50 Shades of Great World Cabaret: We Review ‘Let’s Bo Bo Cha Cha’ on Sentosa

Acrobats, Magicians, and Sailors, OH MY!

As every Sassy Mama knows, there’s a season for everything (most things). There’s a time for quinoa salad and a time for bakwa, a time to hug the babies close and a time to let them fly (when you turn 21, pumpkin), a time for 50 Shades of Grey and a time for Great World Cabaret, running at Resorts World Sentosa from now through 17 March.

Featuring some of Singapore’s biggest comedians – Hossan Leong, Mark Lee and Judee Tan – Great World Cabaret is about as far from Christian Grey as you can get without getting thee into a nunnery, though its run-of-the-mill sexual innuendoes (mostly in Hokkien, mind you) places it primly in the PG13 category. Which is why I say, with some confidence, if you are looking for fun for the whole family (or, if honesty’s your game, looking to park your kids and in-laws while you behave imprudently with the kids’ inheritance at the casino next door), Great World Cabaret is the answer to the unuttered prayer.

In it there are dancing girls! With outrageously sequinned eyelids and dresses in all the primary colours! French sailor boys bouncing off tables and biffing each other! (Only difference between the sailors and your boys is that the sailors are getting paid for it.) Beautiful singing girls with headdresses and wigs out to here! Fire-eating magicians who are mute! (Actually, just one.)

Disappearing acts! Reappearing acts! Making confetti appear out of thin air acts! Acrobats jumping, twirling, somersaulting and making human towers! And – the highlight – Mark Lee saying rude things in Hokkien that no child will understand. Mark Lee had the grandmas rolling on the floor laughing. It is a gift, go witness it.

Yes, there is a striptease. But it is so tame, so unthreatening, and so brief that no child will come away with the misunderstanding that a striptease actually occurred. There are no pythons. The child might think, oh, she has had a costume change. She was in a green cheongsam, and now she is in a beige bodysuit with sequins. But more likely, the child will think, will she jump off some furniture already?

For the Sassy Mamas and Hot Papas (the Christian Greys sans fixations?), Great World Cabaret will disappoint if you think that you are getting the real deal with its sex, bawdiness and smoky tawdriness. Instead, think of it as a McDonald’s Happy Meal version of a cabaret – a cabaret for kids, the kids on Sentosa who are reminiscing about the cabarets that their parents used to go to, who have imagined them with all the glitter and sequins and none of the dirt – and you will be laughing and clapping along with your own little acrobats.

Let’s Bo Bo Cha Cha! Great World Cabaret
When: 19 February-17 March, Mon-Fri 8pm (no shows on Wed)
Where: Resorts World Theatre, Resorts World Sentosa, 8 Sentosa Gateway, Sentosa Island, Singapore 098269
How much: Standard tickets: $48-$108; Premium tickets: $128. Buy your tickets through SISTIC or at Resorts World Theatre.