Bernie Dieter’s grandma grew up in a travelling circus and was once smuggled over the border into West Germany in a caravan, hidden under a pile of sequined costumes. Dieter didn’t know about this until well into her own career as a cabaret singer, performing in shows inspired by Berlin’s legendary Weimar Republic nightclubs. Dieter embraced the spirit of those sexually liberated, hedonistic spaces, where difference was celebrated and politics were examined through satire. Before Nazism gripped Europe, this was a decadent Golden Age; only during the onset of dementia did Dieter’s Oma begin reminiscing about life in war-torn Germany, and the granddaughter realised that the apple hadn’t fallen too far from the tree. Of course she would end up travelling with a sequined show, impressing and uniting people in divisive times.

‘Yes, the back story part about my Oma is all true; it’s in my blood,’ says Dieter, real name Jen Byrne, a half-German, half-Australian diva who oversees 70 minutes of truly thrilling, filthy, uninhibited fun in Bernie Dieter’s Club Kabarett. It was a hit at Underbelly Soho Boulevard in London and has already enjoyed sold-out seasons in Melbourne, Budapest and Japan. Now Dieter has returned to Edinburgh for the first time since 2019. Her cherry-picked troupe of five circus and burlesque performers are all fabulous, taking turns to blow minds and drop jaws with contortionism, trapeze, fire and drag skills. But it’s the vampy Dieter that stitches it all together, stalking the room in stilettos, unapologetically pleasure-seeking, purring at her front row, unsuppressing one crowd member at a time.

‘I’ve got to break down the barriers as fast as possible,’ says Dieter in her offstage accent: less thick German, more soft Aussie. Minutes into the show, we’re watching the Mistress Of Mayhem being stroked by four men from the crowd, a blur of hands on her thighs, shoulders, and then, with very minimal encouragement, each other. ‘A crowd might start off reserved, but if you give them a little bit of permission, it goes a long way. Things can escalate quickly and they really go for it,’ she smiles.  

Writhing onstage in a black bodysock, with glitter handprints embossed all over, she coos her message about these horribly isolated times that we live in, and the need for ‘beautiful connection, babies!’ She invites us to ‘be whoever the fuck you want to be!’ The crowd, some waving tiny flags handed out earlier saying ‘Weirdo’, ‘Punk’, ‘Slut’ and ‘Filthy’, don’t seem to need much fluffing; they’re quickly bewitched and onboard. 

Then Dieter gets her freaks on. Russia-born Danik Abishev is an impish acrobat in jeans and black nipple pasties, jumping lithely on his hands, fanning his limbs flawlessly through the air with pointed toes while Dieter sings her cover of Prince’s ‘Kiss’. Jacqueline Furey is a stripteaser in black lingerie who breathes fire. We can literally feel the heat halfway up the Spiegeltent as she whirls her torches around (not a euphemism), swigging from a hip flask, then dabbing her mouth delicately after yawning a giant blaze into the air.

Iva Rosebud is a statuesque, moustachioed drag queen in slippery pink silk, lipsyncing flirtatiously to ‘La Vie En Rose’ before removing a few petals. Then several more. Soliana Ersie is a contortionist extraordinaire, never dropping her glowing smile as her legs wrap into cubist shapes around her ears while her toes scuttle around, seemingly independent from her body. Some may remember Jarred Dewey, the stunning aerial trapeze artist from Party Ghost, a wonderfully macabre Fringe drag cabaret from 2023. He has legs that go on for days, plus an extra ten inches in sparkly porn heels, and he wraps his legs gracefully around poles, drawing gasps and oohs as he goes. ‘What can I say? I have very talented friends,’ shrugs Dieter after the show when I ask how she gathered up her impressive team of misfits. 

‘I studied law before doing this,’ says Furey, wiping off her make-up before the performers go for a post-show wine. ‘That felt like a tiny death; and not in a fun way,’ she laughs (Dieter once ran a cabaret night in Berlin called the Little Death Club). ‘I thought I’d rather die than do this, so I quit. My soul was dying every day I wasn’t a performer. I’ve been working with the amazing Bernie Dieter for ages,’ adds Furey, who does a death-defying trick with an LED sword that many assume must be fake. It’s not. ‘I was lucky; the company gave me an amazingly huge stage, and they are really safety focused. Being a really risk-averse person actually makes me really good at this job.’ Safety was on everyone’s minds the previous night when Club Kabarett was cancelled as a precaution due to the raging Storm Floris.

Each performer creates their own routine, but the overall show is very collaborative. Dewey hand-makes his own costumes, for example, including a very elegant pair of high-waisted velvet knickers, with a jewelled eye on the back. Dieter picks tracks for performers and they adapt their set to the music; she adds her laugh over the catchy ‘Haha’ by Belgian electropop duo Charlotte Adigéry & Bolis Pupul during Ersie’s set, and boldly covers Nena’s ‘99 Red Balloons’ while Rosebud does something unforgettable with a birthday cake. 

‘There is a real authenticity in this show, despite cabaret being so showy and beautiful; the actual core of it is really us,’ says Dewey. ‘Our DNA is in the show. I’ve done lots of contemporary circus but in this I feel the most seen. It’s so amazing to see Iva come out as a drag queen; some have seen drag queens before, some maybe never have. But everyone is having a good time and laughing together. It’s a celebration. That’s the power of queer art; especially when you’re inviting everyone in on it.’

This gender-bending cabaret does not want to make anyone feel left out. It’s not just about sexuality; the messages it spreads are of self-acceptance, freedom, fun, pleasure and bodily autonomy. One of the show’s most rousing moments is a call-to-arms torch song, with references to Roe vs Wade, where Dieter is defiant, spreading wings on a dress that reads ‘my body, my choice, you will never own me’.

‘The show has a broad audience,’ Dieter says. ‘We want to make a safe space for everyone. We want the older man who has maybe felt alienated in nights that are exclusively queer to come here and have a great time. Women too. People from all walks of life. To feel valued. And moved. To address some of the things going on right now that affect us all.’

Dieter wears a dress at the end with ‘Mother’ embroidered many times on it. She doesn’t have children of her own but considers the performers and the people who come to see the show as her babies. ‘Yeah, it’s showing I’m there to take care of them. You can come along, have a laugh and a drink and leave happy. Simple. “Woo, we saw a willy tonight! And tits!”’ she jokes. ‘But it’s also an important place to introduce some American and UK politics, to think about how we are affected by toxic masculinity, horrible people like Andrew Tate. There is something similar about that time, when my Oma was being smuggled over the border, and now. That division among people is very extreme and visceral right now. Everything is forcing us into polar opposites; you can’t be in the middle, or be unsure of your opinion, it becomes very tribal. People are scared. They need a place to come, feel safe. Connection is really the antidote.’

Bernie Dieter’s Club Kabarett, Underbelly Circus Hub, until 23 August, 7.20pm.