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Performing once a month at east London pub The Glory, gay sketch-comedy group The Sex Shells last night premiered their first full-length show. And it was spectacularly funny.
On a stage dressed with red velvet and the kind of giant shell Botticelli’s Venus liked to pose on, three of the four-stong group – Le Strange, Calum Mac, Dom Top – are resplendent: singing and dancing away, their costumes are peppered with hundreds of pink crystals and feathers. Though it’s clear that Le Strange won the fight backstage over costumes, adorned in an Elizabethan ruff and a pink tulle cape. Meanwhile, the fourth, the fantastically named That Woman Rosie, sits at the piano with a giant shell on her head. Talk about squad goals.
Making full use of the camp canon, the songs include reworkings of music from West End musicals and Disney films, with some Paul Simon thrown in for good measure. Loaded with chemsex puns, sketches include a brilliant ode to the sesh featuring a missing baggy, based on ‘Cell Block Tango’ from ‘Chicago’. The drama of Nigella Lawson’s drug scandal is told to the music of Disney’s ‘The Hunchback of Notre Dame’. And a truncated Abba medley tells the story of a provincial twink and his dream of making it big at Central St Martins.
Bold, brash and utterly shameless, this show only runs for two weeks so please head down to the Glory while you can, but ease off the eyeliner: you’re going to leave it with your make-up fucked-up from crying with laughter.