KATHERINE MACALISTER meets Australian Emma Powell, the woman behind sell-out show Busting Out! which is coming to Oxford Emma Powell calls Busting Out! her “little bitty titty show”.

Either way she and Bev Killick get their boobs out on stage every night.

But while this might sound gratuitous, it’s not. In fact Emma says any men who come for pure titillation (see what I did there) usually leave within the first 10 minutes.

Because Busting Out! is for women, by women to celebrate the wonders of our breasts.

Even so, it takes two plucky Ozzies, who saw a gap in the market, to introduce us to such a liberating boob fest.

So do they find the British a bit more reserved? “Well, we went down a storm in Southend, but it was a bit, well, quieter in Norwich,” Emma decides.

Busting Out! is Emma’s brainchild.

A proud E cup, Emma coined the phrase ‘one tit clapping’ when she came out of the shower at home down under and wondered where else she could go with breast gags.

“Puppetry of the Penis was doing great things, and I knew there was a female version to be had. But while Puppetry is basically tricks, ours is more of an old-fashioned variety show with songs and jokes as well as tricks, all breast related. It’s sketch comedy really with boobs.”

And then Emma concedes: “It’s a hard one to explain. I’ve heard women saying you might not get it but you’ve got to go because it’s brilliant.”

And with a 40,000 global audience paying to see Busting Out! over the past five years, you’d better take her word for it.

So was it hard the first time? “Oh yes, I had to have a stiff Scotch,” Emma remembers.

“But I first showed Busting Out! at the Melbourne Comedy Festival with one of the school mums. It was only a 60-seater theatre but it sold out and the show was picked up by a producer and it went from there. And Busting Out! has meant that as a single mum I’ve been able to buy a house, give my daughter a good education and my mum a car.

“So yes, it’s all been very empowering.”

So what does Emma’s teenage daughter think about her mum’s profession?

“She just tells everyone I was in Mamma Mia The Musical (the Australian version),” she laughs. “Which I was. But we don’t have a college fund, we have a counselling fund,” the 42 -year-old laughs.

“My mother was a politician and I think I’m following in her footsteps and doing something I’m passionate about. Because while we don’t stand on our soap boxes in Busting Out!, we are liberated and proud to be women. And we always have people coming up to us afterwards saying its made them feel better about themselves.”

With plans to take Busting Out! to the US and Spain, the show’s only going to get bigger.

Let’s just hope Emma doesn’t get bored of getting her boobs out every night.

“I have always had a love/hate relationship with my boobs, because I was an early bloomer and they were all anyone noticed, so I didn’t like them too much then, “Emma remembers.

“But now I’m proud of my body and that’s who I am. And you get to a certain age when you either age gracefully or go backwards and start having work done, and I’m going to age gracefully. I just do it in front of hundreds of people who applaud every night,” she giggles.

* Busting Out! visits Oxford’s New Theatre on Thursday, March 24.

Call the box office on 0844 847 1585 or see newtheatre oxford.org.uk