Any show that would leave us scrawling both the phrases “inhuman intimacy” and “bum percussion” in our notebooks must surely be worth the watch. Nadia Beugré’s L’Homme rare (The Uncommon Man) certainly is: an all-male quintet performance that premiered at Montpellier Danse in 2020, here presented as part of London International Festival of Theatre (LIFT). Boisterous and meditative, sensual and unnerving, the show explores and challenges our expectations of the black masculine form.

From the very first moments, we are placed in the position of voyeurs. The five dancers descend from the back of the auditorium with abandon, twerking, gyrating and vogueing with (and sometimes on) the audience. Their clothing is redolent of identity, from a kaffiyeh to a kilt to a red fishnet bodystocking. As audience members help to undress them onstage, the dividing lines between the performers are blurred, until they are recognisable only by their bodies — and, specifically, their skins.

For after the first, near-orgiastic party onstage, the tone immediately shifts. The music becomes uncanny, a lone dancer sobbing as he disposes of the strewn clothes. Stillness prevails. From this moment, the actors’ faces will be hidden to us. It is only their backs and buttocks, made stark and unfamiliar by the brutal lighting, that remain visible as the performance evolves and shifts.

What is L’Homme rare? A moving portrait of male intimacy. A radical queering of the stereotypically masculine body. A comment on, and exercise in, black male objectification. The show is all of these and more. You may come for the bums, but you’ll stay for the insight into gender, race and the male form.

Presented as part of London International Festival of Theatre (LIFT), 12 – 13 June 2024 at the Southbank Centre.