It's not every day that I perform a striptease onstage in front of 60 strangers, and it would be remiss of me not to mention something of the event, for those unfortunate enough to miss my debut (and subsequent retirement).
It's Melbourne Comedy Festival, and of the hundreds of acts playing across the city, it was difficult to decide on a couple to see, but it would have been wrong to come all this way and not check out someone. We were attacked by various people handing out flyers in front of the Town Hall, and the one that caught Cat's eye was 'The Boy with Tape on His Face.'
It wasn't until Cat had booked the tickets that I pointed out that all the reviews of the show said it was interactive, with audience participation throughout. "Don't worry, they won't pick on us'" she said, using her poor magic powers to predict the future.
So, we wound up at the show just before it started, and the usher pointed out a table in the centre of the audience. It looked safe, unfortunately with a clear eyeline to the stage, but far enough back that the suckers at the front were bound to get the brunt of the comedian. Just before our comedian walks on, there is a announcement - "Tonight's show is interactive. If you're picked, just go with it, otherwise you'll look like a cock." Uh huh.
The first minutes were entertaining enough, a couple of folks up on stage to perform comedy under direction (as the title suggests, the guy doesn't speak throughout the show, instead using musical cues and doing slapstick and Chaplinesque stuff), such as two guys fighting with cushions (one guy with the lead from a Playstation controller tucked into his pocket, the comedian "playing" him, in an epic "Man versus Machine" battle), another poor bloke who keeps getting brought up on stage then pushed straight back off.
Shortly after, our mute comedian looked me straight in the eye and beckoned me up. I knew this would happen. I knew this would happen as soon as I had read the first review of the act. So I clomped up on stage, and the guy handed me some baggy trousers to put on over my clothes. Then a Hawaiian shirt. Then a luminous labourer's vest. And finally a hard hat.
Now, each part of the act is completely unknown to the audience, so you know something stupid is going to happen, but not what it is. So when the guy wanders off stage and sits in my seat next to Cat, leaving me alone on stage, what's going through my mind is this - sod all. I had no idea what I was supposed to do, standing like a lemon in front of a crowd of strangers.
Then the guy claps his hand together, the lights drop to a pervy red, and the music from "The Full Monty" kicks off, and the guy just gestures at me to get 'em off, to the delight of the audience.
Myself and dancing are not friends. Far from it. Dancing is my mortal enemy. It is the Superman to my Lex Luthor. I don't even dance with my wife, despite the lurve (much to her chagrin). So, standing on stage with the music playing, and the crowd baying, the nanosecond of thought is filled with two things:
(a) RUN - run like the wind, sprinty boy, and don't stop until you reach Big Ben.
(b) Get your sweet ass groove thang on, and funk down.
(a) is obviously my path of choice, so it seemed strange even to me when the groove kicked in, and to be fair to a man blessed with no rhythm at all, I got that room moving to the beat of a geeky stripper. Even when I couldn't get the trousers off without slumping to the floor and fighting them, curse my enormous feet. But even then I gave the crowd a bit of butt wiggling, because I am one jive-ass creature of the dancefloor. The applause and whooping were great encouragement, and despite this being my swansong as a stripper, the brief but horrifying moment will stay with me for the rest of my life (and probably with the emotionally scarred audience members of both sexes).
To say Cat felt bad afterwards would be an understatement. I didn't think she'd stop apologising on the way home. I think she thought I'd be fairly upset. But I'd had a blast, and it makes the rest of the show a bit more relaxing knowing that your ritual humiliation is done. And to be fair, all the folks who were dragged up on stage did their bit well. We ruled. So go see this guy if you get the chance, and make sure you've had a drink or two, just to take the edge off of the stage fright, because you're bound to end up on stage with him (or without him in my case).
And yeah, I know at least a dozen people reading this would give body parts to see footage, but thankfully there were no cameras present. So you'll just have to take my word for it (or pester Cat for the gory audience details).
