3 hours ago
4
Each night in the three-week run of new Australian play Naturism, cast members strip backstage to perform nude on stage. But that’s not what the play’s about.
Written by Ang Collins, the 80-minute work, part of Griffin Theatre’s 2025 season, is about climate anxiety. Set in a remote, off-grid bush eco-paradise founded 20 years ago by a group of Baby Boomer naturists, it’s a comedy about generations, humans and nature clashing, sparked by a Gen Z eco-influencer crashing the commune.
For cast member Fraser Morrison, nudity is his costume.Credit: Steven Siewert
Its genesis came six years ago when Collins and her partner evacuated an area near Noosa in Queensland because of bushfire. The 2019-20 Black Summer bushfires followed and Collins, vividly affected by the fire’s physical proximity and media coverage of the resulting devastation, felt helpless.
“My response to being incredibly anxious about that whole season and feeling powerless as an artist – why wasn’t I an ecologist? Why am I a stupid theatre artist? – was to write a comedy,” she says. “But just writing a play that increases people’s climate anxiety probably wouldn’t help.”
Reading Collins’ first draft, director Declan Greene, also Griffin’s artistic director, was struck by its cleverness and humour.
“She’s writing something about human vulnerability to our changing environment that is orchestrated through naked bodies,” he says. “It’s the fact that under our clothing and the trappings of civilisation we’ve built around ourselves, we’re incredibly vulnerable and fragile creatures, particularly in the scope of this enormous catastrophe our world is facing.
Loading
“Even though theatre is probably not going to change the world anytime soon, Ang is offering something really special about what we’re actually supposed to do with the wild anxiety a lot of us feel about the climate.”
Using comedy that Collins describes as “genuinely silly”, Naturism’s themes include the serious effects of being bombarded with news, opinions, marketing and increasingly specious AI and social media content without limits. The play’s use of full-frontal nudity is also no flippant tactic.
Chloe Dallimore, the production’s intimacy and movement director, has worked with the cast over weeks, helping them feel comfortable and determine what they, and their characters, require when performing nude.
“It’s a workplace,” she says. “There are logistical considerations for the actors. It’s also to make sure the nudity is just part of the production and doesn’t override everything else or become another character. Essentially, we’re just doing normal actor things in a birthday suit.”
‘It’s joyous, liberated, gorgeous and very body positive.’
Declan GreeneFor cast member Fraser Morrison, nudity is his costume.
“I’m most aware of that at the play’s end,” he says. “Suddenly, you really want to cover up because the costume is no longer on you. Once the clapping comes, you’re just Fraser on stage naked, and you’re thinking, ‘Someone get me a robe immediately’.”
Naturism’s nudity is not explicit, however.
“It’s not kinky, it’s not sexual, it’s not in-your-face,” Greene says. “It’s joyous, liberated, gorgeous and very body positive.
Camila Ponte Alvarez plays Evangelina, a Gen Z eco-influencer.Credit: Kate Geraghty
“It’s treated very seriously because, ultimately, the play says that part of the solution to climate anxiety is a genuine, embodied connection with nature.
“It’s the thing that we’re mourning, but also it’s our engagement with it.”
It’s also a play offering a rare reflection of humans.
“A lot of the time, the highly curated nudity of bodies seen onscreen doesn’t resemble the bodies of the people watching it,” Greene says. “I think it’s really important we see realistic representations of bodies on stage, in media and elsewhere.”
What advice do they have for audience members anxious about that?
“Get uncomfortable,” Dallimore says. “And we’ll hold your hand.”
Naturism, Wharf 2 Theatre, Sydney Theatre Company, until November 15.
Most Viewed in Culture
Loading
