Festival blog: On performing naked for the first time by Ansuya Nathan

Published on Monday 11 August 2008 09:13

SO IT'S the last few acts of the show and I'm sitting backstage. In the nude. And I'm completely comfortable.

It's as if I do this every day. Which, admittedly, is true to an extent as I have been nude backstage and onstage everyday for the last three weeks. What amazes me, however, is how much of a non-event it has become. I used to wait for the very last second before going onstage to disrobe. But here I am in the buff, with at least ten minutes to go, waiting for my entrance. All I need is a crossword …

It's a far cry from the first time I did this. Cut to three weeks ago and the tech run for our show, Feasting on Flesh (pictured), for the Brisbane Festival. Then I walked off stage, screamed, fell into the arms of Australian stage legend Bille Brown (with whom I share my main nudie scene) a trembling, sobbing mess. Now, I feel a little unloved if the audience don't respond with mad applause to my low-lit naked figure.

I have more adrenalin coursing through my body when I have to go on stage and clean up the mess after burlesque performer Gypsy Wood's Spaghetti Act – red nipple tassles and all. I'm terrified that if I don't get all of the pasta, Tom "Flippy" Flanagan will break his neck doing one of his ridiculous acrobatic routines. Or aerialist Mark Winmill will go flying into the audience due to the juice of one errant tomato. This, coupled with the time constraint of having to clean up while Le Gateau Chocolat wanders through the audience offering himself up as the ultimate dessert. I leave the stage breathless with only enough time to change costume (again!), grab a mike and walk back on for my next scene, perfectly poised as any surly nightclub singer would be.

So, yes, being nude in front of an audience is not such a big deal any more. But a word of warning to any louts who think from reading this that seeing Feasting on Flesh is like being at a strip club – the gentlemen in the cast are fiercely protective of us ladies. If any disrespect is shown you might get chocolate cake pegged at you. After it's been somewhere it doesn't really belong …

&#149 Feasting on Flesh is at Assembly @ George Street, 10:30pm, until 19 August.