Although we don’t budge from our seats, we come out of Striptease feeling totally undressed and exposed. This is a feat that Pere Faura pulls off with aplomb. Such is the wit and winsomeness of this paunchy performer we end up loudly applauding his assault on our reserve.

He begins the show with his own deftly tongue-in-cheek ‘déshabillage’. Then, with the expert timing of a seasoned stand-up, he takes us through an ‘exposé’ of his research into the art of striptease, undertaken because of having had to make a show with that title, but according to the conventions of a ‘normal’ arts festival. Along the way, he cocks a clever snook at the ludicrousness of the jargon and shoptalk associated with the worlds of so-called higher art forms.

Veiled in mischievousness, he lays bare the mutually agreed transaction between imagined and real, performer and spectator, buyer and seller.
Multi-level provocation and lots of laughs to boot.

‘Anticipation of an idea’, ‘an attribute to postmodernism’, ‘an artificial construction of eroticism’… What am I talking about? Striptease, of course! From Pere Faura’s semiotic discourse we’ve learned that striptease can be lot more than just ignoble entertainment. The show itself is proof! At first we are watching a parody of a famous movie scene from Striptease with Demi Moore. There’s a camera recorder on a tripod facing the audience, but it doesn’t seem to have any special purpose. To our surprise, the spectators’ reactions had been recorded during the show and end up being projected on a big screen. What a trick! Besides the witty and sophisticated lecture on the phenomenology of striptease, I loved watching the scene from the movie and Faura’s simultaneous interpretation of the choreography. The whole show was built on a hilarious and smart concept. Bravo.

Ola Fraitova