Empire: The World’s Most Outrageous Spiegeltent Show

Overview

Bold, beautiful and frequently hilarious, this 90-minute circus-meets-cabaret-meets-vaudeville extravaganza should take top priority on your summer to do list.

Fresh from a raved-about debut season in Times Square and sold-out tours across Oz, Empire is now open for business in Wynyard Quarter, with a 700-seat heritage carnival tent complete with pop-up garden bar. Spirits were high on opening night, where punters were enthusiastically discussing cryptic international reviews and pretending to want to avoid the front row.

While the acts themselves are difficult to describe, each and every one is jaw-droppingly impressive, with the performers’ potty mouths and easy banter with the audience just as entertaining as their moves.

Highlights included dizzying, Titanic-esque spins by roller skating duo Denis Pataov and Mariia Beseimbetova, pocket rocket Yasu Yoshikawa performing on a giant German wheel, and the Gorilla Girls, whose lingerie-clad acrobatics sent excitement levels through the roof.

Mellow sequences wisely peppered the otherwise fast-paced show, and the finale – where Memet Bilgin Rigolo, his concentration almost tangible, balances a single feather on a criss-cross of fourteen branches atop his head – was nothing short of spellbinding.

Empire has something for everyone (in spades!). It’ll be one of the best nights out you’ll have this summer.