REVIEW

Puppetry of the Penis Cheltenham Everyman Theatre Sunday, September 19

IT is a man's worst nightmare. Standing naked in front of hundreds of women laughing at his bits.

A good many psychologists have made a healthy living attempting to unravel the male inadequacies revealed on the back of that old chestnut.

But for a couple of very well endowed Aussie guys it is not so much a nightmare as a dream come true.

Puppetry of the Penis began as a pub party trick and is now a phallic phenomenon taking the country by storm, overwhelmingly its women, after a sell-out West End season. Men were, you will not be surprised to hear, conspicuous by their absence.

A mere handful among a braying, excited herd of women aroused into pre-penis appearance glee by the irrepressibly filthy humour of warm up act Jackie Clune.

Given this is a family newspaper it is beyond my remit to give a graphic account of precisely what the audience was exposed to but perhaps the names of a few "installations", as the boys call them, will fuel your imagination.

So, ahem, here goes: Slowly emerging mollusc, the brain, bulldog from behind, the fan, the windsurf, the mushroom cloud, Eiffel Tower, didgeridoo, Gollum, the eye, Ayres Rock and the natural law-defying manoeuvres of the G-String and the hamburger.

If you were not close enough to take in the intimate detail of their genital origami a giant video screen behind them ensured little was missed.

And here's the thing. Though this was all about two naked guys contorting their most private parts on the most public of stages it was, perversely, and I use the word advisedly, neither gross nor crude but gentle, good-humoured often breathtaking entertainment.

If the penis puppeteers are in your neck of the woods anytime in the future, swallow any puritanical reservations you might have and go see them - guys too. It is a sackful of fun.