Camping It Up With Bloolips

"Get Hur," by Roy Dobbins, directed by Bette Bourne. Performed by Bloolips, at On the Boards, 153 4th Ave.Weds-Sat through January 23. 325-7901. --------------------------------------------------------------- If Busby Berkeley had concocted a musical about Ancient Rome and cast it with English music-hall comics who love to dress up like chorines, it might look like "Get Hur."

Then again, who else could dream up this bent, quirky and endearing pastiche but the English camp-theater troupe, Bloolips?

Made up in white-face, with red-tipped noses and artful glitter eye shadow, the six members of Bloolips (who have not been seen in Seattle en masse) all have a bit of the circus clown and a lot of vaudeville in them. But their scores of costume changes - heavy on the glitter, lame and feathers - and cache of double entendres are right in the gay drag tradition.

In the burlesqued "Get Hur," writer Roy Dobbins stitches a quasi-sensical plot about the Roman emperor Hadrian (played with panache by Bette Bourne) and the murder of his lover Antinous (Precious Pearl, a master of insouciance with a Cockney voice that could curdle cream).

As two chatty slaves (Bella Borgia and Gretal Feather) slink around in one outrageous get-up after another, the bossy seer Ozara (Ivan) sorts out the mystery.

There's the underpinning of a tender love story here, and a touch of detective story. But the main business is monkey business.

Anyone may launch into a tap dance, pull out a ukulele or a deliver an excruciating pun at any moment. The goddess Venus arrives on a skateboard shaped like a half-shell; the emperor tosses off his armor (tin cans with the tops removed) and vents, "I hate war! Too many fashion accessories!"

The bevy of songs (accompanied with verve by pianist Bella Borgia) have a '20s bounce and bubble, like a madcap flapper tune ("I Want To Be Bad"), and the uproarious Ziegfield Girl trip-out, complete with chiffon scarf-juggling, "I'm Mad About Leisure." (Sample lyric: "I'd love to have a slave paint my nails with lacquer/ Or serve me peacock brains on a cracker.")

Over two flash-tacky hours, the Bloolips boys tap, sing and pun their little hearts out. When the script dawdles (as it does a lot in in Act II), you can trust there's another zany number or priceless one-liner just around the corner.

"Ben Hur" glories in the gayness that surely existed in ancient Rome, and pokes fun at those who would deny homosexuality today. Bloolips puts this all across, though, in the good-natured, accessible manner of great clowns everywhere. You don't have to be gay to get a real hoot out of them.