Exports from the penal colony

By REBECCA BARRY

Who would have thought a couple of Aussie blokes could build a A$25 million ($27.5 million) business making silly shapes with their genitals?

Puppetry of the Penis creators Simon Morley and David Friend didn't - until their nutty comedy stage-show left a lasting impression seven years ago.

Since that first performance of "installations" (manipulating their most sensitive instruments into hamburgers, windsurfers, sea creatures and so on), the duo have had to split up to keep up with demand.

Tonight will be their first time on stage together in 18 months, during which time Morley and his penis have conquered Germany, Holland, Belgium, the US, Britain, Canada, Australia and Mexico, while Friend has toured Iceland, Portugal and Italy.

Now the pair are focusing on merchandising and franchising their business further, training the next generation of puppeteers, the most recent in Mexico, Argentina and Venezuela.

They estimate there are now about 150 people working with the show worldwide, and at any one time there are at least eight shows on tour around the globe. One million people have seen them starkers since it began.

And while both of them have appeased their initially horrified parents with lavish gifts, they insist on continuing to work.

"We need to," explains Morley, who has tried to retire four times.

"When you add up all the expenses, this great wad of money goes in the top and this little, tiny drop comes out the bottom. It costs a lot of money to market the thing. In New York they spent $200,000 before we got there. That's a lot of money to recoup."

These are modest words from a man who later admits to doing "very well" out of this unlikely enterprise, a success story he puts down to a combination of originality, a shift in attitudes and sheer professionalism. It might look like the performers are chatting off the bat but they've kept the show scripted, meaning there is no room for creative licence.

Changes are generally made only when the script is translated into other languages or localised slightly. Any tiny changes must be signed off by the creators themselves.

"It's just making sure that the theme and the feel of the show stays the same," says Morley. "It would have been really easy for us in the early days to make this full of sexual puns and turn it into a bit of Allo Allo, Are You Being Served? sort of humour. But I think the fact that we didn't do that and we try and push this off as art, is one of the reasons why it succeeds. So if we have people straying from that formula, we could be damaging our business."

The business side of things has not always come naturally and both the pair admit they had a lot to learn. Before Puppetry, Morley promoted comedians "but I wasn't all that good at it". Friend was studying to be a computer programmer.

Marketing a stage show with full-frontal nudity was going to be a challenge and, in some places, including New Zealand where the show debuted two years ago, protests against the show were staged because it was deemed too rude. One television station refused to air an episode of The Tonight Show with Jay Leno because the stars of Puppetry of the Penis appeared on it.

"If someone complains about our show or tries to shut it down they end up selling an extra 2000 or 3000 tickets. So we actually encourage that sort of behaviour," says Morley. "Occasionally we'll write a letter and complain about ourselves."

"In Melbourne about 10 years ago, The Vagina Monologues couldn't get advertising and went down the toilet," adds Friend. "Now it's one of the world's biggest shows. It's been translated into every single language."

Morley: "There was a guy in France in the late 1890s who used to fart in tune. And he was the biggest thing in the Moulin Rouge. He was the highest-paid entertainer in Europe at that point. He was a genius."

The power of celebrity endorsement has also helped. One night they provided the after-dinner entertainment at a party attended by 20 A-list celebrities, including Elton John, Hugh Grant, Naomi Campbell and Posh and Becks, a fact they now use to sell the show.

Friend: "The next day we're walking down the street looking at newsstands and they're all on the front page and we're going, 'Yeah he's seen my penis, he's seen it, she's seen it'.

"We still regularly wake up and shake our heads and go, 'What's going on?"' says Morley. "Someone's going to wake up to us soon, surely."

Performance

* What: Puppetry of the Penis

* Where and when: St James Theatre, 8pm tonight, for a limited season; Rotorua Civic Theatre, July 6; Gisborne Memorial Theatre, July 8.

* See Puppetry of the Penis for all New Zealand dates