Simulated sex in the city

Raunchy lesbian show will not be repeated says Gardai”‚ screamed the headline of a local newspaper in Galway following a recent staging of Club Outstageous which, ironically, is located on the Dyke Road. Throughout that week a number of tabloid headlines were to follow as papers reported of “several drug seizures” and “complaints about raunchy sexual performances”. Suddenly the popular alternative night had become the target of moral watchdogs throughout the country.

“We started Club Outstageous about three years ago because we found that, if you were a little bit off-the-wall in the way you dressed, you just weren’t allowed into anywhere,” says one of its organisers, Gary Guyett. “The mainstream clubs would look at you like you were a freak and wouldn’t let you in. Club Outstageous is about total freedom of expression in every way.”
The promoters admit that there’s a “narcissistic and scandalous element” to the club.
“We’ve covered a lot of taboo subjects which would have been a lot stronger than what happened at the last two Club Outstageous, featuring the two girls in question,” Guyett resumes. “One we did a while back was George Michael’s Sex Outside. We did a big show showing that everybody has sex outside – it’s not just a gay thing. We’ve also covered themes like lunatic asylums and touched on the subject of religion in our shows. They were a lot stronger than those two girls going topless and doing a simulated sex act. We’ve never done actual sex on stage – we wouldn’t want to go there. What those two girls did that night was probably one of our milder shows.”
Asked whether he thinks that Galway audiences are open to explicit scenes, Gary says, “Yeah. What we do totally suits the current Irish clubbing climate. People don’t want to be moralised to by small groups. People want to be able to express themselves and I think that’s why there’s been such a backlash to the reaction from the tabloid media recently. I mean you don’t take your granny to Club Outstageous for tea – you take her to Bewley’s or someplace like that. If you don’t want to see anything other than the mainstream high street nightclub then don’t come to Club Outstageous. It’s a big venue, The Black Box Theatre, and if you don’t want to watch what’s going off on stage or in the cage, then just don’t look at it.
“Some mother said that she was horrified that someone gave her daughter a flyer to go see the peep show,” he continues, “but it’s not as if anyone was dragging her in against her will. If you wanted to see the peep show on the night you paid your E2 and you went in and saw what was in there.”
Guyett feels that Club Outstageous is mild compared to some of the images peddled by the media and pop industry.
“TV3 were down in Galway looking for a story on the whole Club Outstageous thing”, Gary proffers. “They stopped a girl at random on Shop Street and asked her if she’d heard of the club or the controversy that was surrounding it. She said she had been to every single one of the Club Outstageous nights and she’d loved every one of them. She also said that she’d seen more obscenity from Christina Aguilera and Britney Spears at The Point than she’d ever seen at Club Outstageous. I think that more or less sums up how ridiculous the whole controversy is”
As for where all the ‘shock horror’ headlines leave them, Guyett admits, “We’re not sure. Galway Arts Council is a pretty progressive type of group, so I don’t think they’d be in favour of any kind of censorship. Obviously we have to show that we are going to toe the line from now on. We want to continue as a group and it would be a crying shame if it was stopped because of certain members of the Gardai or members of the public objecting. There’s a bigger picture here and anybody who knows about Club Outstageous knows that it’s not just about those two lap dancers. They were probably a bit more risky than they should have been, but I thought they were a lot riskier the first time. They tamed the show down significantly.”
One thing is certain – when the next Club Outstageous takes place on October 9, it’ll be under the watchful eye of the press, Gardai and other concerned groups.

For more information on Club Outstageous log on to www.cluboutstageous.com