Simon Cabaret has been around since 1991 according to their website. It is one of the ‘must go’ shows in Phuket for tourirst, famous for their ensemble of lady boys (Thai’s term: Kathoey for transsexual women). Since my girl friends are curious about the lady boys, we decided to go for this show located in Patong. We took a long walk after dinner to the show place which was about 2km further down the road and were absolutely glad to have found the place after walking on some dodgy unlit stretch of the road. I managed to book the tickets online for THB600 each instead of the published rate of THB800, though the online booking didn’t go smoothly at first but nothing was too difficult for such IT savvy person like myself… LoL

We had a round of drinks at the bar before the show started at 9.30pm. The theater hall was comfy, with free mineral water provided for the patrons. We were lucky to have chosen the 2nd row seats right in front the center of the stage, and the hall was quickly filled with people, mainly from tour groups. 

The show started quite on time with some familiar tunes here and there in English, Chinese, Korean, Indian etc (I was a little disappointed that no Thai song though). They were all dressed in colourful and over the top costumes. My friends were commenting that those overly colourful costume were meant to distract the audience from noticing their often desynchronization and bad lip syncing. The show were a little too long and draggy, some parts of the shows (especially the Chinese songs) came out desperate to please the Chinese audiences in my opinion. The ‘Barbie Girl’ funny act was definitely the highlight of the show, and of cause the act where 4 really pretty lady boys dressed very little dancing to some Korean pop song which were really ‘eye candy’ even to us girls. Still, the lip syncing became something too much for me to bear towards the end and I was glad to the see the final curtain call after almost 2 hours of show. 

After the show, all the dancers were lining up outside the theater (see picture below) working their *ss off trying to get people to take pictures with them (with tips of THB100-THB200 expected for each lady boys in your picture). Well, we didn’t pay any of the lady boys but I managed to take some pictures while walking down the line and also maintaining distance from them. 

Overall, the show was not as bad as I’d expected (probably because I’d lower my expectation close to nothing). It was entertaining at some parts but surely I won’t be going back there again. Recommended for the 1st timer but just don’t put your expectation so high and just enjoy the show as it goes.