My, How You've Grown!

Daniel Radcliffe, known to millions as Harry Potter, is now doing a stage production of Peter Shaffer's Equus in London -- including the nude scenes.

This is London has a brief notice detailing some of the reaction; those quoted in the story are largely negative. (Funny how that happens, isn't it?) From the few comments, I found this one choice:

I just wonder when nudity became a step up?

Of course, it's from someone in Ada, Oklahoma, but still -- as I recall from Sunday school in my childhood, the whole point of the story of Adam and Eve was that covering our nakedness was a step down.

And of course there was the commenter who wanted to know how and under what circumstances his parents had agreed to it. That stopped me for a minute, quite aside from the prissy attitude (one can almost hear the disapproving sniff), and as if it were anyone's business but Radcliffe's and his parents'. I suppose, since he's seventeen, his parents would have had to give permission (but, it being in the UK, I have no real idea of the legalities of it), but I don't see why they wouldn't. Not everyone is convinced that there's something "wrong" with being naked. That's actually very much a Middle Eastern concept. Take a look at early carvings and tomb paintings from Egypt and Assyria: captives are pictured as naked as an icon for their degradation. Kenneth Clark, in The Nude, made a distinction between "nude" and "naked" which I, quite frankly, found somewhat spurious. His idea was that "nude" was somehow noble and brave, while "naked" was ashamed and base. (Looking at Rafael Minkkinen's volume New American Nudes, I find "naked" challenging and self-confident.) Straight out of Christian thinking, that -- the very idea of having to make that distinction (although I will grant that it is much more justified for an art historian than in daily life). When you realize that pre-Christian Europe had few reservations about nudity -- not only the Greeks, but the Picts and Celts as well (the Romans being a somewhat prudish people by the standards of the day) -- it starts to hit home.

I personally have little reservation about appearing nude -- all you need to do is visit a/k/a Hunter to see that. (In fact, I'm planning a gallery tentatively titled "Boy With A Camera" that will be self-portraits. Relax -- they're all older photos.) My reservations have to do more with aesthetics than anything else, although I find that slipping by the wayside as well. I'm reminded of John Copland's series of nude self-portraits, done when he was, I believe, in his late sixties -- not pretty, but powerful. If I'm convinced that my belly is not taking over, I'm fine with it, even though I'm starting to sag a little bit. The idea that it's something "dirty" no longer occurs to me -- although, in retrospect, I'm not sure that concept ever had much hold on me anyway. (See? You can surmount the horrors of your early upbringing. In that light, I should note that casual nudity was not something that happened in our house. These days, I'd rather be naked than not -- weather permitting, of course.)

I also ran across mentions at Andrew Sullivan and towleroad. Interestingly enough, Andy Towle's comments are pretty much straight reportage. Andrew Sullivan calls the play ". . . a wonderful, if highly manipulative, exercize in psychological trauma." I think I've just spotted another lack in the conservative mindset: of course it's manipulative. Art is. If there's an artist alive or dead who ever made art without at least one motivation being to influence people, I'd like to know about it. (Think about all the great Church art of the Counter-Reformation -- Rubens and the like. Sole purpose: PR for the Church.)

Of course, it may not be the conservative mindset that's speaking here. It may just be the bourgeoisie, which only wants to be manipulated in socially acceptable ways.

I think it's just that I see comments like Sullivan's as an attempt to distance oneself from the experience of art, which is obviously something I'm not going to do. I stoutly maintain that the audience is as involved in the creation as the artist, and to shy away from that kind of all-out participation is missing the point.

I would love to see this production. It's a tremendously powerful play, and I'd like to experience it from my present perspective. I saw it in Chicago the 1970s, and was impressed. I don't remember the nude scenes, which I'm sure would have stuck in my mind, but then, it was Chicago in the 70s.

And Daniel Radcliffe is certainly easy on the eyes.

Update:

Some commenter somewhere (and I'm sorry I've forgotten where I saw it, so I could give credit where credit is due, but I have), came up with what is probably the definitive comment on this: "Harry Potter and the Treasure Trail of Doom."

Yes!