WCXX

I've always found Kander and Ebb's vaudevillian evocation of a topsy-turvy world in which the wicked go free and the good get punished – and the female of the species proves more deadly than the male – a bit of a trial. Yes, incredible tunes and a ravishing sense of Prohibition-era style, but so cold, so heartless.

This production doesn't attempt an overt break with tradition. Conducted on a big-budget scale, it still remains faithful to the familiar stripped-back aesthetic. At the same time, though, it's a sufficient departure to allow room for a reassessment.

By contrast, this energetic, flashbulb bright, flesh-baring account embraces carnal activity with fervour. The flawless high kicks are all present and correct, but the gymnastics are matched by a sense of gyrating, libidinous delight. In a musical obsessed with what goes on in the bedroom department, we get flesh-and-blood players, not a row of mannequins.

The writhing sensuality brings home the wild passion that drives the show's murderous and rivalrous anti-heroines Velma Kelly and Roxie Hart (exquisitely played by Verity Rushworth and Gemma Sutton). And it allows you to see the smoke-and-mirrors world of celebrity – seized upon by both as a means of escaping the gallows – as a naked substitute for sex. Roxie needs to keep the public on the boil or she'll vanish in the haze like her inadequate, invisible hubby Amos.

With the Curve's technical sophistication everywhere apparent and with knock-'em-dead performances across the board – hats off to David Leonard's seedily alluring lawyer Billy Flynn, Sandra Marvin's vocally magnificent Mama Morton and Adam Bailey's triumphant tranny Mary Sunshine – this may not be a conventional Christmas treat, but boy does it end the year in high style.

Until Jan 18. Tickets: 0116 242 3595; curveonline.co.uk