Have Maltese audiences grown up, or do sexual themes on stage still unfaze them? Veronica Stivala puts the question to Jo Caruana as the actress gets ready to star in the comedy My First Time.

With a title as obvious as My First Time, I shan’t bother going into the nitty gritty of what this play is about. But, of course, it is this very subject that makes it appealing. As Shakespeare, D. H. Lawrence, James Joyce, Chaucer and, well, E. L. James knew all too well, sex sells. The crux, as Oprah would agree, is how it is presented.

Perhaps it is our curiosity, or maybe a certain element of catharsis, and possibly even schadenfreude, but we like to know about the slips and mishaps, the secrets and details of what goes on behind the closed doors of others.

One of the pull factors of My First Time is that it is based on true stories. The stories that are being played out in front of us in the series of sketches that make up My First Time actually happened to people. And to spice things up a bit, some of them to the very people in the audience of the show you are watching.

My First Time is an off-Broadway play that opened on July 12, 2007 at New World Stages and ran until January 22, 2010. The show is based on a website that grew in popularity in 1998 “that allowed people to anonymously share their own true stories about their first times”.

I first watched the play in 2009 when it was put up by Mellowdrama and I still remember the excitement/dread/bewilderment/(insert your reaction here) exhibited by audience members who were asked to anonymously share their first time stories on a slip of paper before the show started.

The relationship between the audience and the subject matter is something I am keen to explore further. While times are most definitely changing, and the Maltese are becoming more open-minded, we are definitely not on a par with, say, German audiences, for whom the film Shakespeare in Love (which has a full nudity scene) was rated six years. And that came out in 1998.

I speak to Jo Caruana, one of the four stars of this play, to get her views both from the point of view of an actress, as well as to learn about audience reactions to sex on stage.

She admits that the risqué side of things is a tiny part of her theatrical life and she has actually only played about four such roles in her career so far. “Most of the time I’m playing the fairy in pink,” she quips.

That said, Jo is not new to wearing the odd risqué costume (such as her underwear outfit when she played Brooke in Noises Off last winter) and to doing some nude scenes (though there is no nudity in My First Time). “It’s never been that big of a deal,” she says.

A lot has changed since Equus, which took place eight years ago

“If the script requires it, then I have been happy to do it – and the parts that have been played were so much more than that; either a very dramatic role such as Jill in Equus, or pure comedy such as Brooke.”

She concedes she does not exactly love doing it, but if it’s part of the part, and she loves the part, then she’s game.

“If, on the other hand, they’re gratuitous, then I would turn them down,” she stresses. “It’s important to be true to a part and to the play.”

What may come as a surprise to some is Jo’s admission that she is actually quite a conservative person in real life and that spends most of her time in very corporate attire – “I’m much more comfortable that way,” she says.

Mellowdrama first produced the show locally in 2009; directed by Wesley Ellul and it completely sold out. Now, Ellul is producing it again for his own theatre company Tac Theatre.

The format will be the same – four actors (Jo, Thomas Camilleri, Naomi Said and Joe Azzopardi) – telling thousands of stories. The script has been updated from the last time, giving it more of a local flavour, and the actors are all giving it their own twist.

Perhaps surprisingly, Jo says she has never experienced a negative reaction from Maltese audiences when it comes to sex and nudity on stage.

“I think they’re fine with it in general. And I think a lot has changed since Equus (which contains full frontal nudity), which was eight years ago.”

She goes on to note how she “would like to think that Maltese audiences have grown up a lot. Reactions to anything I have done recently have been lovely and positive - with very little said about the nudity,” she says. “My mum, on the other hand,” she laments, “is still getting her head round it.”

These risqué roles she has taken on have never really affected her personal life. “Theatre is a huge part of my life and I feel very fortunate about that,” she concludes.

My First Time opens on Friday at 8pm at City Theatre, Valletta, and runs till November 1. Tickets are available online.

www.ticketline.com.mt