Natalie Barr was left shrieking on Sunrise on Thursday morning when she was hit with a shocking surprise on live TV.
The Seven breakfast show host, 56, was presented with a large holiday gift by co-host Matt ‘Shirvo’ Shirvington, hidden beneath a sheet and bow on a table.
But as she pulled the red velvet sheet off her surprise, Nat went screaming when she uncovered a contortionist performer was twisted up beneath it.
The fun began with Shirvo, 46, giggling as he joked: ‘I think it’s time to see what’s under Santa’s sack right now.’
He then gestured to the red sheet which covered a huge mass that appeared to be a box on a table, saying: ‘Go for it. I can’t be happier about this.’
‘That sounded really weird,’ Nat laughed. ‘I have no idea what this is.’
Natalie Barr, 56, was left shrieking on Sunrise on Thursday morning when she was hit with a shocking surprise on live TV
As she gripped the edges of the sheet and prepared to whip it off, Shirvo cautioned her to ‘be gentle’, prompting her to ask: ‘Is there a person?’
‘No, what are you talking about?’ Shirvo said.
But Nat shrieked as she ripped off the sheet to reveal it really was a person twisted up into a human knot: ‘What the hell is that?!’
‘It is a human,’ Shirvo said as the contortionist untwisted his body and began to put on a shocking display of flexibility.
‘It’s what?’ Nat cried. ‘Oh my, God. Oh, sugar. Oh wow. Oh my, God. It is a person.’
The lighthearted moment comes after Nat unleashed about the ongoing debates about Australia Day, calling on the government to decide if it should be celebrated.
Her comments followed Australian Venue Co, which owns more than 200 pubs across the country, saying the January 26 public holiday causes ‘sadness’ and ‘hurt’ for many patrons and that it would not be marking the national day.
‘Here we go again. Every year this happens,’ Nat said during an interview with Labor Senator Murray Watt on Monday morning, before she asked him if he supported the move by the pub company.
The Seven breakfast show host was presented with a large holiday gift by co-host Matt ‘Shirvo’ Shirvington, hidden beneath a sheet and bow on a table. But as she pulled the red velvet sheet off her surprise, Nat went screaming over what she uncovered
‘It is a human,’ Shirvo said as the contortionist untwisted his body and began to put on a shocking display of flexibility
‘It seems like the culture war starts earlier every year. We’re not even into January, and it’s begun,’ Senator Watt explained.
‘I think it’s a decision for each business to decide what they want to do. This company has decided they don’t want to hold Australia Day celebrations, but there will be plenty of other venues around the country that will.
‘I’ll leave it to those businesses to make their decisions, and their patrons will make their own decisions about where they will go on the day.’
But Nat was not impressed with this answer, and called on the government to make a decision on the day once and for all.
‘Why leave it up to every business? Do we need a ruling on this? Every year, we tear our hair out because of the argument.’
Senator Watt reaffirmed his position and warned Nat that the government risked infringing on people’s freedoms by telling pub owners what to do.
‘It is tiresome we keep having an argument every single year. As I say, it is even December and we’re starting it,’ he said.
‘But our government isn’t going to dictate to pubs what they have to do, we don’t live in North Korea.
‘We’re not going to have a government that tells pubs what they’ve got to do on particular days of the week.’
Venues boycotting Australia Day include Bungalow8, Cargo, Kingsley’s Woolloomooloo, and Parkside Hotel in Sydney, as well as the Esplanade Hotel, Prince of Wales, Duke of Wellington and Garden State Hotel in Melbourne.
Also shunning celebrations will be the Claremont Hotel and Bassendean Hotels in Perth, the Regatta Hotel, Boundary Hotel, and the riverfront Fridays bar in Brisbane and well as the Parkside Hotel and the Colonist in Adelaide.
