Take a chomp out of Bite Club

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What’s the first rule of Bite Club? Everybody talks about Bite Club!
Part circus, part drag show, part burlesque and all round fabulous, Bite Club is the latest extravaganza from the much-loved Briefs Factory.
Led by co-founder Fez Faanana, Canberrans are in for three nights of fun and beautiful boys in tighty whiteys performing to the sounds of Aussie musical artist, Sahara Beck.
Guests will be treated to a shotgun wedding and table settings of music, circus, drag, burlesque, theatre, and comedy by these renowned cabaret mischief-makers.
And coming back to that first rule of Bite Club, Fez says it’s actually “everyone is invited and everyone is welcome.”
This is the fourth time Briefs Factory has performed in Canberra and Fez says that makes the group and our city more than just courting.
“We’ve gone beyond friends with benefits and we’re at the meet the parents stage of the relationship,” he assures me.
Running for three nights at the Canberra Theatre Centre from Thursday 21 to Saturday 23 November (and a cheeky boozy brunch before a Saturday matinee!), Fez has an invitation for Canberrans.
“Bite as much as possible and know you’re invited to a raucous live-action show with a rockin’ female musician. It’s a bit of different style other Briefs’ performances, there’s no less spectacle but all the acts are woven together with Sahara’s music and by the band.”
Each night there are 11 beautiful boys on stage, made up of the cast and band, with Sahara as the captain of the ship.
“She has the most amazing catalogue of rock, folk melodic and electronic music and each of our five performers found one they really connected with and interpreted,” says Fez.
“Although most of the time our interpretation was completely different to what Sahara originally had in mind.”
Fez, known for his larger-than-life drag personas, surprised himself with his choice of song.
“I really thought I’d go for a rocking number, but I’m actually performing one that – as some from an island nation likely to be the first climate refugees – really hit home. It’s about being a bad environmentalist, and that choice to turn back and get your coffee keep cup or get the takeaway cup ‘just this time’. It’s about being human.”
Being human and connecting to each other is at the heart of Bite Club. The show was born out of Brisbane in 2020 when the world shut down. Fez was already based in Brisbane but knew many artists and performers who were stuck, unable to get home and feeling adrift. So, he gathered his Briefs boys together, marched into a commercial real estate office with a box of Caramello Koalas and negotiated a deal on an empty student accommodation building. He offered four weeks of discounted rent in advance, and they stayed for 10 months!
“We had eight artists and two technicians all together – it really was like the dodgy housing commission version of Melrose Place,” he says. “We’d never just created a Briefs performance for the sake of it, there was always a show to be planned, but here we just played and let our creativity out and made things.”
The group had to be creative in lots of ways, they couldn’t order feathers from their usual supplier “because it would have taken seven years”, so co-founder and creative genius Mark Winmill turned to leftover costumes and scraps and made each performer a signature feathered fan.
These costumes are so important to who the Briefs boys are. “Drag is many things for many people. It’s a safe place,” Fez explains.
Joining Fez and Sahara are showman Mark ‘Captain Kid’ Winmill, aerial extraordinaire Thomas Worrell, Luke Hubbard as the fabulous Nastia, Dylan Rodriquez as the sumptuous Serenity and, master of the acrobatic cyr wheel, Rowan Thomas.
But wait there’s more! On Saturday from 11 am there’s a special Briefs Boozy Brunch show. Tickets include a mimosa on arrival, and buffet breakfast followed by a matinee performance of Bite Club.
So, get ready for some political bite, gender juggling, visual spectacle and tongue-in-cheek shenanigans with the Briefs boys!
THE ESSENTIALS
What: Briefs: Bite Club
Where: The Playhouse, Canberra Theatre Centre
When: 21-23 November 2024
Tickets: $79.00-$110.00 + booking fee
Bookings: canberratheatrecentre.com.au
Feature image supplied.