Naked Men Talking: Daniel Hay-Gordon
In the conversation we talk subversive camp, ballet tights, and why he's nervous about Christmas.
For our podcast, Naked Men Talking, I caught up with Daniel Hay-Gordon from Thick & Tight - their latest show is Camp as Christmas.
In the conversation we talk subversive camp, ballet tights, and why he's nervous about the festive season.
It feels a bit early to be talking about the festive season, but here we are. You've announced that Thick and Tight are bringing Camp as Christmas to the Southbank Centre. Is Christmas the epitome of camp?
I think that in some ways it is. It depends also how you define camp. There's good camp, there's bad camp, there's high camp, there's low camp - Christmas involves a lot of these definitions.
I think there's brilliance in Christmas, if you dig down into it, but there's a lot of bad camp in Christmas as well.
With this show, we've tried to subvert all of the usual things that you would get from Christmas while still giving the audience something that has a bit of tradition in it, because people do like that. We've tried to take away the stuff that is just constantly on repeat with Christmas, that's the bit that we want to get rid of.
Why did you want to build this show around the campness of Christmas?
This show has been about returning to our camp roots. We began making a lot of our work together for queer audiences and gay bars. It was always about letting everyone in on the joke and trying to give people the most amount of fun possible.
What makes it subversive?
Our work is always political - we're going to have a Nigel Farage and we're going to have a Donald Trump and we're going to be framing them in our particular way.
When the show starts, it's number after number - we've got Judy Garland, we've got Liza, we've got the turkey that's too camp to cook, we've got Virgin Mary. As the show goes on, it reveals the nasty underbelly of what's going on in the world right now.
It's naughty. It's not nasty. It's always about punching up. We never punch down.
What are some of the festive season traditions that you embrace?
I like eating. I like that part of it.
I like being with my family.
You started your career in dance - how did you discover and start to explore that performing was what you were passionate about?
I began when I was about eight, doing ballet classes. The teacher put on stage productions and I remember the feeling of being on stage being amazing and terrifying as well.
For me, performing is this whole other side of myself. I come alive in a very different way as a performer. It's very important in my life that I do that and that I explore that.
Quite soon into my career as a dancer, I realised I wasn't very interested in being just a body. I really wanted to connect in much deeper levels - to entertain but also use many more skills such as lip-syncing and drag and mime and satire. I find that so much more rewarding.
We really learnt this new craft within spaces such as the RVT - doing Ducky. It was also about - in my 20s - finding a community and realising that where I loved to be was in queer spaces and that helped me to find who I was.
How has your experience of dance and performance shaped your relationship with your body?
I did ballet, so - at a young age - you're in a jockstrap and tights. It's strange. It sets you up on a funny old conversation with your body because you're almost naked at a very young age, and going through puberty is strange. Then there's a big pressure to be thin and - for a man - there's a big pressure to be heteronormative.
The relationship that I had with my body was that it wasn't enough - my legs weren't long enough and I wasn't muscly enough.
You have to just accept what you've got.
What was the process for you to figure that out?
Self-care.
I gave up smoking and stopped punishing my body. I learnt pay myself a bit more respect.
Also, a bit of therapy helps to talk it through.
Your current focus is on Camp as Christmas. Beyond that, what's on your vision-board?
I'm going to be doing the movement for a production at The Globe.
For Thick & Tight, we're exploring links with live music and classical music.
We're also talking about making a show called The Worst. We often do portraits of famous or infamous people, so it would be a villain show - there's so many baddies right now.
Given the journey you've been on with your body and your work, are there any insights or lessons that you wish that you'd learned earlier or anything that you wish that you could tell your younger-self?
Me noodling around in my bedroom as a kid, lip-syncing to songs and dancing around, all of that was great. Playing is the best - just being allowed to play and to be bored and to come up with things.
Also - this is such a typical thing a queer person would say - you will be loved. What you have to give to the world, people will love it. Maybe not everyone, some people might really not like it, but what you are and what you're capable of will be loved. There are stages when I was young where I didn't think that would happen. So, yeah, I would tell my younger-self that you'll be loved.
Camp as Christmas will run at the Southbank Centre from 10 December until 3 January
Gareth Johnson