Lois Weaver - Sexology, Arches, Glasgow

Mary Brennan

FOUR STARS

Tammy WhyNot (Lois Weaver) is in town - and in her element. Asking the kind of questions of her audience that make folk squirm a little bit, maybe laugh in embarrassment...and then genuinely open up to this tousled blonde bombshell in the guise of a country singer. What Tammy needs to know from us is our frank and personal thoughts on getting old and having sex: Tammy/Weaver is now in her mid-sixties and has been doing serious research on this both at home (in New York) and across the UK.

In Glasgow, she's gathered together a posse of (beyond middle-age) participants to act as backing singers. They too will divulge private information on relationships, sex after the menopause, sex after sixty... seventy... eighty. None of this is ever tacky, prurient or overly-intrusive. We're talking Tammy, here, not a world-renowned lesbian performance artist - which Weaver is - acting Jeremy Kyle and his ilk. This hour is funny, tender, affectionate and grounded in Weaver's passion for making work that is honest, unafraid and relevant to real life, her own included.

Whatever their age, Weaver's audiences know the concerns she raises: is my body desirable? do I actually feel like having sex? can I still function? am I past it? beyond intimacy? Tammy's appearance was part of the Sexology Season Glasgow that rounded off the Arches Behaviour 15 season. Over the weekend, in collaboration with the Wellcome Collection, the venue was a busy hub for discussions, interactive performances and workshops that explored the world of sex, sexual identity and sexuality. What we need to know now is, with the closure of its nightclub. can the Arches continue its visionary programming of radical work.