#WeAreNightlife is a campaign which celebrates the night-time leisure and hospitality industry.
A loud proud and wonderful venue we feel we must highlight, perfect for the #WeAreNightlife campaign, is Proud Cabaret. Proud is a world class cabaret with venues located in London and Brighton. The night-time show would which includes circus acts, acrobatics, fire and raunchy burlesque as well as fine dining and cocktails. The offer a completely unique service which has been attracting audiences and celebrity performers for a number of years.
Alex Proud is the owner and founder. In 1998, he founded one of Europe’s leading photographic galleries and has expanded the business to encompass cabaret and club entertainment venues. As a leading figure in the industry, Alex Proud has been vocal on his frustration with the government’s handling of the pandemic and how nightlife has been treated.
Proud Cabaret has a wide range of entertainment and celebrity guests ready for reopening. They’ve prepared extensively in time for reopening date, refurbishing venues and curating new shows. Alex discussed with us what he expects to see post-lockdown, and how he believes it will spark a reinvention of the capital’s nightlife sector.
#WeAreNightlife aims to celebrate the diversity and importance of the British nightlife sector, venues such as Proud Cabaret are excellent examples of the different unique experiences nightlife offers and why we need them back open.
Alex Proud talks about London and how the nightlife scene in the capital lends it-self towards more experiential venues:
“Proud Cabaret works in London and Brighton so well because I think it’s about fantasy – I think it’s about people. We know that the market’s much more experiential; whether its VR (virtual reality) or playing golf inside or Abba at the O2, everyone wants an experience. I think people really enjoy that experiential sense of coming into a whole new fantasy.”
Alex looks forward to reopening and finally moving away from life under government restriction:
“The reopening day is so exciting for us. I’ve been a fairly outspoken critic of how the government handled lockdown and so I’m perhaps more frustrated than most on being forced to close. This venue was run incredibly safely and entertainment venues were responsible for a tiny fraction of infections – you go to the supermarket, to hospitals, to work were all dangerous; coming to restaurants wasn’t, and it’s frustrating for that reason.”
“Now we are about to open, it’s a really exciting and positive time – That doesn’t make it okay what happened but let’s look forward and build now. We just can’t wait to be back entertaining you.”
Alex discusses what we should expect to see in this new age for nightlife post-pandemic:
“I think the only good thing about COVID is that it might bring rents down in central London which might see a real flourishing of young students / people just out of college coming back into the centre of town and giving it a bit of oomph, which London definitely needs. It (London) feels sometimes a little bit self-satisfied, and I like to see younger generation keeping us sharp. Competition is wonderful. I love it. I’d like to see young people come back into the centre of town and creating new venues more often.
Alex talks about how integral nightlife is to society and British culture:
“For a lot of people it’s (lockdown has) taken away the very soul of life. For some people the soul of life is religion, for some people its family, for a lot of people it’s the joy of eating good food, of being served, of not washing up, just for two hours you don’t worry about anything. I think when you take that away life can feel really joyless, very routine and very formulaic. I think everyone missed going out; whether that being your local for a pint, whether that be a cabaret, whether that be your local fish and chip restaurant; we missed it horribly and realised how fundamentally part of being British our nightlife is.”
Find out more about Proud Cabaret here and stay updated on what’s on and the wild heights they are taking British nightlife to next.
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NDML is the broker that’s number one in the nightlife sector and we offer exclusive tailor-made policies and have decades worth of expertise. Our award-winning service is built upon genuine relationships, and that’s why projects, such as #WeAreNightlife, are so important to us.