FOR many visitors to Berlin, Sally Bowles, the character created by Christopher Isherwood and played by Liza Minnelli in the film Cabaret, embodies the decadent charm they hope to find here.
Every summer since the film was released more than 20 years ago, tourists have been searching for the Kit Kat Club, where Sally performed. Berliners would snootily inform them that the club never existed in real life and some would add unkindly that it only appears in Cabaret and is not even mentioned in Isherwood's Berlin stories.
That was until a group of Tech no enthusiasts took over a corner of an old factory in Kreuzberg and bet up one of the most daring clubs Berlin has seen for many years. They called it the Kit Kat Club and, two years later, it has become the most talked about venue in the city and its name is a byword for fashionable sexual licence.
Sally Bowles herself might blush if she came to the Kit Kat Club Fetish Party that starts every Friday night and runs through to Monday morning. The dress code is strict anyone not wearing a fetish outfit, usually leather or rubber must strip to the waist before they go in. Inside, the barmaid wears nothing but a pair of thigh high latex boots and a long, narrow scarf, setting the tone for her guests.
Half naked women and men loiter around the bar, many with handcuffs dancing from their belts, others wearing leather collars. A woman in one corner paints patterns in luminous green and orange on the face, shoulders, back or chest of anyone who wants it. The drug friendly sound of Acid Trance oozes across the dance floor as a few dozen figures jolt and sway, most smiling quietly, each looking blissfully wrap up in himself or herself.
Nubile boys and athletic girls pout and pose on raised platforms while a slender young Brazilian leans back in a leather sling. A fat man leads a young, long haired woman around the club on a leash, a thick leather bit fitted between her teeth. A man with his hands bound behind his back kneels on the floor, paying devoted attention to an older woman's high heel shoe.
As the club starts to fill around 2 a.m., a dimly lit, cushioned platform becomes steadily more crowded. Soon it is full of men and women enjoying one another in pairs or groups, many moving between male and female partners. On a small table nearby lies one leaflet explaining the rules of safer sex and another advising on sensible drug use.
Sex and drugs have been part of the Berlin scene at least since the 18th century, when prudish English visitors complained about the shamelessness of the city's prostitutes. When Isherwood came to Berlin in the late 1920s, there were more than 100 gay bars and scores of bordellos catering to every sexual taste.
The Nazis closed down most of the bars and sent thousands of gay men and women to the concentration camps but Berlin returned to its old ways as soon as Hitler was defeated. The allies who occupied the city after the war officially adopted a high moral tone but the presence of thousands of soldiers ensured that West Berlin brothel keepers and bar owners prospered.
The favourite haunt for the British army was Mon Cheri, a striptease club in the seedy part of Charlottenburg that squaddies called "Grotty Charlotty". At the climax of each show in Mon Cheri, the stage would open up to reveal a heart shaped bubble bath, which the customers were invited to share with the girls.
The Techno boom that has dominated German youth culture since reunification in 1990 also transformed Berlin's club scene. The focus moved to the east of the city where big, interesting old buildings were available for tiny rents. Clubs opened in old bank vaults, aircraft hangars, railway stations and vegetable shops. E-Werk, in a disused electrical power plant dating from the turn of the century, became the city's cathedral of Techno and, within a couple of years, Germany's most successful club.
Techno introduced a new, cheerful atmosphere of sexual licence and a relaxed approach to drugs, especially Ecstasy, LSD and amphetamines. The latest trend is away from the vast clubs that opened in recent years towards more intimate venues like the Kit Kat Club. As official Berlin gets excited about its restored status as the German capital, the city's subculture is rediscovering the spirit of Sally Bowles.
