Director Michael Hurst portrays not his usual character Iolaus, but Widow Twanky instead. Widow Twanky is a traditional English pantomime dame portrayed by a man, first noted in 1861.
This musical episode replaces the usual theme during the end credits with a big band sound. The rolling end credits do not acknowledge the female singer who dubbed the Widow Twanky's solo nor the professional dancers who performed as Althea and Hercules.
The plot is a send-up of Baz Luhrmann's Strictly Ballroom (1992) which was a send up of a documentary Samba to Slow Fox (1986) about the world of amateur competitive ballroom dancing. An ugly duckling dreaming of competing in the Pan Pacific Grand Prix, using dance steps that are not "regulation". The main dance featured in the film is the Rumba. Every key plot point is brought in and many of the same lines are used, word for word, and many scenes, especially the dramatic entrance onto the dance floor for the contest, and the final scene where everyone gets out on the dance floor to dance, even the jacket Hercules is wearing for the contest is very similar, though not an exact replica of the one in the film. Strictly Ballroom was an international sleeper hit that introduced Australian director Baz Luhrman to the rest of the world.
The episode is set in a place called "Rhumba" which also happens to be the name of an Afro-Cuban dance from the 1930's.
The Magistrate's henchmen are dressed in traditional Greek soldier uniforms called "tsoliades" which can still be seen at traditional Greek dances and at the changing of the guards at Parliament in Athens.