Sit back and enjoy readings of Shakespeare, Oscar Wilde or
Henrik Ibsen, sip a glass of wine -- oh, and gaze upon the readers
themselves: they’re naked.
That combination of delights is on offer once a month in New
York thanks to the enterprising group Naked Girls Reading.
At a recent session, about 30 people, mostly younger couples and
men, met in a small room with a boudoir atmosphere in Manhattan’s
trendy Greenwich Village.
Joining them were four young women in bathrobes and heels, who
climbed onto a small stage and took seats on a large sofa. Applause
welcomed the readers, including from an older man who had until
then been quietly reading his newspaper .
As a part of a new show of Naked Girls Reading women in
bathrobes and heels read Shakespeare,Wilde and Ibsen
“Welcome! I would like to start by introducing our naked girls
reading for the evening,” said the host, a burlesque performer with
the stage name Nasty Canasta.
With her were Gal Friday, Sapphire Jones and Tansy and with a
flick of their dressing gowns they were transformed into truly
naked readers, ready for what they like to call “full frontal
literature”.
What followed was a lot like a traditional reading session, with
witty and gripping passages from theatrical works like Wilde’s “The
Importance of Being Earnest” and “A Doll’s House” by Ibsen. The
readers were accomplished performers and Sapphire Jones prompted a
moment of real emotion when she dedicated a Shakespeare text to her
late grandmother.
“I like the storytelling and that is the way I do the
storytelling. I feel very comfortable naked,”
Nasty Canasta said after nearly
two hours of reading. Gal Friday admitted to feeling nervous
at
first, “but now to be naked is not even an issue anymore.”
Listeners -- or perhaps viewers -- also get used it. “You can
always feel the shift, so when you see a nude at first you say,
‘oh, there is a naked girl!’ Then we start to read and you can feel
their eyes going up.”
Naked Girls Reading was founded in Chicago in 2009 by Michelle
l’amour, who, like many of the readers, comes from the world of
neo-burlesque, a risqué form of theater inspired by the music hall
burlesque shows of the early 20th century. “I was sitting on the
couch and reading naked when my husband found me.
Let’s say he was inspired by the image. We started laughing
about doing nakedgirlsreading.com. And then, we thought this is a
good idea,” she told AFP.
Michelle l’amour then contacted Nasty Canasta to take the idea
to New York in October 2009. Other performances have taken place
across the United States and London.
