Suzi Feay: This Is The Life

Nobody has any shame these days, do they? Perhaps we should all take heart from the Royal Adulterer in Chief. Despite having his tampon fantasies aired to the world, he manages to hold his head up high when he's on ribbon-cutting duties. Just look at "Lord" Archer. Look at the cheating Major, his wife and Tecwen Whittock, all bleating that a miscarriage of justice has taken place when clearly (cough! NO!) it hasn't.

The out-of-date idea that the English are uniquely shockable has featured large in publicity for XXX, the new play by La Fura Dels Baus. Driving to the Riverside Studios, I passed several "London Sex Show Shock" headlines on newspaper billboards. The dear old Evening Standard has, of course, attempted to have it both ways, sending a news team to screech about filth and pornography, together with an arts critic in a mucky mac to complain that it isn't shocking enough.

There are two jaded responses that I'm extremely sceptical about when it comes to explicit sex on film or on stage: "It was really boring!" versus "It was really funny!" Both seem to be uncomfortable evasions, and I like to think I'm far too respectful of the shock and awe of prick power and pussy power to fall for either of them.

In fact, XXX flirts with both attitudes (in the case of humour, it doesn't just flirt but snog and fellate it). I did spend a great deal of the two-hour show convulsed in giggles (like the rest of the audience), but the humour is absolutely intentional, and you're laughing with La Fura, not at them. But overall I was gripped and impressed – by the evident seriousness of the play, and by the dazzling execution.

Yes, it features the most explicit sex ever seen in a mainstream show. You will be (almost) convinced that you've seen a brutal anal rape. This scene brilliantly highlights the central paradox of sexual fantasy: that something which would be utterly horrifying in reality can seem to be seductive, fascinating, even beautiful. Yes, the scene in which the sniggering, violent "director" Dolmancé pulled out his caramel-coloured cock and appeared to ram it up a young, naked actress's behind, while the backdrop showed a close-up projection, is disturbing, and the attitude behind it despicable (no matter how much women whimper, they love it really). Yet we know they're actors, and we are being invited to enjoy this artistry, this trickery. Did we see "wood"? Well, Dolmancé's cock looked very believable, but at one point the head seemed to twist the wrong way, like Regan's in The Exorcist. And another organ was so prosthetic it might just as well have been a saveloy.

Another distancing effect is the fact that the play is performed in Spanish, necessitating subtitles – though the dialogue is mostly of the "Aiieee! Màs! Màs!" variety. I must say, coño is a much nicer word than its English equivalent.

There seemed to be a lot of gay men in the audience. The Marquis de Sade, on whose work this play is very loosely based, is after all the Secretary-General of Sodomy. But there wasn't much to satisfy them, apart from a brief bit of snogging between the two male leads. Much of the screen is given over to vast close-ups of shaved, greased female orifices, which looked oddly like intelligent creatures from outer space. One clip featured a woman using a suction device which puffed up her vulva until it resembled a jam-inflamed ring doughnut. This show should come with a warning to gay men.

Towards the end, a woman near me in the audience stood up, yelled "More! Give 'er more! Double vaginal! Anal! I want to see it!" and, with very little encouragement from the actors, whipped her top and bra off to reveal her Bob Marley tattoo. Then a tall blond man who earlier had refused to join in said: "I've changed my mind!" and rushed up. Together with two actors, he removed her jeans and thong – at which point, I'm afraid, we had a panty-liner moment. (Ladies, if you are thinking of participating, do remove all sanitary products first.) She then spraddled down in the aisle right next to me while he worked his head between her legs for several minutes, and the rest of the show just carried on. Eventually, they sheepishly stopped and began cuddling.

Despite that, the only person I saw who was truly shocked by any of the shenanigans was a gay man who recoiled when he was encouraged to suck Ms Panty-Liner's nipple. It was like asking Lady Bracknell to put her head in a bucket of maggots. Surely this is the Divine Marquis's most unholy legacy: that with all our permissiveness, we've spawned certain men who are so uptight and phobic that they're revolted by what must surely be a primal urge: to suckle a female nipple. How Sade would have screamed with delight!

Rowan Pelling is away. 'XXX' runs at the Riverside Studios until 17 May