Colchester Fringe Festival 2026
Embarrassed Naked Female (this show contains nudity)
Woman's Move
Genre: Comedy, Dark Comedy, Drama, Experimental, Feminist Theatre, One Person Show, Political, Solo Play, True-life
Venue: Three Wise Monkeys
Festival: Colchester Fringe Festival
Low Down
Elsa Couvreur’s Embarrassed Naked Female is a warning to all performers and a blueprint for reclaiming our autonomy in the internet era. One of the most thrilling and compelling fringe shows out there.
Review
Elsa Couvreur put a performance of her multi-award-winning play The Sensemaker online. That show, which features five minutes of Couvreur naked, has been cut out of context, leaked and taken from Couvreur’s control, and placed on every porn site you can think of. Millions of people have seen these five minutes of Couvreur naked and have masturbated over that clip. That is no exaggeration. Couvreur’s art has been bastardized, taken out of context, and turned into highly-sought after pornographic content.
Couvreur’s story is a familiar one. To anyone who has had a nude leaked online, they share in Couvreur’s suffering by anonymous users. I myself, as a performer who gets nude on stage, have a constant fear of losing control of what I put out there. When I choose to get nude, as any live performer does, it is for those people in that room and for an artistic purpose. But with the digital age, that is harder to control. Broadway and West End theatres have already tried to control leaked nudity in their theatres to varying degrees of success. A person sneaks a photo or video. I upload a unlisted YouTube link of my performance and someone unwanted finds it. With growing technological advancements, and everyone’s access to said technology, there is less and less control over my privacy of our most private parts. I worry the worst could happen with my own body and that my art will be recontextualized for porn. It did for Couvreur.
Couvreur, as many of us, felt helpless and self-blaming in this struggle. Perhaps it is my fault? Perhaps I should have censored my recording? Perhaps I shouldn’t have been nude at all? Couvreur decided no. It’s not my fault. And did something daring: confront the men who were leaking her recording to porn sites… and wrote a damn good fringe show about it.
Armed with only a laptop and projector screen, Couvreur recounts her encounters with the online forums which stripped her of her autonomy and violated her consent. Forums which argued with her about whether she could, should, or even can control her image. It is thrilling to watch. An overwhelming experience which is simultaneously a warning to all performers of what can happen, and perhaps more vitally, what to do when it happens. The show asks vital questions about consent in the digital era, fetish vs. fantasy, bodily consent, autonomy, and more. It is an overwhelming experience because of that and one which you cannot look away from. Embarrassed Naked Female is a true crime podcast live on-stage.
Every artist, who dares to push boundaries, needs to see this show. This is a MUST SEE show. Say anything more than Couvreur is a triumph would only spoil its impact. And despite all of the nonsense she survived, Couvreur still got fully naked at the end of the show. Yes, this show does contain nudity. She’s no stranger to the internet now. She knows the rules and now so do we. And yet, still bared it all once again. No matter how terribly the internet treats Couvreur, trust that, with a confident wink, Couvreur is never gonna give (you) up making great fringe theatre.
