After an extensive UK and European run, she returns to Australian stages this August alongside Dita Von Teese for Nocturnelle, the most opulent production the showgirl has staged to date.
Hand-picked by Von Teese as the only Australian featured in her touring shows, Kitoko has spent years building a reputation as one of the most in-demand artists in the international scene. She was crowned the world’s number one burlesque artist in 2019 by 21st Century Burlesque, and as a core soloist she has appeared in more than 50 cities, from the Folies Bergère in Paris to the London Palladium.
Those rooms tend to leave a mark. “The big historic venues hold so much reverence that when you enter you can instantly feel a shift in energy, it naturally makes you want to bring your own essence to the stage,” she says.
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Her practice slips fluidly between burlesque, theatre and high fashion, and she insists the crossover feels less like a balancing act than a calling. “The meeting of worlds feels natural to me. I yearn for expansion and I really want to do it all in this lifetime,” she says. That appetite has carried her from an original cast role in Hamilton Australia to Anne of Cleves in Six the Musical, with a runway turn for Nicol & Ford at Australian Fashion Week 2026 still ahead.
As a Congolese-Australian performer in a historically white form, Kitoko brings her own lens to the work — often appearing in extra-long box braids, even in era-specific acts. “Plus I feel my hottest when my hair is in extra long box braids, it’s just become my signature,” she says.
She’s clear-eyed about how things have shifted, crediting social media for the reach while arguing the craft still lives in the room. “It’s a ‘live’ performance art and you need to be in the room, feeling it, seeing it. I think a lot of people are actually craving tangible things these days too,” she says.
Costume is its own discipline. Kitoko designs and constructs much of her own work, collaborating with skilled makers on the trickier mechanics, and approaches each act as a full sensory build. “I want to build a world that the audience can viscerally experience; I’m such a sensory person myself,” she says.
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Nocturnelle is Von Teese’s first outing as a striptease magician, a lavish follow-up to the sold-out Glamonatrix that draws on 19th-century illusion and her signature Stripscapes. Kitoko’s own number reworks an act from Von Teese’s Las Vegas residency, though her favourite moment belongs to someone else. “Dita plays the villain in an Erte magic swords act which is my favourite in the show,” she says.
The rapport between the pair runs deep. “We’ve established a lot of trust over the years, I can basically create whatever I like for the shows when it comes to my solo acts because she knows my style and taste,” she says.
For all the spectacle, the homecoming is the part that lands hardest — and this time there’s a bonus. “It’s so nice to have a grand return to home in such a high glam, high vigour way,” she says, relieved to skip the long-haul flight for once.
What follows sits in less defined territory: new music, more burlesque, a push into digital work. “It’s that liminal space of creation I’m currently sitting in that can be angsty but super exciting,” she says.
Dita Von Teese’s Nocturnelle plays at the Palais Theatre on 8, 9 August. Get tickets here.
