Sex the eye-catcher at NZ arts festival

By JOSIE McNAUGHT

Bodies writhe and move in a seductive, sensuous rhythm. Thigh muscles strain against taut fabric, breasts heave and hips sway within clinging fabric, while the sweat slowly builds across strong, olive-skinned forearms, chests, faces and through cascades of dark, unruly curls.

You thought the arts festival in Wellington was about sitting in theatres on overstuffed seats, chardonnay in hand, politely absorbing some well-earned "kulcha".

Nah - it's about something more base and universal: sex, sex, sex.

Take the Ballet Nacional de Espana, for example. Forget about delicate, skeletal figures, tottering en pointe and encased in nylon tutus. Instead think of a cry, similar to the call on to a marae, the hand movements of traditional Indian and Indonesian dance, and the compelling and captivating rhythms of Spanish flamenco music, and you have some idea. The male dancers, in fitting, high-waisted traditional Spanish garb, set the scene with head tossing and foot stomping to rival any young buck. But when the women appeared it really took off. They twisted and turned, with castanets snapping and shoes tapping out an irresistible rhythm.

And what made it all the more raw and beautiful was the fact they looked like real women with muscular torsos, breasts and expressive faces that moved from delight to melancholy to passion and took the audience with them.

After a cold shower, it was off to The Elixir of Love, by Donizetti. The New Zealand Symphony Orchestra expertly accompanied a stellar international cast who whipped through the dazzling, fast-paced score.

And, yes again beneath the quite hideous 1980s fashion that was somehow resurrected for this show, sex was not so much rearing as coquetting its not so ugly head. You want 1980s superficiality and excess? Then you have come to the right place.

The story is traditional boy meets girl, he is short and dumpy, she is tall and beautiful. She is attracted to flashy bloke, he is gutted. Magic potions and healthy inheritances intervene, and boy gets girl, although being opera, we never go beyond the bedroom door.

I attended lots of balls in the 1980s and I lay the blame for the shiny taffeta tragedies that we donned entirely at the feet of the late Lady Di. When she hopped out of her carriage in 1981 in the first meringue dress, she laid the foundations for one of the ugliest fashion trends ever.

The final scene of the opera, at the 1985 high school prom ball, was an orgy of teased hair and drop-waisted frilled frock. Usually a grand scene like this gets a round of applause from the opening night crowd when the curtain goes up, but I suspect that, like me, they were all struck dumb at how truly ghastly we must have looked at our own school and university balls.

But the performers, to their credit, didn't let footless tights or grey shoes get in the way of their exquisite singing.

Suitably mollified now, I grabbed my 6-year-old daughter and headed to the matinee of The Junebug Symphony, performed by France's La Compagnie du Hanneton. The show's name comes from the word Hanneton, which translated literally means junebug - having a bee in your bonnet.

Not that any of the near-capacity crowd would have been complaining about any of the show, except that like all good dreams and fairytales, it had to end.

With the audience roughly 50/50 adults and children, the skilful performers played to both groups: just enough slapstick, dark humour and acrobatics for the kids, and sensual contortionists in velvet cat suits slithering and sliding about the stage for the adults, in a performance that was a fusion of the surreal and erotic.