A warm red glow washes over the leather booths of the Galapagos Art Space. The tables – later to be filled with couples, birthday and bachelor parties – are separated by a central walkway that’s suspended over water. The Dumbo theater’s staff is busying themselves with preparations for the evening’s performance of the Floating Kabarette.
In a matter of hours, performers will emerge onto the walkway, strut up and take to the stage. For the audience, a night at the theater means watching their performance. They’ll only see what is put in front of them, what’s displayed on the stage.
But what happens behind the scenes?
Through the steel door marked “Stage door,” a concrete labyrinth winds through the bowels of the theater. A smell of chlorine wafts along its corridors.
The first dancer arrives. Her voluminous ebony hair emphasizes her slight frame. With feline caution, she plods onto the stage that’s still wet from being cleaned earlier in the day, sits cross-legged on the floor and stretches out. A few feet away, the stage manager is atop a ten foot ladder, changing light filters. The red curtain is drawn across the stage.
*
Two dancers stand before the mirror in the main dressing room. Their eyes are locked in concentration as they draw Cleopatra lines along their eyelids. The harsh light from the fluorescent bulbs above the mirror make their faces look deceptively severe. Among the make-up bags lining the ledge of the mirror, an oversized bag of pretzels is propped up against the glass. Its contents gradually diminish over the course of the evening as performers reach into it, replenishing themselves after their act.
On the other wall, two mirrors hang next one another. Another dancer with dirty blond hair, sits in front of them gluing on false eyelashes.
The host’s booming voice rings from downstairs as he warms up.
A voluptuous woman in a leopard print, faux-fur coat bursts into the room. She unbuttons her coat to reveal a sparkling red dress; the light catches its sequins. Her arrival makes the already-cramped room suddenly feel smaller.
The lady in red steps out of her dress and prances around the dressing room in black underwear. The stage manager appears. “Half an hour call,” he says to a chorus of, “Thank you!”
A girl with bleached-blond hair scrapped into a topknot, revealing a chunk of pink underneath, maneuvers a suitcase past the girls preening in the mirror. The dirty blonde steps past her, flips her waist length hair over her head and fills the room with the smell of apple sours from her hairspray. She twizzles her curls relentlessly, fixing them up and then tugging them back down.
“I can’t tell if my hair looks dumb,” she says to no one in particular.
One of her colleagues responds, “It does not look dumb.”
As the lady in red pats vibrant red glitter over her lipstick, the host calls, “Have a great show everyone.” The first act is called to the stage, and the dressing room clears out.
*
Less than ten minutes pass and the dancers drag white boxes, props from their act, off stage. They change out of their costumes as Dead or Alive’s “You Spin Me Round” pounds from the front of house and whoops emit from the crowd.
The ebony-haired dancer takes a red wig of a plastic bag and tucks her locks into it. She stands on tiptoes, leaning on her elbows as she paints black teardrops beneath her eyes. She takes a step backwards to examine her work, then leans back into the mirror and pulls the line further down her cheek. Her mouth is slightly open as she replicates the pattern on the other side.
A narrow corridor juts out of the back of dressing room. She steps into it, plugs her iPod headphones into her ears and robotically jerks through her routine. The synthetic red wig sticks to her face.
*
Two aerialists push a yoga matt up against a wall. One sits with his legs stretched out, toes in point. The dirty blonde curls up next to him and puts her head in his lap.
“The pain tolerance is the worst,” he says. “If you can deal with that, you can do it.”
The rhythm of the muffled music from the front of house is abruptly interrupted. The three stop their conversation and exchange quizzical looks. The stage manager runs up the stairs, leaps over them and darts out the door that leads to the auditorium. The crowd chant of “Kris, Kris, Kris!”
Five minutes pass and still no music can be heard. The three have resumed their conversation. Eventually the music starts up. The show goes on.
The ebony-haired dancer appears. She stands in front of the matt. “They kept telling me ‘go on,’ ‘don’t go on.’” She’s agitated. A colleague comforts her. She goes back into the dressing room and stands in front of the bright mirror.
She wipes the black teardrops away from her under her eyes. “It feels so good to take everything off.”
*
A bald, suited man appears from the stairwell halfway through the evening and hands out the paychecks. The host looks at his before folding it in half and tucking it into his breast pocket.
The aerialists have performed their act. They bid everyone goodnight and leave.
The ebony-haired dancer pulls on a pair of grey, faded jeans and black jumper. She loosely pins up her hair. A few strands fall out the back. She packs away the red wig into her suitcase.
“Where,” she asks, “are my drinks tickets?”
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