Developed in 2018 via residencies at The Marlborough Theatre Brighton, UK and Brisbane Powerhouse, 'Bitch On Heat' is a dark, funny, and confrontational performance art piece about sexual politics in the age of implied consent and the #MeToo movement.
A deafening roll of thunder and bolts of lightning wake the audience from their complacency while a male narrator sets the scene by retelling the story of Pandora’s Box. Like the biblical story of Adam and Eve, the tale of Pandora’s Box is a misogynistic morality poem about the first woman on earth bringing evil and adversity to the world.
As the lights come up, performance artist Leah Shelton emerges from a swathe of white wedding materials encased in a body hugging, skin-toned latex bodysuit with oversized pouting lips and pert Barbie doll breasts. Yep, she is a human-size sex doll giving in to temptation.
With as many characters as Hesiod’s 'Theogony', Shelton delivers close to a dozen gender stereotypes, including a classic '50s housewife, a trophy wife, whore, a sex doll, a sleazy male chauvinist, a sex slave, sex-columnist, a sexual predator and a wild dog panting for sex.
Shelton works hard for her audience and a rapid succession of costume changes, prop replacements and character shifts is testament to her skills as a performance artist. In most instances she changes character by simply shedding another layer of her latex outfit to reveal yet another side of her chameleon-like persona.
Using the mythical Greek story as the foundation blocks for this wild critique of the sexualisation and denigration of the female body, Shelton leaves no stone unturned as she tears apart every presumption and facet of assumed male/female relationships.
While the stage setting is simple, it is ingeniously designed and in this high impact, lo-fi production, Shelton is both Pandora and the monster residing within. She is coy one moment and sexually charged the next; but this show isn’t about sex, it’s about confronting gender rules and breaking them.
There are plenty of symbolic gestures, endless metaphors and the lip-synced dialogue to keep the show rolling forward to the climax where the impaled head of her nemesis sits atop a pole which in turn is used for a dance routine generally seen in men’s clubs.
Shelton couples absurdist humour with classic clownery, cabaret, burlesque, circus arts, pole dancing, puppetry, slapstick, lip-syncing and dainty ballet in a furious, full-frontal attack on the senses that leaves little to the imagination.
'Bitch On Heat' may surprise you, shock you, make you think, get angry or even make you yawn. Like much new theatre, the success or failure of this work is in the eye of the beholder but what is inescapable is that every moment of this 45-minute performance is designed to elicit a response from the audience.
Directed by British performance art provocateur Ursula Martinez, 'Bitch On Heat' is a bold and adventurous work that not only demands attention but deserves it – as does Shelton, whose mesmerising performance gives you little choice but to sit up and take notice.
★★★★☆ 1/2.
