertainment business it can be who you know not what you know.

To prepare before a show, I don’t drink anymore so I can’t say I have a good stiff one! I think for me it’s just getting into costume. There’s something about the transformative power of make-up, wigs and costumes that really transports me into the performance ‘zone’.

I love the fact that so many women are coming to shows to be entertained by other women, there’s something very special about that. If a lot of women are coming to watch other women take off their clothes then there’s less emphasis on the sexual element of burlesque and more focus on the glamour and narrative, which can’t be a bad thing!

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Our thanks to Cha Cha Boom Boom for taking the time to share your experiences with us.

Ed.