With more midriff on display than in the ladies 200m final, it was more than just the singing and dancing raising the temperature among the audience.
The lovely dancers from this 2012 UK tour were actually matched by their male counterparts in costumes more revealing than a 100m world record breaker to the point that wolf-whistles and whoops could be heard from excitable individuals in the front stalls.
All good fun, and probably key to this rather knowing production where facial expression, a roll of the eyes and subtle moves on stage can reveal as much as the spoken word.
With the cast all-important to Chicago, it was energising to see each and every performer from the chorus to the bill-toppers working effortlessly together to deliver the anticipated pazazz (and All That Jazz).
We all know and love Ali Bastian (Roxie) from her time on Strictly – graduating to the all-singing, all-dancing big musicals from Hollyoaks via The Bill.
The same goes for leading man Stefan Booth (Billy Flynn), whose soap pedigree is identical.
Corrie’s Tupele Dorgu (as Velma) must have wowed the casting director with her long legs – perfect for her routines stepping over the chair-backs!
And it was Brookie and The Bill for Bernie Nolan, too, who first rose to fame as lead singer of The Nolans.
Another actor relishing her role, she’s in sparkling form playing Mama Morton in one of her own favourite musicals.
All proved very much more accomplished than the annual soap awards might have you believe.
The ragtime band permanently on stage looked, sounded and acted as if they were a well-loved fixture.
That must largely be down to their leader Adrian Kirk, hamming it up for the audience as conductors so often do!
Neatly-choreographed by Gary Chryst, based on the original work of Ann Reinking, the nimble leads of Roxie Hart and Velma Kelly found no routine beyond their grasp – with some of their moves mixing it well with the entire company for some of the show-stoppers.
Energetic, suggestive, and full of Razzle Dazzle, they hurtled helter-skelter towards their natural fate in 1920s Chicago.
Neatly juxtaposed in understated style is Jamie Baughan as Roxie’s husband, devoted and gullible but always a Mr Cellophane.
With the West End run drawing to a close this latest tour may be the last time for a while that you can enjoy the back-stabbing, double-dealing would-be Vaudeville stars unravel their web of deceit.
