Skip to main content
The Paris Theatre’s back in business.
Longtime Portlanders may remember the historic theater by Voodoo Doughnuts on the corner of Southwest Third Avenue and Burnside Street for its decades as a porno theater. The Paris Theatre was revamped into a nightclub in the late 2010s, but closed suddenly in 2019 after its roof collapsed. The Seattle-based cabaret theater troupe Can Can stepped in, and while the pandemic delayed its reopening, the venue now known as Can Can’s Paris Theatre opened for business on Friday, Nov. 21.
WW attended a preview of Can Can’s Paris Theatre on Nov. 17. The first audience tested out the menu and building features and watched its debut program, ‘Twas the Night Before Nutcracker. Singles and couples are best accommodated at small cafe-style tables either in the theater’s balcony or ground floor. Larger groups will likely get split up, or they may be able to sit at a raised counter table that sits above the ground floor pit to make those audience members more eye level to the stage.
Can Can’s Paris Theatre isn’t serving dinner theater entrees, but more like luxurious old-timey concession snacks. There’s $10 artisan-flavored popcorn and $15 beignet straws. The Ferris Wheel ($26) is effectively a charcuterie board, while the Great Escape… De Fete ($18) is a corn dog served with two pigs-in-a-blanket skewers. Their flaky outer pastry shells are coated in black and white sesame seeds and served with Dijon mustard (an advertised wasabi sauce was not served).
The cocktail list is nearly twice as long, with tastes ranging from sweet to savory. Practice saying Lou Reed’s Leather Jacket ($18) a few times before ordering the smoke-kissed blend of rye whiskey, amaro, mezcal, sweet vermouth and orange blossom. The Campfire Disco Ball ($16) is served warm, a cinnamon and blood orange mezcal hot toddy. The drinks’ bold flavor profiles pack enough of a wallop that drinkers will want to sip slowly, both to not overwhelm the bar staff and to not take too many restroom breaks (more on that in a minute).
‘Twas the Night Before Nutcracker is a loose retelling of the Christmas classic in three easily digestible acts with two intermissions. Can Can dancers Luna Lynn Day, Resa La Revv, Jordie Campbell and Abby GoLucky are the company’s chorus dancers, and while they were not perfectly synchronized for the dress rehearsal, their routines were as fun as their heavily detailed costumes. If Can Can could add two more chorus dancers to its tiered stage for this or future shows, the group numbers would feel like fully fleshed-out spectaculars using every inch of the stage.
Joining the dancers is Portland-based duo Izohnny, producers of the queer cabaret BOYeurism. Johnny Nuriel plays a glammed-out Drosselmayer with a little Marlene Dietrich eye makeup, acting as the show’s emcee and occasionally showing his other talents like singing. Nuriel soulfully covers Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah,” changing from Dickensian drag into a blindingly shimmering robe-dress that looked like it was pulled from the closet of the world’s most fabulous winter warlock. Isaiah Esquire plays the titular Nutcracker, or something, slipping out of and into beautiful costumes. Esquire’s nearly nude solo number with a sheer white veil billowing with a fan, lit under deep pink light, is one of his strongest performances in recent memory.
Its elements aren’t all totally successful on their own, and the Paris Theatre still showed some signs of active construction, like blue painter’s tape marking the ledges of light wood steps that still seemed like they needed some extra pizzazz to fit the vintage theater vibe. (The theatre’s owners confessed that they were still sprinting toward the finish line of opening night.) But once the lights go out and the show starts, the Can Can’s Paris Theatre sells a glitzy experience to audiences that feels like a natural next step for a town famous for cabaret shows like Sinferno and Darcelle’s. If you want a show to follow the Nutcracker’s plot faithfully, go see that at a ballet company. What’s offered here is something proudly silly and sexy, a little rough around the edges but captivating nevertheless.
