31 October, 2006

Bust Op

Over the weekend the Sydney showgirl community lost one of our own..

I'm sure many you remember a fantastic performer, Bust Op. Even though I was not a close friend, it is of course sad to hear that such a unique and talented person left us so early in life.

He passed away on Friday evening at St Vincents Hospital after a long battle with cancer.

My thoughts are with his friends and family who are deeply grieving at this time.

Rest In Peace sweetheart..

27 October, 2006

My Humble Thanks...

26/10/2006 Sydney Star Observer


POCKET ROCKET

When Mr Mary's in Redfern opened a few months ago, the stage area seemed large and difficult to fill for the three performers I saw there.

Shelley Legs Diamond and her troupe have changed that. I saw their show last Saturday and have to commend them on their excellent choreography and precision performance.

They utilised all the space available and showed there's a huge difference between lip-synching to a show tune in a confined space and putting your years of dance training and practice through its paces.

Congratulations to Mr Mary's for providing a larger space for our drag stars to strut their stuff, and to Shelley Legs Diamond, the pocket rocket, for raising the bar in drag entertainment standards.

Nicholas C from Sydney


My thanks to Nicholas C for his humbling comments in this weeks Sydney Star Observer. You're such a sweetie!

I have received much positive feedback regarding my new production show "Masquerade: A Dirty Masked Affair", and appreciate Nicholas' time he took to publicly praise our efforts.

My thanks to you again Nicholas! Come in and say "Hi" and I'll shout you a drink or two at the bar..

Now, speaking of the Mr Mary shows on Saturday nights, the show times have been altered slightly to now be 10:30pm, 11:30pm and 12:30am.

This means people have more time for those yummy meals before the show in the bistro, and then to dance the night away to one of my favourite DJs ever, Justin Scott.

I hope to see you at Mr Mary's soon!

25 October, 2006

Pussy Problems

One of the two cats that my partner has, Scooter, was quite sick on the weekend. Waking up to loud howling, to our horror we found a cat laying on the floor, clutching to the carpet for his dear life, and not seeming to respond to anything visually.

We soon discovered be had gone suddenly blind - his pupils were completely dilated and he could not even see anything in front of his face. He had even been so distressed he had even wet himself.

It scared the hell out of me to see him in such a state, and of course we made an urgent dash to the Vet in the middle of the night.

On our way there, he started to calm down as I patted and talked to him in his travel case. He even got some of his vision back.. Thank Goodness! It seems like his body must have shut down while it was going through some sort of fit.. We hoped the Vet could find out more..

While at the Vet, his condition started to improve, but after describing his symptoms (and with some prods and pokes - like a thermometer up the bum!), we were told that we could be looking at a cat with severe diabetes and kidney problems.

We had to leave our poor little boy at the Vets, pending some blood tests.

Come Monday, we had confirmation that he in fact did have diabetes and would need to have 2 injections of Insulin a day for the rest of his life.

He was transferred to the Paddington Cat Hospital during Monday for further tests and the commencement of his treatment.

He stayed overnight, and come Tuesday afternoon I was in tears at work thinking he might be on his last legs. Finally my partner sent me an SMS saying that Scooter was allowed to come home.. My heart was relieved, to say the very least!

We went to pick him up at the hospital and were taught how to inject his Insulin, and on what his new diet will consist of.

Soon I was very happy to have him lazing about the house again.

His grumpy meows were sorely missed - the apartment was so quiet with him gone.

Scooter will be back at the Cat Hospital on Friday for more tests and to find out what is happening with his kidneys. Until then, I hope that everything is going to improve, as he has become one of my little boys that I adopted from my "marriage" and I love him so much..

17 October, 2006

Opening Night: MASQUERADE - A Dirty Masked Affair

It's the season for Opening Nights it seems..

Last Saturday I opened my new show, "MASQUERADE: A Dirty Masked Affair" at Mr Mary's in Redfern.

It was a relief, to say the least, that it went down very well with the audience. My thanks to all those people who have sent emails/sms's/called me to congratulate the cast on a job well done.

With our two new performers, male dancers Daniel and Davide, we take a journey from a Masquerade Ball to the Bedroom, in a high energy and sexy show.

My thanks to Kirsten Damned for making our costumes, Cleo Coupe for editing the soundtrack, Daniel for his finale choreography and Charisma for hers. A special thanks to my partner for helping with the dramas of putting up the chandeliers and being my personal taxi!

I'm still taking some time to breathe now, before heading back into producing another show for Mr Mary's, this time with Charisma Belle and the two boy dancers. Then after that it's right into my new Stonewall shows! So I'm a busy girl atm..

Click HERE to see info on the shows I'm putting on.. Otherwise, you are certainly invited to come along to watch our extravaganza - shows/entry is free, all you need do is buy a drink or two!

Hope to see you out and about..

Luv Shelley
xxx

09 October, 2006

Opening Night: Priscilla

I was lucky enough to be invited as an official guest to the Opening Night of Priscilla.

Now apart from the show - which went PERFECTLY (5/5 Diamonds!), I will concentrate on the other events of the evening.. Namely the Red Carpet, and the After Party!

RED CARPET...

What a star-studded event! And as my fellow showgirl, Tora Hymen, would say, "It was the who's who, and the who's that, of the entertainment industry"!

Terrance Stamp, an original cast member of Priscilla: Queen of the Desert (Movie), a number of Home and Away stars, Jimmy Barnes, Barry Crocker, Maria Vanuti, and our very own superstar, Carlotta, was just a small selection of the many celebrities there to show their support for the fabulous new Aussie musical.

Fellow showgirls also attended, such as Mitzi Macintosh, Verushka Darling, Claire De Lune, Kitty Glitter, Portia Turbo, Courtney Act, Chelsea Bun and Amelia Airhead. We all had a ball posing for the photographers of the many major publications covering the event.

After some mingling (and poking out a few celebrity eyes with my DIVA Flower Dress!) we were ushered to our seats - right next to Mel and Kosh (Channel 7 Breaky Show). Now Mel was delightful, but as always I wanted to stick Kosh's head down a toilet until be stopped breathing!

With a performance about to start, the directors and producers made their way to their front row circle seats for the Opening Night extravaganza to commence. Excitement and nervousness, was thick in the air. The lights dimmed and the overture started to loud cheers from the audience.

As mentioned before, I will not talk about the show again, but I will say I was certainly very proud of my friend's performances, particularly Trevor Ashley (aka Cleopatra Coupe).

With new additions/changes to the show, and a seamless run, everyone enjoyed themselves immensely - performers and the audience.

The leads even took their individual bows! Hooray! (Read about my pet peeve HERE!)

After the show, it was then on to the After Party...

AFTER PARTY...

We were ushered along from the Lyric Theatre to the Showroom for a very glam after party. The entrance to the showroom was moved so that we were taken through a "Priscilla Gate". Then continuing around to the left, we took the spiral stairs up to the showroom foyer for entry to the main party room.

The room was impressive, decked out with possibly the biggest mirrorball in the world, smaller mirrorball clusters surrounding it, chandeliers made of feather boas, and a flashing dancefloor. (The dancefloor/stage I found out was a old set for a Ch7 game show - though I couldn't find out which one.. Koshy wouldn't tell me while I continued to threaten drowning him!)

The word around town was that Gloria Gaynor was performing at the party, and this was confirmed by my contacts in the know, however the goss is that she pulled out of the deal... Wonder why...??

The performer taking her place was Charlene.

She is obviously not the singer she once was, and had a very difficult time trying to get the crowd pumped, but managed to get the party-goers behind her when she sang her hit from Priscilla - "I've Never Been To Me"... not once, but twice! She sang the "original" version, then the "tweaked" version, as she put it (ie dance mix).

Of course all the celebs came along, if for nothing but the free piss-up! David Campbell, Bronwyn Bishop, Barry Humphries, Adrian Raschella - the list could go on... were all there, and I was lucky enough to draw their attention with my DIVA Flower Dress.

Unfortunately, I didn't take my camera along (can u believe I forgot!!!), but some of the celebs took pics themselves, so hopefully I'll get a copy sometime to put up on the site.

With all the mingling done, I slipped into something a little more comfortable for the remainder of the night and had a great time schmoozing with the crowd. I even caught up with an old dance lecturer of mine from WAAPA there - Claudia Alessi. (Hi babe!)

Soon it was about 2:00am and we made a move before it got too tragic!

It was an incredible night - as it was promised - and I will never forget it.

Thank you to the producers for inviting me along, and for putting my name in the Official Priscilla Program as an "influence" to their production! I have been very touched..

Make sure you do see Priscilla, it's a landmark moment in musical theatre in Australia, and of course, is again (in a different way) reaching out to mainstream Australia and helping with our community's visibility.

04 October, 2006

Priscilla: ACON Preview

**I know I'm slow on writing about the show, but I have honestly been working heaps on my new Mr Mary show, that I simply haven't had time.. Anyways, on with the blog...**

What a fabulous show Priscilla - The Musical is.. Just as it promised! What a great night..

We were first welcomed to the Lyric Theatre by my fellow showgirl, and ex-boss, Mitzi Macintosh. Mitzi talked about her involvement with the "Priscilla" legend, mentioning she had performed her version of the show more than 1000 times! (She actually mentioned the exact amount, which was amazing in itself!)

Next was a short speech from ACON, thanking the producers and audience for allowing the show to be a fundraiser for the organisation.

The director of the show, Simon Phillips then took to the stage. Firstly welcoming us to the show, he added that due to the complexity of the show, that the evenings performance would actually be the FIRST EVER run through of the show on stage! Wow!

We were advised, in a very fun and light-hearted way, to expect at least 2 major pauses in the show, as technical issues would be worked out. He even assured us he would even talk us through it!

Then it was on to the show..

Now I won't give away a lot of the surprises (of which I've previously been privy to from a number of sources - Cleo/Freeda/TM and the producers themselves).. So no worries for those reading on..

After the opening number, my good friend Cleo Coupe (aka Trevor Ashley), who plays "Miss Understood", takes to the stage for a solo. The audience loved her, and I was so proud I was crying - her outfit was fabulous, as you would expect from the Oscar winning designers, and this all set the tone for the spectacular to follow.

Of course the storyline is kept close to the movie, with some of the most memorable lines delivered throughout.

Tony Sheldon, who some people may remember I danced and choreographed for in DIVAs 2005, plays "Bernadette". He was brilliant and very believable in the role. Check out his first wig! It's absolute heaven! He was a joy to watch over the entire show. I can't speak highly enough of him..

Jeremy Stanford, in the role of "Mitzi", was on the other hand, a little flat. To be fair though, he did warm up as we got further into the show.

My friend, Daniel Scott - a local boy, played the role of "Felicia". He played it so well, and at times looked liked and "channeled" Guy Pearce! With such a gorgeous voice, he really added spice to the show - as only Felicia can!

We went through the show for 45 mins before the first show pause happened - in Broken Hill no less!. It was a fortunate place to stop, as we got to hear again Genevieve Lemon's rendition of "I love the Nightlife" - sooo very funny!

Soon enough, Michael Caton (from "The Castle") enters playing the role of "Bob". Bless him, he is no Bill Hunter, but he was still a lot of fun. (I wonder if Bill would have done the show..?) Michael even got a short solo to sing as well!

One of the other cast highlights was "Cynthia" (Lena Cruz), better known as the "Mail-order Bride". She bought the house down when she just walked onto stage - not even a word uttered! Finally, when the cheering died down, she said "Lemonade?". The crowd then erupted again for literally at least 2 minutes, stomping the ground, cheering and clapping! She was a cack! Her big number, which I'll keep quiet, was so funny that I was again in tears... Of laughter of course! Such a clever song choice..

Freeda Corsett (aka Damien Ross), who I have recently worked with in the show "Grease" at the Imperial Hotel, was awesome in a flashback scene. She play the "Young Bernadette" and in my opinion, really shows all the performers on stage how to walk, dance and act like a woman!

There were a few faces I recognised from my time at the WA Academy of Performing Arts (WAAPA) in the show too, so I was always on the lookout for who was in what role.

Of course there were a number of stops in the show, and this gave the performers a chance to interact with the audience, which actually was really nice. We got to see a side of the performers most people don't see - their own personality.

There were only 2 spots which were disappointing for me..

Firstly, the scene where the queens meet the aboriginal tribe. For some reason, the dancers in the background are just dressed in black clothes (That look like strangely like tracksuits!). It's a very uninspiring set of costumes, for a scene which was one of the most memorable moments in the movie. Of course the bright "Gumby" costumes make an appearance, but surely something better could be done for the outback boys/girls.. Hell, I'd by them a set of real costumes if the Priscilla Producers would let me..

One of my pet peeves, with any show, is that the audience should be allowed to show their appreciation for the cast, individually, as well as an ensemble. Still, as of Tuesday night, the main cast is not taking their bows, rather the entire cast is lumped together for a group bow. One person has explained to me that they "have heard" this is because the Producers wanted the Bus to be the star.. I really don't think that is the case.. Anyway, I do hope they refine their bow sequence, as what they are currently doing is quite unconventional for a musical, and not particularly respectful to (especially) the 3 leads.

It was a long night (the show ended at midnight!) but we still moved off to the after party, held at the Showroom on the other side of Star City.

I got the chance to chat with some of the cast and crew, and it was a great to catch up with a few old friends.

After making our way to the Irish Pub near the Casino, we caught up a little more with our showgirls, Cleo and Freeda who gave us a insiders view on the show. There was so much to catch up on, but lack of sleep forced me home come 2:30am..

In the end, the show is FABULOUS! I was sad that I didn't make it into the show myself, as it would be a wonderful show to be a part of. I hope it stays in Sydney at least until Mardi Gras, if not longer, as it deserves strong support. But don't leave it long.. Go book it now at www.ticketmaster.com.au or on 136100.

Make sure you see this one.. It's a (now) legendary Aussie story, staged in such a fantastic way.. I'm sure this show will make it to New York and London in no time!

Shelley Show Index: 4.5 Diamonds out of 5!