Character vs Reality

I have been thinking about how we create a burlesque person for promotional purposes. We all do it, to an extent. We have the performance name, the costumes, the makeup. Not many of us look and act the same slobbing round the house, or with our mates from school, as we do at an industry event. Creating the persona is usual in performing arts, and useful. But how far does it go? It is just a glammed up version of ourselves, of "Jane Blogs" or is it a whole fictional character?

What I am NOT talking about:

• I am not talking about the whole "personal/professional blur" on facebook profiles and the like, that is a different blog.
• I dont mean lying about your experience or qualifications.

I am talking about creating a character. There are degrees of this. Examples from the comedy world:

Most extreme: creating a crazy character and pretending it is the reality, or at least never showing anything otherwise. Examples- Harry Hill, and that annoying new comedian whose name I cant remember with bad teeth and thick glasses. 

Less extreme: creating a crazy character but letting everyone know it is just a character. Examples: Ali G, The Pub Landlord.

How extreme? More common though is a sort of blend between reality and larger than life persona, never admitting it is a persona but we all know its there. Think Russell Brand, Milton Jones, Jimmy Carr, and pretty much every celebrity.

Lilly Allen once said on twitter "Lilly Allen doesnt exist, she is a fictional character". Marilyn Monroe came to hate the persona, came to hate the name Marilyn, felt it was divorced from herself as Norma Jean.

But so often there is that odd blur with reality. Dont get me started on things like TOWIE and Made in Chelsea!

So where does burlesque fit? Most of us have degrees of persona, some of us branded more heavily than others. Where should it stop (should it stop at all?)? Should we create persona like "Silk von Rouge was born on a desert island, daughter of a sultan" etc? Ie totally fictional? And if we create this character, do we have to explicitly let it be known that this is what we are doing, or can we go all the way and appear to BE the character, all the time? Do we accept it as a given that this is what we are all doing, and that you are not interacting with a real person at a gig but a character? Or a mixture of the two?

Whatever the answer (if indeed there is one), the whole thing is quite tiring. I freely admit to slobbing around in scappy cardigans in front of this laptop, Glorian being firmly on hold til showtime.