Lieve Stad 2025: Pearl Dive & Pro Wrestling

During Lieve Stad 2025, our house, International Theatre Amsterdam, echoed differently. As part of the Lieve Stad festival, ITA welcomed two programs that completely transformed the energy in the building.

In the grand hall, Amber Vineyard’s Queer Cabaret Pearl Dive turned the stage into a queer altar: sensual, sacred, and unapologetically... tender. Amber held space for bodies, spirits, and desires that have long been (and continue to be) erased and misrepresented by most big institutions.

Amber invited everyone to dive into the vast spectrum of sexual identity and expression. To allow the hidden parts of ourselves to emerge. In this liquid space dedicated to Queer Female Figures, Lesbians, Non-Binary & Gender Non-Conforming beings, and those with Trans experiences, a dive is taken into the expansive spectrum of sexual identity and expression. A fiery evening of hot, queer and divine shit.

The performers and the public brought celebration and healing through their presence. Hot, queer, and divine shit, by and for Hot Queer Beings... Reminding us all that pleasure, too, is political.

In the other room, the Rabozaal, Pro Wrestling Holland brought twenty years of underground wrestling history to the main stage. These extraordinary performers filled the room with emotion and release. Their trows, locks and drama were giving the audience many moments of shared catharsis.

What once began in 2006 as an underground project of two Dutch pioneers, the masked Tengkwa and the now globally renowned Malakai Black (Aleister Black WWE), has grown into the national face of professional wrestling in the Netherlands. With roots in the gyms of yesteryear and shows with more than a thousand visitors today, PWH is now on the global map as the showcase of European talent and storytelling in the ring.

From Tokyo to London, from Hamburg to Barcelona: talent from the PWH Academy is causing a furor throughout Europe. Stars like Lorenzo Lina (the Netherlands' most popular wrestler), TANK (the relentless Women's Champion back from Japan), and Ricky Sosa (the youngest PWH superstar ever) enter the ring in Amsterdam - along with international guests, brutal tag teams and treacherous rivals like Zafar Ameen, The Praetorians and the obscure collective The Circus.

Watching Amber Vineyard bring the house down in one room, while wrestlers like the Flamingo Bros claimed a spectacular win in the other, was a beautiful reminder that “theatre” lives in the soul and the body. Deep gratitude to the artists and communities who carried this day.

And a big thank you to the incredible team behind the scenes at ITA, who are making this edition of Lieve Stad truly epic.