Inferno is not your typical Las Vegas magic show and that has a lot to do with the Fuel Girls. Teta-Maria Stone, for example, is a performer unlike any Las Vegas has ever seen.
“If you’d seen me 15 years ago, I was a completely different person,” says the dancer, aerialist and stuntwoman originally from Gloucestershire in southwest England. “I had never been abroad and I was very shy, a bit of a ballet geek. It’s not that I was not a good girl, I just wasn’t one to put myself out there and be very expressive. Finding the world of cabaret and circus enabled me to grow into a person capable of expressing myself in a way I otherwise wouldn’t have been able to.”
Indeed, tattoos and fire may not suit a ballet geek. For the last 10 years, Stone has been a member of the Fuel Girls, a traveling troupe of multiskilled entertainers performing pyrotechnic feats at various festivals and events. When Inferno launched at Paris Las Vegas earlier this year, the show’s producers deftly paired the Fuel Girls’ unique talents with Swedish illusionist Joe Labero for a fiery, magical spectacular that quickly distinguished itself.
“The Fuel Girls have changed a lot over the years and when I first joined, there were (different) stunts,” Stone says. “But the concept has always been that whatever the boys can do, we can do better, and in a bikini. Over the years we have added more trained dancers and performers but we still have that rock-and-roll image. We’re just highly skilled at the same time.”
Inferno marks the first time the Fuel Girls have collaborated with a magician or any other artist for a large-scale production, but since the girls have a wide range of skills—many are choreographers, too—the adjustment process has gone smoothly. Stone says the show is always evolving and she appreciates the opportunity to learn different illusions. “It was a childhood dream of mine to be a magician’s assistant,” she laughs. “But the aerial portion is my favorite number in the show and main act. It’s a very layered act with some amazing pyrotechnics and the backdrop of all the girls’ choreography. It’s a great picture.”
And Inferno has provided more than an opportunity for the Fuel Girls to expand their repertoire. For Stone, the show has offered an education in all things Las Vegas.
“I had never been so I didn’t know what to expect, and also I’d always been quite fascinated with Las Vegas,” she says. “It’s been quite different that what we expected. There’s a lot of natural beauty and interesting places to explore beyond the Strip. We spend a lot of time downtown in the Arts District and I really like the vibe down there, but we like to get out into nature and do some adventuring at Red Rock and the Valley of Fire, too.”
