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Auteurs - Showgirl

Music Video
ArtistAuteurs
SongShowgirl
DirectorLindy Heymann
IntroNo
OutroNo
Sound MixStereo
Technical Specificationscolour - format unknown

Wiki

Synopsis

The video accompanies an offbeat domestic fable about a narrator who marries a showgirl, expecting glamour and a brighter life. Instead, the relationship settles into an unstable routine of bowling, getting high, low-paid work, and long periods of waiting. Her seasonal career and his inability to find steady employment gradually replace romantic fantasy with economic frustration. The performance-driven presentation keeps the focus on Luke Haines' dry, melancholy storytelling, ending with the couple still bound together by marriage, disappointment, and the fading promise of stardom.

Factoids & Trivia

  • "Show Girl" was The Auteurs' debut single, released in December 1992 ahead of the band's debut album, *New Wave*, which followed in early 1993.
  • The song was written by Luke Haines and produced by Haines with Phil Vinall.
  • The track's central image of a showgirl bride turns glamour into an awkward domestic situation. The lyrics move from romantic expectation to unemployment, seasonal work, and a sense of being trapped together.
  • The song's bowling reference became one of its most recognizable details, giving the otherwise bleak story an oddly mundane and comic touch.
  • "Show Girl" helped establish The Auteurs as a band distinct from the brighter, more conventional side of early-1990s Britpop. Contemporary coverage emphasized the group's glam-rock influence, literary lyrics, and unusual subject matter.
  • The song appeared on *New Wave*, an album that was later nominated for the 1993 Mercury Music Prize.
  • The video remains part of the surviving archive of The Auteurs' early-1990s promotional work and has been reissued through official online music channels.

Lyrics

Junk shop clothes
Will get you nowhere
They're out of season
It's betrayal with no treason
Junk shop clothes
Will get you...
There is one reason why
Your mother was a seamstress
Chaim Soutine never spent
A thrift shop dime
In his life
Lenny Bruce never walked
In a dead man's shoes
...
© Auteurs - Showgirl. This is an excerpt, provided as citation under fair-use.
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