CABARET & VARIETY

Final Baby Girl!

Assembly George Square, (Venue 17), until 28 August

Love comes in many forms, some more visceral than others. Final Baby Girl! is a notably twisted search for romance that comes courtesy of Baby Lame, a towering drag queen whose babydoll make-up and dress are matched with a shock of back-combed blonde hair, big black beard, combat boots and a taste for horror. A deeply wrong upbringing and a job in a video store at an impressionable age have, we learn, left Baby with strange ideas about love: she can imagine nothing more fulfilling than being adoringly slaughtered by a monster-movie-style paramour. So in Final Baby Girl!, she embarks on the search for a psychotic soulmate, matching up with a range of wronguns, corresponding to different eras of screen horror, and one or two of the real-life monsters stalking this country today. She might even learn a little something about herself along the way…

It’s not a genteel show, then. But buckle up and there’s plenty to relish in this serving of horny drag horror with heart. Baby can come on strong, no question, but she’s a sweetie underneath, welcoming the audience warmly and roping us into participating in some deliriously inventive scenarios. The production values are impressive too, from cleverly sustained propbased gags to set design that could be described as “Texas chainsaw mascara”. Suitably for a story inspired by horror movies, there’s also an impressive range of sophisticated video-projected material, from tongue-in-cheek advisory notices to grotesque animated back-story.

And you don’t have to peel back too many layers of tissue to find the real humanity underneath. It’s not just larger-than-life fantasy creations who have had their ideas about healthy relationships and self-worth screwed up by a troubled upbringing and bad choices. Beneath the gore, and the OTT pop covers, beats the heart of a Baby who just wants to be loved.