A Very Queer Formal

Le Gateau Chocolat’s work traverses genre and format. He’s trodden Bark of Millions with Taylor Mac at Sydney Opera House, and BAM New York, performances at Royal Festival Hall and Royal Albert Hall, Barbican with Basement Jaxx and Metropole Orkest, Glyndebourne, The Globe Theatre, Edinburgh Festivals and Bayreuth. He performs the likes of Wagner to Whitney Houston, Purcell to Radiohead and continues to subvert what it means to be a true icon in the post-genre era.

The six-and-half foot tall, six-inch heeled, wig-clad wonder swings wildly from one end of the musical spectrum to another, from disco, opera, musicals and pop. His recent production ICONS has toured to Sydney Festival, Wales Millennium Centre, Soho Theatre, Underbelly Southbank and elsewhere. ICONS has also been presented with accompaniment from the Little Coco Orchestra, a Le Gateau Chocolat initiative to support diverse musicians through the creation of an ensemble formed entirely of women of colour. In theatre includes at the National in Rufus Norris’ production of The Threepenny Opera, Feste in Emma Rice’s final visionary production of Twelfth Night at The Globe (2017), Effigies of Wickedness – Songs banned by the Nazis (2018), a co-production between the Gate Theatre and English National Opera and Daddy Brubeck in the Donmar Warehouse’s production of Sweet Charity (2019) alongside Beverly Knight and Clive Rowe. He further appeared as part of Taylor Mac’s A 24-Decade History of Popular Music: The First Act at London’s Barbican Theatre (2019), and as a featured cast member of two-time Olivier Award winning cabaret and circus, La Clique and La Soirée.

Le Gateau Chocolat has presented many solo shows including In Drag (Royal Festival Hall commission), accompanied by small orchestra, is an exploration of the effects of living in drag through music by artists ranging from Wagner to Nick Cave presented with trademark wit and candour; and Raw Cacao, an intimate song cycle with repertoire from Spirituals to Nina Simone, and Whitney Houston, presented by Carnegie Hall Citywide (2024), and Lyric Hammersmith – For The Culture (2022).

In opera, he has worked with many contemporary composers, specifically Julian Philips (Varjak Paw at Royal Opera House), Jonathan Dove (Tobias and The Angel at the Young Vic), Jocelyn Pook (Ingerland at Royal Opera House and Anxiety Fanfare at Hull City of Culture 2017 and Royal Festival Hall) and Orlando Gough (Imago at Glyndebourne Festival Opera), and his headline attracting performance as part of Tobias Kratzer’s acclaimed production of Wagner’s Tannhäuser at the 2019 Bayreuth Festival.

The Doll is the UK’s premiere cross-crossdresser (woman crossdressing as a gay man, crossdressing as a woman). She is the worst thing to come out of Ireland since the Famine, and is a performance artist, playwright, actress, and drag twat insistent on joining a historical lineage of transsexual woman who like to pop on wigs and change history. She has performed all over the world (and Kent), and has brought her drag “”talent”” to venues such as Brighton Dome, Southbank Centre, and the National Theatre, and festivals such as Glastonbury, Masseria Wave, and Mighty Hoopla. Some people have said she’s alright, and she’s run with it. 

Lilly SnatchDragon is an international, award-winning political comedy drag queen, burlesque artist and compere. Her approach to how the West stereotypes S.E Asian women won her ‘Best Newcomer” at the London Cabaret Awards in 2015. She has been in the Top 10 ‘UK’s Most Influential Burlesque Performers’ since 2015, including No. 1 in 2017, and currently No. 16 in the world for 2024. Engagements include The English National Opera and Improbable Theatre production of ‘Cosi Fan Tutte’ at the London Coliseum, ‘Sound of the Underground’, written by Travis Alabanza, at The Royal Court Theatre, ‘The Grotteaux’ by Shotgun Carousel at Woolwich Works and most recently performing in Las Vegas competing at The Burlesque Hall of Fame 2024 for the ‘small group category, in which she won with her partner Mark Anthony. She is also one of the founders of sell-out show ‘LADS’ and of renowned all- Asian cabaret collective ‘The Bitten Peach’. 

Emerging idiot Frankie Thompson is an ‘acclaimed clown’ (ToDoList) and performance artist. Her work has had sell out runs across London and Edinburgh. 

‘Hysterically Funny, Deeply Strange’ – Time Out 

‘Like nothing you’ve ever seen before… We all need some Frankie Thompson in our lives’ To Do List 

Midgitte is brilliant. They have a beautiful singing voice that often brings an audience to tears while contemplating all the vivid possibilities life can bring us. Midgitte is hilarious, and can often be found leaving crowds collapsed on the floor while their guts explode from laughter. They have phenomenal timing, dragging the emotions of spectators from joy to despair on the turn of a second. Their work can be acerbic, invoking a revolutionary zeal in the most inhibited of people, bringing new horizons of power, disgust, and the brute force of confronting our shared humanity on a dying planet. They also do drag.