Community, celebration and stars: Adelaide Cabaret Festival 2024

Artistic Director Virgina Gay describes the tone of her inaugural Adelaide Cabaret Festival and enthuses about some of the program highlights.
A white woman with short blonde hair poses dramatically before a gold lame screen. Her hands are behind her head, her face is turned to the right, and she is singing or screaming with joy. She wears a white shirt under a black suit, and her midriff and a hint of her black bra are visible.

‘Sex, sass, queerness, community and celebration … that’s the vibe that I think best encapsulates my particular take on cabaret,’ says Virginia Gay, Artistic Director of the 2024 Adelaide Cabaret Festival.

‘I just remember thinking, “I didn’t know you could do this with songs that I recognised from musicals”… I didn’t know you could do this alchemy. I was like, “I’m in. I’m hooked. This is magic. Sign me up. I’ll see f***ing everything”,’ Gay enthuses.

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Richard Watts OAM is ArtsHub's former National Performing Arts Editor; he also presents the weekly program SmartArts on Three Triple R FM. Richard is a life member of the Melbourne Queer Film Festival, a Melbourne Fringe Festival Living Legend, and was awarded the 2019 Sidney Myer Performing Arts Awards' Facilitator's Prize in early 2020. He received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Green Room Awards Association in 2021, and a Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM) in June 2024. Photo: Fiona Hamilton. Follow Richard on Bluesky @richardthewatts.bsky.social and Instagram @richard.l.watts