Priscilla Silcock, aka Sapphira

A DANCER will be attempting to set the world record for the number of people taking part in a burlesque lesson this Sunday.

Priscilla Silcock, who goes by the stage name Sapphira, is planning to host a record-breaking lesson from her living room in Holloway, with more than 150 people expected to join her online from across the world.

Describing the public perception of burlesque, she said people found it “confusing” because as a performance it gets “tangled up” with “the other type of work that people do in that space, which is more in the realm of sex work and striptease”.

“It is sexy,” she said, “but it also comical. It can be many things – and that’s what’s complicated, there’s no real rule with it.”

For Australian-born Ms Silcock, it transformed her life after a childhood growing up in a religious sect that excommunicated her at 17, and then suffering a serious bout of mental illness that saw her hospitalised.

Sapphira’s Showtime

She later came to London at 26, and fell in love with the cabaret and burlesque scene.

“Burlesque was really just reviving in that time,” she said, “and the women were everything they wanted. They just had – the stars of the day – just had real command over their bodies. They showed what they wanted to, it was provocative.”

She went on to become an award-winning dancer and entrepreneur, and in 2020 she created World Burlesque Day (WBD), which is held every April 26 – next Friday – in honour of 1930s burlesque icon Gypsy Rose Lee.

“I would really like us to go viral,” she said of her hopes for the record-breaking challenge on Sunday.

• For anyone interested in taking on her dance challenge – you don’t need any experience – visit https://www.worldburlesqueacademy.com/course/world-record-attempt