'Chicks' makes sexism fun again in Tempe

A raucous, raunchy mix of cartoonish violence and sexuality, it’s sort of a new-feminist “South Park.” Consider yourself warned.



Aside from the gratuitous pole-dancing, one of the primary pleasures of “Chicks With D--ks” is its intentionally cheesy low-rent theatricality. The minimalist motorcycles, for instance, might remind one of the “horses” in “Monty Python and the Holy Grail.” And as for superhero special effects, they are entirely up to the miming abilities of the cast, which thankfully are fantabulous. Kudos to fight choreographer Chelsea Pace, who favors camp over realism here, and rightfully so.



Chief femme fatale Emily Rubin, who was hilarious as Henrik Ibsen’s oversexed maid in Stray Cat’s “Heddatron,” is even more hilarious (and oversexed) as a leather-clad Vespa. But every member of this cast contributes to the guilty laughs, including Nathalie Cadieux as Chantalle, a faux-French vamper who puts the “chic” in biker chick, and Jamie Sandomire as Kitten, the delinquent with a master’s degree who delivers the play’s cerebral moral while performing a tabletop go-go dance.



Hands down, however, best in show goes to Michelle Chin as Cindi, the perky teen described in the script as “innocence … on a stick,” at least until she, like her idol Vespa, goes bad (and bad-ass). Playing off a long tradition of cartoon villains, Chin sounds for all the world like the dog-pack leader with the malfunctioning translation collar from Pixar’s “Up,” and she performs an anti-climactic laugh-spasm that’s one of the funniest things we’ve seen on Stray Cat’s stage.



THIS IS AN ABRIDGED VERSION OF THE ORIGINAL REVIEW - READ IT IN ITS ENTIRETY BELOW