STICK your tongue out at Susan Date? How dare you. How could you do that to someone so non-threatening.
Date looks like everyone's aunt in her sensible shoes and the kind of clothes that forgive a second helping. She's the type you'd invite for a sherry.
But her voice changes the impression. She controls an audience with it. When she lowers the pitch, she's the dusky-voiced Lauren Bacall. When she raises it, she becomes a little old lady, rummaging the stalls of Portobello Road.
''Here's one to use when you call in sick at the office,'' then she switched into a flu-stricken, sympathy-inducing nasal number.
She contorts her facial features like a mime artist and just one of her screeches could shatter crystal. Strangers, at first, hesitate when she invites them to feel her rib cage.
But people respond to her challenges by getting down in front of her on all fours. And several dozen did recently when the British speech specialist held a workshop in the Fringe Theatre.