EastEnd Cabaret: Notoriously Kinky

Comedy duo EastEnd Cabaret bring an updated version of last year's debut show The Revolution Will Be Sexual back to the Fringe for 2012. Flirtly and unashamedly naughty, this rather unconventional act doesn't so much walk the line between good taste and bad as sprint right over it without glancing back.

Sultry, smouldering Bernadette Byrne oozes smut and charm in equal measure, even as she plucks a couple of hapless participants from the audience, while "tame freak" and sometime foil Victor Victoria—literally half man, half woman—mostly broods forebodingly in the background. Together they perform a number of riotously entertaining and filthy musical numbers.

The subject matter may be blatantly unsubtle—titles like 'Is it in yet?', 'Danger Wank' and 'Accidental Anal' will give you the picture—but their lyrics are inventive and entirely hilarious. Byrne delivers her vocals in a pitch-perfect burlesque diva tone, while Victoria's live loops of multiple instruments—including the kazoo and the musical wood saw—are thoroughly impressive.

The duo also have a remarkable chemistry on-stage, with an impeccable awareness of one another lending a sense of polish and precision to their performance. Indeed, their skewed, twisted and ambiguous relationship is the source of much of the comedy between songs.

While there may be a few too many overlong gaps between songs, relying on awkward silences and even more awkward facial expressions from Victoria to draw a few chuckles from the crowd, the pair maintain an impressive energy throughout and conclude with a couple of barn-storming encores.

Lovers of subtelty will have to look elsewhere, but for everybody else this is uproariously ribald and entirely enjoyable hour.