The Stripper

When a musical promises blondes, burlesque and bullets, it’s clear that the girl on the poster is going to be a bombshell. As The Rocky Horror Show parodied science fiction b-movies, The Stripper investigates and shoots dead popular crime fiction.

There’s trouble in Pine City.
A lonely heart has died in mysterious circumstances and it falls to Al Wheeler to untangle the events that led to her death. Along the way he meets and seduces half the population of South California, edging closer to his grand conclusion.

Amongst his lovers is Deadpan Delores, a cousin of the deceased and a burlesque girl with dangerous addictions. The superficial is stripped away to reveal truths lying just beneath the surface.

In this its first production outside of Australia, Bob Carlton’s revival of Richard O’Brien’s 1982 musical slowly reveals saucy underclothes. Based on Carter Brown’s novel of the same name, this witty homage to mid-nineteenth-century pulp fiction encapsulates everything that was sexy about the sixties.

Former Coronation Street actor Jonathan Wheeler is Al Wheer, the tongue-in-cheek lethario of Pine City who is played to exaggerated perfection and with keen observation of the Cary Grants of cinema. The surprise cheer of the night is Jack Edwards. His performance as florist and suspect Harvey Stern, though small, wins rich applause.

Disappointingly, the production jars occasionally. The characters, though likeable, feel too comedic for comfort for most of the first act; though several songs are notable, it's not until the final number of act one that the spirit of the piece finds its proper outlet and is allowed to develop to excellent effect.

The set, a series of tenements covered with pages of the original novel, is a contrived and outmoded arrangement of flats and sliding doors. Its moving pieces are sluggish and it looks of little better quality than the pulp fiction from which it is constructed.

Emma Jayne-Appleyard’s Deadpan Delores is the star of the show. Full of smoke and sexuality, her portrayal of the character, along with O’Brien’s excellent lyricism, creates a something of an anti-Gypsy. Her predatory nature and flair is delicious to watch; there’s a strong sense of female empowerment in her character and it’s a pleasure to watch this corruptive streak strike the other female characters.

Planning My Big Exit, Appleyard’s eleven o’clock number, is one of the most powerful moments I have seen on the Glasgow stage this year, infinitely helped by Matthew Eagland’s excellent lighting. As Delores quips, “joking apart, dying’s an art”. What an art.

Most people will go to The Stripper expecting a new Rocky Horror and, whilst the creators may be there, it is a whole other set of jaws. Whilst Rocky Horror high-kicked to the sound of Bowie and Meatloaf, The Stripper swings to Sinatra and Fitzgerald. O’Brien’s presence is minor - he appears in only three scenes - much to the annoyance of several audience members audible during the interval. And although one man made several attempts, the audience participation is nil in Pine City. Give it ten years.