Fringe Review: NEUROMANTIC - a queer cabaret
Imagine David Lynch meets Sesame Street, meets Fred Rogers, meet Broadway, but wait - make everything rainbow, and dial up the saturation to eleven, and you might have a sense of what NEUROMANTIC - a queer cabaret is like.
It’s the first solo show of the Melbourne-based artist Cynthia Sobraty, to call it a cabaret is perhaps an injustice. It’s a technicoloured collision of theatre, storytelling, poetry, original music wrapped up with a multi-coloured ribbon.
The experimental show makes perfect sense for Melbourne Fringe, which has, for more than 36 years, been an opportunity to put a spotlight on the grey in a world of black and white.
It’s presented as part of Critical Mass, which brings together a flock of artists, performers, musicians, dancers and thinkers during Fringe who seek to break up the established political narrative.
Sobraty hits the mark with this self-described, “wastrel genderfuck manifesto” of a show.
They agitate, question, celebrate, skillfully maneuvering through topics from transphobia to cancel culture, leaving no stone unturned in this perceptive exploration of what it means to be queer person in Melbourne.
Gender narratives are ripped open, burned (almost literally), white assimilation is attacked through a grotesque caricature involving latex masks of world leaders. Sobraty lays their feelings out on the stage, and we’re encouraged to go on the ride with them.
NEUROMANTIC is a true acid trip of ideas, yet despite touching on some dark, but critical places, the cabaret ends on a wonderfully light note.
The message is refreshingly positive, and it’s hard not to leave the room with elated spirits. Sobraty is to be commended for curating such a safe and honest space - it’s not easy to get a whole audience on their feet dancing.
Sobraty is a powerhouse, a performance artist that nails everything from music to dance to effortless, sharp on-the-spot humour. They have that natural charisma that places them so comfortably on a stage, oozing talent from every movement, every note, and every piece of (biodegradable) confetti. If this is just their first show, they’ll be one to watch.
They are no ‘black minstrel’ - they take charge of their own narrative; they are driver and the hero of their own story.
They are allowed to take up space, they assert. They are worth it. And so are you.
9/10