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'Shocking'
sex play opens
BBC News
A play described
as "shocking" and the most sexually
explicit ever staged in the UK has made its
debut in London.
XXX, performed by Spanish theatre
group La Fura dels Baus, features scenes of
graphic sex acts said to be "beyond hardcore".
The two-hour multi-media show
involves naked actors performing simulated sex
acts in front of video screens depicting further
explicit sexual activity.
The show takes place at the
400-seat Riverside Studios venue in Hammersmith,
west London.
Based on the writings of the
Marquis de Sade, the performance "aims
to challenge boundaries of what is acceptable
without a moral judgment". |
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The play, created by Argentine-born
Valentina Carrasco, has caused outrage in some European
cities because of its themes of sexual violence.
It has been cleared by London's Metropolitan
police vice squad after officers found no evidence
of a criminal offence.
They watched a video of the performance
and said there was no illegal activity because the
sex scenes had been simulated.
During Tuesday
night's opening performance an actor planted
in the audience went on stage and performed
a simulated sex act with a female performer.
A Scotland Yard spokesman said
no complaints had been received about the performance.
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It
looks like real sex and the actors are often
naked but it is just touching and kissing
Carlos Padrissa,
co-producer |
He said any complaint received would
be investigated in the normal way.
William Burdett-Coutts, artistic director
at the Riverside, said; "It is very, very graphic,
probably the most explicit, shocking thing ever seen
in a British theatre, and we thought very long and
hard about putting it on."
Carlos Padrissa, co-producer and
co-writer of the production, said it was not pornography
but art.
"The sex in XXX is not real but
virtual," he said.
It
is very, very graphic, probably the most explicit,
shocking thing ever seen in a British theatre
William Burdett-Coutts,
Riverside Studios artistic director |
"It is
all theatre. It looks like real sex and the actors
are often naked but it is just touching and kissing,
there is no penetration." It
is based on the Marquis de Sade's 1795 book
Philosophy of the Bedroom.
Audience members will be able
to send mobile phone text messages about their
sexual fantasies to the actors during the show.
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The performance group was formed 20
years ago as a Catalan street theatre and circus troupe.
Its name translates roughly as "the
fury from the sewer" and the group describes
itself as "detonator(s) of the urban situation".
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