Bogan Yoga is a great idea. It is pretty much exactly what it sounds like: a yoga class developed and led by bogans. Audience are encouraged to both dress up and participate, and I would totally recommend doing both. 

It is really something to see a lady in leopard-print tights and an AC/DC t-shirt putting her all into the routines.  And in that image, we have the essence of this event: the repeatedly hilarious contrast between yoga’s pretensions to world culture and sophistication compared with a bogan’s glorious lack of refinement and undentable confidence. 

As the audience filters in, we are greeted by the best yoga soundtrack EVER!  Instead of world music featuring way too many gamelans, the rock chords of Metallica, Soundgarden, and AC/DC greet us.  Yoga mats of various forms are supplied, including a grotty-as yoga mat, with an appropriately tongue-in-cheek explanation (“we were changing the oil in the car and didn’t want to get it on the lounge carpet”), old sleeping bags, and even some large cardboard boxes. 

The class starts with instructor intros, which are a little bit long – we know who most of these ladies (well women anyway) are by looking at them, which is a testament to both the costuming/makeup and the detailed body language of the ladies portraying them. 

Worth special mention are Molly Sokham as DJ FIU, with tightly-held shoulders and constant head-banging as she mans the decks; Anya Rzehvitskaya as Russian mail-order (or internet-order) bride Svetlana, complete with stripper moves and a new outfit for each yoga routine; and Alice Brine’s spot-on Mirakle, with perfect makeup and some fantastic vocal work. 

Mirakle is the creator of Bogan Yoga, inspired to bring it to the world after it cured a hangover in Bali.  She has a ‘Why yoga?’ spiel that punctures both bogan holiday stereotypes and the middle-class pseudo-intellectual, quasi-spiritual claptrap that can often be heard at yoga introductory sessions. 

The class is cleverly structured, with multiple levels of participation, ranging from ‘lard-ass easy’ chair yoga to ‘advanced’.  I would highly recommend participating at whichever level suits your fancy.  In fact, I would like even more bogan yoga routines!  They’re great, with the introductory yoga poses modified or given alternate names and explanations for how they work. 

Poses include the ‘handle the jandle’, with everyone bending over to literally handle their jandles, or ‘downward facing doggy style’ to allow Trev easy access and reveal the tramp stamps in the room. 

The class finishes with what might be the best ‘Omm meditation’ ever.

Some information on the back wall reveals that part of the goal of this show is to encourage folks to give comedy a go.  I’d say the show succeeds in that Bogan Yoga is different from the usual formal constraints of comedy while still being a really fun and hilarious time.

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