Speaker 1: Welcome to the heart of it. We are recording on
Speaker 1: gaddigle Land High. Sweetheart, Hello you ready for this?
Speaker 2: I am very ready.
Speaker 1: I am so excited. These gentlemen are in the room
Speaker 1: with us, which is fantastic. Jens Rada also known as
Speaker 1: Skank Sinatra and their partner Lockey, also.
Speaker 3: Known as I love this name. I have Rose Bud I.
Speaker 1: A rose, but a trady by day, a drag queen
Speaker 1: by night, whose love story began during one of Melbourne's
Speaker 1: many lockdowns.
Speaker 2: Indeed so.
Speaker 4: Originally connecting over Zoom with the intention of collaborating artistically,
Speaker 4: the two quickly discovered a deeper spark. Both trained in
Speaker 4: musical theater, live singing drag artists and a love for
Speaker 4: jazz and cabaret, YenS and Locke found themselves falling into
Speaker 4: something that was equal parts creative partnership and unexpected romance.
Speaker 1: Since then, their love has taken them around the world.
Speaker 1: They've co created and performed multiple shows together, including Madam
Speaker 1: Martha's Parisian Cabaret, winner of the Best Cabaret in Melbourne's
Speaker 1: Fringe in twenty twenty four. That is Huge, yep, that
Speaker 1: is huge, and The Cabaret Hour winner of Best Variety
Speaker 1: Show at the Adelaide Fringe. Yo, huge, welcome, Yen and Lockie.
Speaker 5: Hi, Hi guys, Hello, it's good to be here.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Are you still in the glow of all these
Speaker 2: winning awards.
Speaker 5: Honestly, it's been a whirlwind and I feel like we
Speaker 5: haven't even stopped. It's just been go, go go. But
Speaker 5: you know that that hustle never stops until it does.
Speaker 5: And we're trying to plan the holiday, which has been
Speaker 5: in the making for I don't know a year, but
Speaker 5: we never find a way to squeeze it in.
Speaker 1: Was that would that be an overseas holiday or a
Speaker 1: local one?
Speaker 5: Well, we're going to Edinburgh Fringe. So we're trying to
Speaker 5: make sure that we have at least a week where
Speaker 5: we have no gigs planned. There's one trying to creep in,
Speaker 5: you know, in the UK. We want to drive up
Speaker 5: from London to Edinburgh over a week, but then you know,
Speaker 5: something has popped up. We're like, no, no, no, let's just
Speaker 5: enjoy the hills of you know, the UK and.
Speaker 2: Just it is gorgeous. That's we just went, well, we
Speaker 2: just went to Scotland. We talked about our Scottish trip.
Speaker 1: Because like it was yesterday is the.
Speaker 2: Best Edinard is so fat.
Speaker 4: We we took a train from London to Edinburgh and
Speaker 4: then we kind of did a did a circuit, went
Speaker 4: up to Isle of Sky, we went to Lockness where
Speaker 4: else did it.
Speaker 1: And then we went up off the top to Inverness
Speaker 1: and down around around the coast around St Andrews.
Speaker 4: But you must make time to travel around.
Speaker 6: I feel like I need a photo with the lock
Speaker 6: news good luck with that.
Speaker 1: The locks are there, the Loch Loman, Locknes, Isle of Sky.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you can get to Island of Sky.
Speaker 4: There's a river there called River d and our son's
Speaker 4: name is river and we often call him river De
Speaker 4: because he's River Dado.
Speaker 2: And it was that was you know, it's the small thing.
Speaker 1: Nice Ali also she was the one that curated the journey.
Speaker 1: So we started off in sort of nice airbnbs and
Speaker 1: then we ended up in the penultimate night of the
Speaker 1: actual road trip, we're in a gatehouse. It was sixteenth
Speaker 1: century gatehouse over a river. Staying in there that just
Speaker 1: felt really freaking.
Speaker 5: Spooky winter.
Speaker 1: Bluestone gatehouse that was built over this river. And then
Speaker 1: the last night we were in a eighteenth century castle.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that was getting renovated.
Speaker 1: Guy was renovated on his own.
Speaker 6: Oh my god, does Ali do all the planning pretty
Speaker 6: much for those?
Speaker 1: Because she's so good at it.
Speaker 4: And I do love it. I do love the research
Speaker 4: as long as I've got time to do it.
Speaker 2: I really love.
Speaker 5: This was one in the Yeah is that?
Speaker 1: How is that in yours?
Speaker 5: Exactly? I'm the alley. I do the planning and everything, and.
Speaker 6: And I'm the one hounding, like have you booked the flights?
Speaker 1: Well?
Speaker 3: Yeah, and the books I turn up?
Speaker 5: I want to go somewhere like this, like this, like this,
Speaker 5: and then I'll make an untinerary and send it through
Speaker 5: for approval.
Speaker 2: Nice.
Speaker 4: Well, take us back to that zoom call, you know,
Speaker 4: was it all sort of business at first or was
Speaker 4: there immediate like this guy?
Speaker 5: Well got a correct that actually there was no zoom call.
Speaker 3: It was.
Speaker 5: It was an Instagram message and that led to what
Speaker 5: are you doing tomorrow?
Speaker 1: Hading on Who's who?
Speaker 3: Slipped into Who's my best friend?
Speaker 6: They met Yen's at an audition and said, you have
Speaker 6: to meet this this guy. He's music did a background
Speaker 6: now doing drag, and I think you would work well together.
Speaker 6: And I had had a couple of lines with my
Speaker 6: housemates and was feeling confident, so I messaged Yen's from
Speaker 6: my drag account like, hey.
Speaker 3: Queens, sleag girl, work, did a work work? I think
Speaker 3: we would work well together. What are you doing?
Speaker 6: And the Ends replied straight away.
Speaker 5: I had nothing else sitting on the couch for six weeks,
Speaker 5: so it.
Speaker 6: Was lockdown, lockdown, but I was because I work as
Speaker 6: a landscaper. I still had permission to leave and like
Speaker 6: a ten work because that wasn't that wasn't essential service.
Speaker 5: Apparently those Brighton houses needed their head, they needed did
Speaker 5: many wealthy family homes.
Speaker 2: Am I just am?
Speaker 4: I just finally connecting the fact that you're a landscaper
Speaker 4: and your name is Ivor rosebud to Hello.
Speaker 6: Ding Ding Dan, you hit the buffalo, got it.
Speaker 5: Cool?
Speaker 2: So the DM slid and then did you then did
Speaker 2: you get on a zoom call with no?
Speaker 6: There was no z So I messaged Ends and I said,
Speaker 6: we'd love to work. Apparently we would work well together,
Speaker 6: and he replied straight away and he was like, well
Speaker 6: when do you want to possibly meet up? And I said,
Speaker 6: well how about tomorrow we can meet for a wine
Speaker 6: and a walk.
Speaker 5: At ten am.
Speaker 1: No, No, it was lab.
Speaker 6: I was am somewhere because you know, everyone in Melbourne
Speaker 6: had given up by that point, and we were all
Speaker 6: having bubbles and out keeap cups and the real chest
Speaker 6: was I said, you get the food and I'll get
Speaker 6: the wine, because I'm a bit of a foodie. I'll
Speaker 6: get I got like a nice drop and he bought
Speaker 6: the pastries and he did. He bought Coal's pastries, which that.
Speaker 5: Was I'm sorry, Coals makes beautiful.
Speaker 3: Beautiful questionable.
Speaker 6: Well he did buy a La Guet and I was like, well,
Speaker 6: at least he bought a sourdough.
Speaker 2: Bi get not last.
Speaker 6: And we met in Footscray Botanical Gardens because and you
Speaker 6: left your five kilometer radius.
Speaker 5: It was on the cusp. I was on the cusp
Speaker 5: and by this point everyone was like, oh, you know,
Speaker 5: it was like five point. I felt very very no
Speaker 5: because I hadn't.
Speaker 1: Did that raise the anticipation in the.
Speaker 5: Created some fire breaking some law exactly. Now that things
Speaker 5: are normal, I'm like, wait, do I even feel anything?
Speaker 5: I do?
Speaker 6: It's a test test, yeah, and we kind of, yeah,
Speaker 6: we hit it off. We were listening to jazz music
Speaker 6: and we realized we had a lot of in common.
Speaker 2: And then.
Speaker 6: Somehow business turned to pleasure.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, and how what was that? How long was
Speaker 1: that time frame where where the business did turn into pleasure? Okay,
Speaker 1: so who caught the fields first?
Speaker 6: Well, we said it was miss kicking in.
Speaker 5: But we spent a few hours talking about cabaret and
Speaker 5: music and really like bonding over how much in common
Speaker 5: we had in taste in art in particular. And then
Speaker 5: one of them was Elaine Stretch is at Liberty. It's
Speaker 5: a cabaret show that she's done, and it's filmed and
Speaker 5: recorded and look, he's listened and watched it a million
Speaker 5: times and I had heard snippets from it. He's like,
Speaker 5: we should go watch it. Oh my god, it's fabulous,
Speaker 5: it's camp. We need to go watch it. Why don't
Speaker 5: we go watch it.
Speaker 6: To get ideas for our collaboration.
Speaker 5: Yeah, And so I was like, I can't go to
Speaker 5: your house, like that's against the rules. I did.
Speaker 6: I did that, but we were in the back garden
Speaker 6: in the house. We were still outside. And then yeah,
Speaker 6: I went into the kitchen to get a cup of
Speaker 6: tea and then I came back and lean over and
Speaker 6: did a spider Man kiss.
Speaker 1: Spider Man. I like Spider Man kiss.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it didn't really quite work.
Speaker 6: They must have rehearsed quite a lot of the movie I've.
Speaker 5: Just Met You and You Kiss Me without even like,
Speaker 5: you know, sussing if that was the vibe. Luckily for
Speaker 5: him it was the vibe still, you know.
Speaker 6: I thought it was very Ford and we've been inseparable
Speaker 6: ever since.
Speaker 2: And the first show you created was which one.
Speaker 5: I actually think we started like just co hosting some
Speaker 5: things first, Like there's this venue in Melbourne called the
Speaker 5: Speakeasy Theater. It's a vaudeville kind of variety. Yeah, where
Speaker 5: is that in the city on FLDS Street. It's like
Speaker 5: it is like a speakers you can't tell from the
Speaker 5: art side. It's very normal.
Speaker 6: It feels very like old school board Villion. Yeah, like
Speaker 6: very catch It's yeah of a kebab shop, you know,
Speaker 6: sick snack afterwards.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, get kebab your shirt.
Speaker 5: I had to do my makeup and there the other
Speaker 5: day because the person opening the theater is running late.
Speaker 5: I had to get into my drag makeup, which gives
Speaker 5: a good two hours. And she was like, I'm going
Speaker 5: to be forty five and I have to start my
Speaker 5: makeup and I've been dropped off with my uber. I've
Speaker 5: got my makeup, So I went into the Kebb shop
Speaker 5: and said, can I do makeup here? I'm sorry? She
Speaker 5: said okay. So for forty five minutes I was sitting
Speaker 5: there doing you know, everything and made a good friend
Speaker 5: with the lady.
Speaker 1: Does it really take that long?
Speaker 5: Like?
Speaker 1: Does it?
Speaker 5: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Two hours?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 5: Comfortably. We can sprint through it in an hour and
Speaker 5: twenty yeah. Yeah, well you've got a mode to cover up.
Speaker 6: No, I don't cover it up. It's part of part of,
Speaker 6: part of the esthetic, part of.
Speaker 1: The Yeah, remember that.
Speaker 4: Can you just both of you, can you just take
Speaker 4: us back to when you were younger?
Speaker 2: Younger?
Speaker 4: Like, where did the love of drag come from? Why
Speaker 4: did you decide to do it? And I mean both
Speaker 4: of you are very well trained. Actually, was that something
Speaker 4: that from little little ones that you knew you wanted
Speaker 4: to be in the theater someway or another?
Speaker 5: Do you want to go first?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 6: Well I grew up watching my nan live with us,
Speaker 6: and I always grew up watching the old fashioned music
Speaker 6: halls like Doll Singing in the Rain, and just like
Speaker 6: the budget on those films and the escape is it
Speaker 6: was always a love and the music. I fell in
Speaker 6: love with the music in the style. Never thought i'd
Speaker 6: ever pursue that. And then mums said that there was
Speaker 6: a performing arts high school, and then my friends said
Speaker 6: that there was performing arts universities. You know, I never
Speaker 6: really thought that that's something that I could actually do,
Speaker 6: and it kind of just like evolved. I just went
Speaker 6: along for the journey drag. Never thought I'd ever do
Speaker 6: drag until I graduated from VCA and I was, you know,
Speaker 6: attending the club scene, and I was watching incredible performance
Speaker 6: art in Melbourne and drag queens doing incredible things, and
Speaker 6: I was like, I can do that. I want to
Speaker 6: do that, And then through a connection with a friend,
Speaker 6: started performing in the Melbourne club scene. Yeah, creating, and
Speaker 6: I think I used drag as a vessel to portray
Speaker 6: some of the messages or political ideas that I wanted.
Speaker 6: And now it's kind of this persona, this alter ego.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that is.
Speaker 1: That a liberating feeling, having that that persona that you
Speaker 1: can it is maybe say things that you would normally say.
Speaker 1: Is that how it works?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 6: And also Dragon itself is political as well, so but
Speaker 6: it is liberating and to also to create art that
Speaker 6: I get to creating your own art and sharing that.
Speaker 5: Yours is also you know, it's unique and it's a
Speaker 5: very special way, like the work that you do, the
Speaker 5: performances you create. I have never seen drag performances like that,
Speaker 5: you know, without going into too much details, this particular
Speaker 5: action that's called levon Rose. You know, the classic song
Speaker 5: starts as a beautiful, beautiful Glamazonian woman with long pink hair,
Speaker 5: a big red boa and gorgeous gown. And then as
Speaker 5: the song goes along, one piece of clothing gets thrown,
Speaker 5: another piece of clothing gets thrown, until the very end
Speaker 5: she's in the splits in nothing, absolutely nothing, but it's
Speaker 5: all soul and extremely and by the end of the
Speaker 5: people are like, what it's going on. I've never seen
Speaker 5: anything like this before. Woman at the top, manhood at
Speaker 5: the bottom, and it's for a split second everyone's confused.
Speaker 6: Which started in a club scene like very like.
Speaker 5: Not punky underground, now it's been.
Speaker 6: Like a dressing gown and nothing else.
Speaker 3: You've toured the.
Speaker 5: World with it now on huge stages.
Speaker 6: Which you know, the whole point of it to reveal
Speaker 6: kind of make fun of drag. Why not make fun that,
Speaker 6: like you know underneath all the makeup and wigs there
Speaker 6: is a different person who is presented on the outside,
Speaker 6: which is why I keep the mustache as well. Yeah yeah, yeah,
Speaker 6: it's fun. Thank you who's paying you?
Speaker 5: I'll be a publicist episode.
Speaker 2: I want to have for unions.
Speaker 5: Well, when I was a little child in South Africa,
Speaker 5: I was forced to always sing every time my parents
Speaker 5: had friends over. They said, yeah and sing a song
Speaker 5: because they saw this like, you know, voice in the
Speaker 5: choir than the church. And then when we moved to Australia,
Speaker 5: I joined this like kind of music theater and acting
Speaker 5: youth school called Bites in Budroom on the Sunshine Coast,
Speaker 5: and then music theater was kind of that route that
Speaker 5: I took because I think that was kind of popular
Speaker 5: for school kids to study. I also kept like singing,
Speaker 5: doing singing competitions on the side. I would always dress
Speaker 5: up as a girl as well, even when I was
Speaker 5: from when I was like ten and then there was
Speaker 5: this singing competition search for a search for a Malula
Speaker 5: bar Star and I put on a wig, I put
Speaker 5: on a dress, and my parents like, you have to
Speaker 5: do less strong really, oh my god, they insisted. They
Speaker 5: were like you've got to do this because I had
Speaker 5: just done this like performance for my grandparents silver anniversary
Speaker 5: and they said you should do the same thing for
Speaker 5: this competition. Anyways, I won, and Milulla Bar was ready
Speaker 5: for a ten year of twelve year old drag queen
Speaker 5: to sing strong enough by share. I know, I know,
Speaker 5: And then the music theater took a break and then
Speaker 5: came back to drag after I studied and kind of
Speaker 5: honed the craft of performing, you know, in all its forms, acting, dancing, singing,
Speaker 5: and now putting it all together in what I think
Speaker 5: is such a beautiful art form, drag cabaret.
Speaker 2: Are both of your families really supportive of the drag were?
Speaker 5: We're so lucky, very lucky.
Speaker 2: I so that.
Speaker 1: You're brother You've got you mentioned before we came or
Speaker 1: we started pressing before press record.
Speaker 6: You've got brothers, three brothers on the second of the four.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and are they are they supportive too?
Speaker 3: They're so supportive.
Speaker 6: I think it's so cool, and I mean, especially with
Speaker 6: the nude work that I've done, they just think it's
Speaker 6: hilarious when they come to the like.
Speaker 3: Was really cool. Thanks, darling.
Speaker 4: But I'm sure growing up with four boys you were
Speaker 4: probably naked a lot, weren't you.
Speaker 2: Most seemed to run around.
Speaker 6: We grew up in the country as well. It was
Speaker 6: three We were just running around.
Speaker 4: I mean that that was the most common phrase in
Speaker 4: our house with our son.
Speaker 2: It was like, where are your pants? Where are your pants?
Speaker 2: Put your pants on?
Speaker 3: It was my youngest brother, I wonder when.
Speaker 1: Yeah, he was classic. I grew up with four boys too,
Speaker 1: really yeah, our bath Sorry, I'm.
Speaker 3: Number one boy number one.
Speaker 1: I have an older sister who was the icebreaker for us.
Speaker 1: She's the hero of the family. Yes, yeah, yeah, And
Speaker 1: but our the morning routine in the bathroom was hilarious
Speaker 1: with four boys switching from each station like you'd have
Speaker 1: one on the duney, one cleaning his teeth in a shower,
Speaker 1: one going.
Speaker 6: Harrier literally literally, yeah, yeah, there were no secret even
Speaker 6: just like dinner times, ens is always like why do
Speaker 6: you always eat like you've there's nothing left on that
Speaker 6: because I had to fight for my.
Speaker 2: First literally absolutely.
Speaker 1: So, how do you guys stay connected? You mentioned overseas
Speaker 1: travel and are you together or do you travel alone
Speaker 1: and do your shows by yourselves? And how do you
Speaker 1: stay connected when you when you're apart?
Speaker 5: Zoom well, up until this point, we have been lucky
Speaker 5: enough that a lot of times we do a lot
Speaker 5: of shows together, so you know, like Madame Martha's show,
Speaker 5: we've toured the country together a lot. But then also
Speaker 5: when we do separate shows, like I tour my Skank
Speaker 5: Sinatra show, like to Edinburgh this year, Lockeye's in a
Speaker 5: show called Club Cabarett. Bernie Dita's Club Cabrette fabulous high budget,
Speaker 5: fantastic circus and variety cabaret show also going to Edinburgh.
Speaker 5: And so typically the festivals, you know, the circuit aligns,
Speaker 5: so we're always in the same place. We were both
Speaker 5: in Perth. I did skanksin Utra, you did Club Cabarette,
Speaker 5: and so it's good because we can also save on accommodations.
Speaker 5: Sometimes it's like perdms that a line that we can
Speaker 5: you know, help each other out one year, like I'm
Speaker 5: on a slightly bigger budget thing and then Locky you
Speaker 5: stay with me than the next year Locke's getting paid
Speaker 5: more day with him. So it works out well that
Speaker 5: typically we're always together, which can also be a curse sometimes,
Speaker 5: like when you're in Perth for five weeks, I'm not
Speaker 5: gonna lie I enjoyed having two weeks to myself in
Speaker 5: Melbourne at the home.
Speaker 6: Do you know the house is really clean when you're away.
Speaker 2: It's also nice to miss each other every now.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think that that's it's important.
Speaker 2: Now, Stank Sinatra, tell us how this name came.
Speaker 5: When I was at WAPPA studying music theater. We have
Speaker 5: to do like this ten minute cabaret presentation, write a
Speaker 5: little you know, snippet and present it to the class.
Speaker 5: And I did a Sinatra cabaret, but I had a
Speaker 5: grand piano in a suit, singing about kind of misogyny,
Speaker 5: but through a you know, delicious nineteen fifties Sinatra lens.
Speaker 1: Then did you write it?
Speaker 5: I did. It was Sinatra songs, but I would parody them,
Speaker 5: change the lyrics and you know, set it up that
Speaker 5: it was such a you know, gorgeous like comply with
Speaker 5: me was like comply with me, and it was about,
Speaker 5: you know, my wife at home, just do as I
Speaker 5: say and everything will be fine. And then I did
Speaker 5: it for the Perth Fringe Festival. It did really well
Speaker 5: at it again the second year after I graduated, and
Speaker 5: then I kind of just wanted to go serious into
Speaker 5: the I guess Hugh Jackman thing. He had came and
Speaker 5: talked to us when we were at Whopper, and I
Speaker 5: was like, I want to be like I want to
Speaker 5: be in musicals and films and you know, do the
Speaker 5: serious actor things. So I tried that and then I realized,
Speaker 5: you know what my heart is just in the cabaret
Speaker 5: drag world. What am I doing? And then Sinatra was
Speaker 5: kind of a natural road because I've always loved the
Speaker 5: music and I felt I had unfinished business with this
Speaker 5: show that I wrote, because I was like, I did
Speaker 5: it in a very like straight coded way before, and
Speaker 5: I think I need to do it in heels, in
Speaker 5: a wig and lashes. And so I had this urge
Speaker 5: to kind of complete this full circle of the Sinatra show.
Speaker 5: I rewrote the entire thing. It's completely different, but it
Speaker 5: came to full fruition in twenty twenty three when I
Speaker 5: did it at the Butterfly Club in Melbourne, this gorgeous
Speaker 5: Caba revenue. And now I've been touring for two and
Speaker 5: a half years, which that show. Yeah, it's done so well.
Speaker 2: I know you're still.
Speaker 1: Creating new things as you go, or adjusting fine tuning.
Speaker 5: Adjusting and fine tuning is a big part of it.
Speaker 5: I've brought on a friend who helps me like polish
Speaker 5: some jokes and writing stuff, Andy Ballock. He's a great writer.
Speaker 5: Brought on some directorial support. My friend of Livia cho Lambers,
Speaker 5: helps direct things and polish. We watch back seasons of
Speaker 5: other ones. How can we make it better? But it's
Speaker 5: reached a point now where I feel like, particularly Adelaide,
Speaker 5: I've done two years now, I've won Best Cabaret twice,
Speaker 5: and I'm like, Okay, I feel like I need to
Speaker 5: do a new show next year. Edam my fringe. I'm
Speaker 5: just doing my second time this August, but I'm starting
Speaker 5: to think, you know, there needs to be another show
Speaker 5: in the making. I'm trying a new one here at
Speaker 5: the Qtopia's Pride best called Skank Sinatra's Dirty Martini Lineup,
Speaker 5: which is like a late night lineup, fun show, chaos, yeah,
Speaker 5: bit of fun.
Speaker 1: Oh you had me a dirty Yeah.
Speaker 5: Every audience member gets one on arrival.
Speaker 1: Oh how good?
Speaker 3: Really, that's great.
Speaker 1: No one goes home empty exactly.
Speaker 5: Tickets to four hundred and fifty dollars.
Speaker 4: We have We have a diar friend. His name is
Speaker 4: Tom Burlans, and he was the man from Snowy River.
Speaker 4: I mean an actor from from a little while ago.
Speaker 4: He was also what he did, oh Farlap, He was
Speaker 4: the lead actor in Farlap.
Speaker 1: He great movies to revisit or visit in your case,
Speaker 1: I haven't seen them.
Speaker 5: The next year or something. So the audition brief has
Speaker 5: just come around, which the music this year.
Speaker 1: I bet Tommy, you'll go up for Tommy. You'll go
Speaker 1: up for Tommy, will go up for Tommy wood Comfi.
Speaker 2: That would be amazing. Well he is.
Speaker 4: He is the like if you close your eyes and
Speaker 4: heard tom sing, he sounds exactly Frank Sinatra, Wow, exactly.
Speaker 4: In fact, he did the singing.
Speaker 1: On on On Sinatra the mini series. So back in
Speaker 1: the nineties, Tina Sinatra, she she gave the blessing for
Speaker 1: the Sinatra Mini series Philip Caswell Kazanov for something he
Speaker 1: played Sinatra. Tommy should have because he kind of had
Speaker 1: that a little bit of a but anyway, Tom sung
Speaker 1: for Tina and she went, I can't, I can't change.
Speaker 1: I can't hear the difference, You're so Tom sung for that.
Speaker 1: He does shows around.
Speaker 2: The rolls it out with the band on the boats
Speaker 2: and cruisers.
Speaker 3: And the zoos and things.
Speaker 1: They do those special nights.
Speaker 6: For the animals.
Speaker 1: So so you guys, you clearly get along. Well, there
Speaker 1: must be times when there's creative differences or things. How
Speaker 1: do you as we are a relationship party, so how
Speaker 1: do you deal with conflict when it comes up?
Speaker 6: When it Well, in Madam Martha's it's a trio based ensemble.
Speaker 6: So unfortunately Meg is the mediator and just to decide
Speaker 6: a lot of the creative decisions.
Speaker 5: The third member of the show, Meg, which one do
Speaker 5: you think is right?
Speaker 1: And she's like, so when Meg's not there later back
Speaker 1: at yeah.
Speaker 5: Home, we call Meg. Meg's on the speedy Honestly.
Speaker 3: Now we call the Nutmeg because great, I'm going to
Speaker 3: call her that.
Speaker 2: I love that.
Speaker 5: Well, it's actually it's a bloody challenge because we do
Speaker 5: have creative you know, differences in choices and stuff. But
Speaker 5: we do respect each other's opinion a lot. And I
Speaker 5: think to actively never dismiss or never like shove off
Speaker 5: an opinion that's said by the other person is something
Speaker 5: to be very crucial of I'm always trying to pick
Speaker 5: up on myself if I seem like no, no, no,
Speaker 5: that's not right, and I'll move forward because we have
Speaker 5: this like shorthand as a couple. When you're creative in
Speaker 5: the room, I think you need to treat the other
Speaker 5: person as if their you know, creativity is something to
Speaker 5: respect the way that you would any other person in
Speaker 5: a professional space. But it's hard. It's hard.
Speaker 6: Yeah, And like forgiveness is important, communication is important, especially creatively,
Speaker 6: always trying each idea and giving value to everyone's respond.
Speaker 5: Exactly, Like sometimes if I if one of us does
Speaker 5: something and I think, oh no, that's so stupid, Like
Speaker 5: all right, let's just try it and then we can
Speaker 5: all make a decision afterwards, because you know, if something works,
Speaker 5: you know once you've tried it. But to dismiss and
Speaker 5: not try it, I.
Speaker 6: Think sometimes it's hard. In Drag we always laugh at
Speaker 6: this because like with the amount of makeup on your face,
Speaker 6: Like somebody will say something and you're like what, But
Speaker 6: like they'll be like, my favorite color is green.
Speaker 3: You're like, I can't believe she's said.
Speaker 5: That, because it comes across as tense because of the
Speaker 5: way the face looks like a severe woman.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 6: Literally, yeah, it's always like we were in the car
Speaker 6: driving somewhere and just says something I'm.
Speaker 5: Like everything feels high stakes when it's sit in a
Speaker 5: drag face.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that would be. I mean, do you ever find
Speaker 1: yourself in the car in full drag?
Speaker 3: Always? Every day? Every day?
Speaker 1: Is it? Is it usually positive?
Speaker 6: Please tell me yesterday you heard the opening of because
Speaker 6: You're headlining Qtop your pride fest and where we were
Speaker 6: driving a darling host or somewhere, we were both in
Speaker 6: drag and someone crossed the bedest in crossing crossing and
Speaker 6: was like.
Speaker 5: Hey, girls, we get a lot of that, which is fun.
Speaker 3: It's joyous.
Speaker 5: It always brings a smile to people.
Speaker 3: Yes, that's what I think.
Speaker 2: I don't know the way that's the way I see drag.
Speaker 2: Anyway I see it. It's so such a joyous, you
Speaker 2: know experience. It's always so full of joy I mean
Speaker 2: we spoke to Hannah Condo.
Speaker 5: Yeah, when I was in Perth at Wapa, we used
Speaker 5: to go watch her every week because she was the
Speaker 5: host of the local you know, gay club at the
Speaker 5: Court and Connections. She's obviously moved to Sydney since then,
Speaker 5: but back then she was the girl in the drag
Speaker 5: scene in Perth and so she very much also, I
Speaker 5: guess was an inspiration to the young people coming up
Speaker 5: in the drag world.
Speaker 7: I saw you just on a on a on a
Speaker 7: acting school question for this, I mean a lot of
Speaker 7: our listeners probably have kids that are wanting to go
Speaker 7: to acting.
Speaker 1: Schools and performance schools.
Speaker 3: Do you was it basically?
Speaker 1: Was it a positive experience for you? For you both?
Speaker 5: Oh, this is a good one we can talk about
Speaker 5: because you went to VCA, I went.
Speaker 1: To both of you have both of those schools have
Speaker 1: great reputations.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 5: I had a great time at WAPPA. The cohort I
Speaker 5: was with was we're still like close as anything. We
Speaker 5: talk every single day. The people I met were amazing.
Speaker 5: The training was it was music theater training. It can
Speaker 5: sometimes be a bit binary in the way like men
Speaker 5: have to be masculine, women have to be you know.
Speaker 5: I think it's changing, you know, but sometimes institutions are
Speaker 5: slow to catch up with the zeitgeist of the times.
Speaker 5: And because Perth is quite far away from you know,
Speaker 5: the Eastern States, it's got a hive mind of its own,
Speaker 5: which is great. But at the same time, it was
Speaker 5: a bit of a shockcoming to Melbourne and Sydney, where
Speaker 5: you'd feel like you're jumping into a pool where the
Speaker 5: industry that was told to you what it was like
Speaker 5: is not anything like what it was described.
Speaker 6: Where you also went to drama school in nineteen eighty three,
Speaker 6: whereas when I went to it was.
Speaker 5: Very twenty sixteen, fourteen to sixty.
Speaker 3: We always have this little rival too.
Speaker 6: I'm like, oh, you have a Bachelor of Arts and
Speaker 6: music theater, but I have a Bachelor of fine Arts.
Speaker 5: You wouldn't be able to tell you would.
Speaker 2: That's fine that.
Speaker 5: You were in the heart of you know, Australia's cultural
Speaker 5: culdron in Melbourne.
Speaker 6: Pretty different from a little bogan from Maitland. But yeah,
Speaker 6: it was an incredible experience, like working so hard as well.
Speaker 6: I think we studied like forty to fifty hours a
Speaker 6: week and then you know I worked as a waiter
Speaker 6: for thirty hours a week just to stay on top.
Speaker 6: But the experiences were incredible, shaping my identity and also
Speaker 6: the people that I met. I think it's if someone
Speaker 6: was thinking about putting a child, or if a child
Speaker 6: is thinking about pursuing a career, and or at that avenue,
Speaker 6: I sleep back that up.
Speaker 5: I have a slightly slightly different opinion on that. Actually,
Speaker 5: if you've got something else that you like nearly as
Speaker 5: much and it makes good money. What you know, it's
Speaker 5: bloody hard to make money in the arts, and we
Speaker 5: are constantly eighty percent of our arguments are about money
Speaker 5: because it's not flowing regularly. We can't plan. We try
Speaker 5: to read the Barefoot Investor or the.
Speaker 6: You know, Oh my gosh, it all exactly our first
Speaker 6: Christmas together. Yeah, we hadn't been together six months, and
Speaker 6: I bought EN's tickets to Mulan Rouge the musical, and
Speaker 6: he bought me the Barefoot Investor.
Speaker 3: I was like, this is not a sign.
Speaker 1: It could be the Barefoot Landscape.
Speaker 6: Yeah, well that's I mean, what time is that?
Speaker 5: But you know, it's like we have no stability in
Speaker 5: the financial way. So I'm like, if there's something, you
Speaker 5: can continue doing your arts as a joyful hobby, or
Speaker 5: you can even do it professionally, but typically it's after hours.
Speaker 5: A lot of musicals, even like independent musicals, rehearse after
Speaker 5: hours on weekends. You can have a daytime job. I
Speaker 5: know a lot of people who studied the performing arts
Speaker 5: with acting, music there or whatever and then spent years
Speaker 5: just doing that full time while doing a cafe job
Speaker 5: or you know, something else on the side, and now
Speaker 5: have you turned it slightly to be more like I've
Speaker 5: found something else that I really like that brings in money,
Speaker 5: whether it's you know, pilates instructor a teacher, and they
Speaker 5: really enjoy that there's some financial stability, and then they
Speaker 5: still do a lot of shows, a lot more shows
Speaker 5: than some people we know who are just one hundred
Speaker 5: percent in the arts with their cafe job or whatever.
Speaker 4: On the side, I agree with you that is because
Speaker 4: being married to a creative and it's like that feast
Speaker 4: or famine where.
Speaker 2: It's like it's great when it's all.
Speaker 4: Happening, but like that famine of like we don't know,
Speaker 4: we can't plan, we don't know if we're doing this,
Speaker 4: we can't say if we can do that, We don't
Speaker 4: we don't know, And it's just oh yeah, I always say, like,
Speaker 4: make sure you have other things that you real your
Speaker 4: face you.
Speaker 1: Really want to do my cheeks are getting sucked through landscaping.
Speaker 6: Yeah, And I'm lucky that it's at the place where
Speaker 6: I can do that between creative contracts. Such a contrast
Speaker 6: the two worlds. Yes, so it's a nice escape, but
Speaker 6: it's also some stability to help things go along, you know.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's not guaranteed jobs either, in a sense that's like, yeah,
Speaker 4: so it's still kind of waiting for the landscape.
Speaker 6: Because I'm like, oh and also if we'll waste so
Speaker 6: much like per six weeks. I'm lucky that I have
Speaker 6: clients who are very understanding or possibly like the fact
Speaker 6: that their gardener is.
Speaker 5: Rosebud sometimes singing got and demand. In Melbourne, everyone you
Speaker 5: know wants because he's very efficient but very good. Everyone says,
Speaker 5: oh my god, you're the best guy and I've ever had.
Speaker 3: Who's paying it?
Speaker 6: Yeah, exactly. The garden's always in demands. I guess it's unlucky.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but in the winter it would slow down, wouldn't it.
Speaker 1: You've got all your coning okay, yeah, the winter pruning.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: Do you get to create gardens too? Do you have
Speaker 1: to go down to Bunnings and pick up all the
Speaker 1: wood and create.
Speaker 3: All the wood?
Speaker 6: Garden renovation in Prince's Hill where I literally moved like
Speaker 6: thirty cubic meters of soil by hand because it's like
Speaker 6: an old terrace home and repaved everything that that was
Speaker 6: an exciting job.
Speaker 5: Something that is also great is that no matter where
Speaker 5: we go you can find gardening work. You've got gardening
Speaker 5: clients in Queensland and we've you know, typically done some shows.
Speaker 6: We went to clown school in Paris, I was working.
Speaker 5: Yeah, you did lots of gardening work on the weekends.
Speaker 5: For Philip Gollier, the clown master himself, really he's like,
Speaker 5: you can do a little be doing.
Speaker 6: Here to have us in for lunch and you know,
Speaker 6: we'd drink wine and he'd always like take a sip
Speaker 6: of his glass and then phill it back up champagne glass.
Speaker 1: But isn't it nice in situations like that where you
Speaker 1: can actually have a conversation with someone of that ilk
Speaker 1: that's not necessarily about the arts. It is about rosebuds.
Speaker 1: It is about creating something else. It just adds a
Speaker 1: different dimension to relationships with people.
Speaker 3: It does, it really does.
Speaker 4: What would you say has been your most magical moment
Speaker 4: on stage together?
Speaker 2: Is there one moment that you.
Speaker 5: Go, oh, it was this or for me, I've been
Speaker 5: discovering it doing our Madam Martha's show here in Sydney.
Speaker 5: When we sing at the end of the show, it's
Speaker 5: a bit cringe, but we sing a three part harmony
Speaker 5: version of Pink Pony Club, but it's got to wink
Speaker 5: it itself and it's you know, kind of ironic, but
Speaker 5: also then it reaches apart, it's really beautiful. And the
Speaker 5: lyric is I'll make my mom a proud And we
Speaker 5: always like look at each other and I'm like, this
Speaker 5: is so nice because we know how proud I'MU are
Speaker 5: of us that we just live so, you know, unapologetically
Speaker 5: in our truth. We're in flow. We love what we do,
Speaker 5: we show up for our family and our loved ones.
Speaker 5: We have an amazing community. And then when I sing that,
Speaker 5: I'm like, this is very special. So that's probably my moment.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 6: I think we're lucky that we get to watch each
Speaker 6: other on stage and see each other in each other's element,
Speaker 6: and no matter where the show goes where if it's
Speaker 6: like in a beautiful tent in Adelaide fringe, or when
Speaker 6: we did a town hall in a rural countrytown which
Speaker 6: had one lighting state the whole time we couldn't see anything.
Speaker 6: I literally fell off the stage. It was hilarious because
Speaker 6: it was the floodlight. Those times, just doing the thing together,
Speaker 6: making beautiful memories and meeting extraordinary people is a special
Speaker 6: in itself, so I can't put it down to one.
Speaker 6: The journey together, yeah, yeah, must be great.
Speaker 1: Have faced challenges as a couple that, you know, people
Speaker 1: wouldn't expect that. Yeah.
Speaker 6: Well, the biggest challenge is when I I'm stealing your
Speaker 6: makeup and wigs.
Speaker 5: We piss each other off a lot about like, I
Speaker 5: really don't like my wigs to be handled in a
Speaker 5: manhandling kind of way. I'm very delicate about my costumes,
Speaker 5: my makeup, my wigs because they're expensive, like wigs, you know,
Speaker 5: easily three hundred and fifty four hundred dollars for a
Speaker 5: styled wig. And then Lockie comes four boys hair gardener
Speaker 5: heavy handed, throws things around my costumes. He's like, can
Speaker 5: I borrow this costume? If you take care of it?
Speaker 5: Comes back? You know, there's stains all over it. It's
Speaker 5: been thrown through the mud, it's been through the rain,
Speaker 5: and I'm like, it's.
Speaker 3: Doing the lawn in it.
Speaker 5: That's rough.
Speaker 2: I was going to ask you about it if you.
Speaker 1: So, what does the shopping day look like? If did
Speaker 1: you actually go out on dedicated like I've got to
Speaker 1: get this and I've.
Speaker 3: Got to get that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you head into Mecca together.
Speaker 5: And actually just like I'm doing an order from Crayole
Speaker 5: and do you need anything? Yeah, and one of us
Speaker 5: is usually like, if one of us needs something, we'll
Speaker 5: usually just check with the other one. Do you need
Speaker 5: some makeup as well? Because it's also always cheaper if
Speaker 5: you order more or sometimes you get discounts and stuff.
Speaker 6: What else would be our challenges that we're faced? I mean, financially,
Speaker 6: there's been times, but I guess we're lucky that we
Speaker 6: have family that we can who love the arts and
Speaker 6: support the arts, that where we can call like you're
Speaker 6: good with money? What else has been challenging?
Speaker 4: Do you give each other like feedback on the performance
Speaker 4: or is that just like way too dangerous?
Speaker 5: Definitely, he's very forthcoming with his notes. Okay, he will
Speaker 5: be very happy to give his thoughts on performances straight
Speaker 5: away after, and I'll have to be like give and yeah,
Speaker 5: I'm still sweating from coming off stage. It's like, I
Speaker 5: don't I think you should cut that song shorter, Like
Speaker 5: it feels like it's drags on and when you walk
Speaker 5: it kind of feels like you're taking a gag out
Speaker 5: of the song, and it's be better if you just like,
Speaker 5: did it beautifully? I'm like, so yeah, working on.
Speaker 1: That, working on that is you know, performance takes different
Speaker 1: different aspects. Obviously you're out there, but then if you're
Speaker 1: directing or producing, is that is that something well, obviously
Speaker 1: you direct your own things as well. Is that would
Speaker 1: you see yourself leaning more into that and stepping away
Speaker 1: from it or is the performance very much still part
Speaker 1: of it?
Speaker 5: I mean, I always think that I would love to
Speaker 5: do more things from the creative engine of shows, like
Speaker 5: I love producing, I love producing, I love producing. I've
Speaker 5: really loved like directorial aspects of Madam Matha's. It's been
Speaker 5: a equal, three part creative process. Like we're very sensitive
Speaker 5: to each other to make sure that no one is
Speaker 5: senior in any other way. Everyone is one hundred percent equal,
Speaker 5: and I very much respect both of you and us
Speaker 5: as a trio for maintaining that sensitivity to each other.
Speaker 5: No one is draconian in their decision making. No one
Speaker 5: feels like their final call is mine and I'm gonna
Speaker 5: end with that, Let's move on. It's kind of always
Speaker 5: like is everyone happy with that? Great? So I don't know.
Speaker 5: I've been enjoying producing, directing music, directing is something I
Speaker 5: love doing as well. I play the piano and I
Speaker 5: have music directed a few cabarets and shows in the past,
Speaker 5: which is yeah, I like that about you.
Speaker 6: I guess like being in the nature of independent theater
Speaker 6: and the fringe environment. You wear many hats, so I
Speaker 6: guess we all have that kind of interest. Obviously, Jens
Speaker 6: is great because he takes more of an interest in
Speaker 6: the producing and is really good at the admin side
Speaker 6: of things. And then like, I don't know, yeah, what
Speaker 6: about when.
Speaker 1: Was I it was in wa It was in Perth
Speaker 1: and they had the Perth Fringe Festival going on and
Speaker 1: walked around inside that in that precinct where in the gardens.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, and a lot of the performers were out
Speaker 1: there marketing their own shows. Are you Are you in
Speaker 1: that too? In that world having to do that as well?
Speaker 5: Definitely humbling it is to be rejected person.
Speaker 6: What's so amazing about Edinburgh fringe too, no matter how
Speaker 6: big the performer is, Like famous actors or comedians are
Speaker 6: on the street like everyone does, having their own shows,
Speaker 6: because I mean that's the only way. There's such a
Speaker 6: big market over there, and there's just so many people
Speaker 6: the only way to do that is through personable.
Speaker 5: And edition Edinburgh Fringe is you have to flyer. It's
Speaker 5: just an understood thing no matter how big your show
Speaker 5: is the increase in tickets that you will get from
Speaker 5: just having visibility on the street and people like it
Speaker 5: when it comes from the performer or the person involve
Speaker 5: the show. People hire flyers as well. But that also
Speaker 5: shows to the artists who are smaller up and coming
Speaker 5: that you know what flowering something that you do and
Speaker 5: you can be proud of yourself flying and not just
Speaker 5: feel like a.
Speaker 6: Completely easy too like no, especially when you're about to
Speaker 6: perform and you're like, I'm literally on in ten minutes,
Speaker 6: but I need to sell twenty more tickets.
Speaker 3: Okay, let's go.
Speaker 5: Because it's that hour before your show, you can catch
Speaker 5: some people who are looking for something to see and yeah,
Speaker 5: you kind of be like, fabulous drag cabaret show, Jazzy
Speaker 5: please come.
Speaker 1: Remember we were in Darwin and we were up there
Speaker 1: and that Spegeltent show that we saw, Yeah, and it
Speaker 1: was fantastic and they were out the performers were out
Speaker 1: there papering as you say, you know, literally ten minutes
Speaker 1: before we've got seats, We've got seats available, come on
Speaker 1: in and it was one of the funnest, funnest nights.
Speaker 5: Yeah. I think it's the rise of the fringe festival,
Speaker 5: or even just like festivals in general, Like you see
Speaker 5: how many have popped up. Every city nearly has a
Speaker 5: version of fringe festival. Yeah, ten years ago. I don't
Speaker 5: know the stats on this, but we're a lot less
Speaker 5: and I think, you know, it's less common to just
Speaker 5: have a city specific show. Shows tour now more because
Speaker 5: you can access more audiences and circus and variety has
Speaker 5: become a lot more popular and kind of big scale
Speaker 5: and budget.
Speaker 6: And Australia has two of the top three in the world.
Speaker 6: So Edinburgh is the biggest than Adelaide, than Perth.
Speaker 5: Yeah, for interest of all sizes.
Speaker 1: Alie wrote this question, can I ask it?
Speaker 2: You may?
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, what's the weirdest thing you've ever hot glued
Speaker 1: for a costume?
Speaker 5: I love how drag specific that is, but you know,
Speaker 5: I have never used a hot glue gun. I know,
Speaker 5: and I hope that no drag queens are listening to
Speaker 5: this because that is blasphemy. I'm not crafty, oh like that.
Speaker 5: I know. I have a friend who makes costumes for us,
Speaker 5: and he's like, he's hot glue that you need to
Speaker 5: put the rhyme stones if you want to pay for
Speaker 5: my early rate, you know, to rhymestone for you for hours.
Speaker 5: I'm not going to do it a lot. And I've
Speaker 5: sat down with this corset and Ryanstones next to me
Speaker 5: for hours, just staring at it, and I'm like, I
Speaker 5: don't know where to start, and I'll be like, I'm
Speaker 5: scared I'm gonna put in the wrong place. I have
Speaker 5: a phobia of ruining things.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 6: Mine was for my very first debut as I ever
Speaker 6: in the club scene. It was a ballet belt and
Speaker 6: because that's when I wanted to do a reveal where
Speaker 6: I took my dress off and I was wearing it.
Speaker 6: It's a ballet belt that a hot glued roses all
Speaker 6: over and I hot glued of rosebud too, you know,
Speaker 6: my the back of the ballet belt, because I wanted
Speaker 6: to do the full reveal and the arrival of I
Speaker 6: have a rosebud and turn around and put my head
Speaker 6: through my legs and there was a rosebud. I guess
Speaker 6: that's the weir it is thang. I guess that's such
Speaker 6: a visual and now it's hanging in a museum.
Speaker 4: Of first does your does your drag persona influence you
Speaker 4: a lot in in real life? Do you feel the
Speaker 4: blend happening a lot?
Speaker 2: Or is it? Are they quite clear to different personas?
Speaker 6: We always say that it's a height in version of ourselves. Yeah,
Speaker 6: I guess drag naturally kind of is I feel I
Speaker 6: like to think there's a little separation between ir and locky,
Speaker 6: but maybe looking back to me running around naked in
Speaker 6: the backyard, there's not so much.
Speaker 5: I don't know. I feel like I feel like I'm
Speaker 5: a lot more chill and go with the flow and
Speaker 5: easy going as a person outside of drag, But then
Speaker 5: when I'm in drag, I'm usually like kind of serving
Speaker 5: boss queen energy and like the decision maker and you
Speaker 5: know kind of.
Speaker 6: Now you do that in life.
Speaker 3: Yeah. True.
Speaker 1: What's what's one thing that drag has taught you about
Speaker 1: about vulnerability especially in relationship too?
Speaker 5: Well? I mean it's a very different time to do
Speaker 5: drag now than it was, you know, even ten years ago.
Speaker 6: So where the commercialization through Ripaul and you know, just
Speaker 6: the market being flooded and it's you know, everyone loves drag.
Speaker 6: It's cooled to have drag queens.
Speaker 5: Or drag is very popular in a way that I think,
Speaker 5: you know, we stand on the shoulders of many giants
Speaker 5: who did it in a time when it was unsafe
Speaker 5: and dangerous, you know, like Oxford Street. Now you walk
Speaker 5: up and down and there's you know, drag queens galore,
Speaker 5: and it's the vibe there always has been. But I
Speaker 5: think particularly like the safety level is very different now
Speaker 5: because it's kind of celebrated as a part of not
Speaker 5: only LGBT community, but with the rise of you know,
Speaker 5: queerness in the world, it's accepted a lot more now.
Speaker 5: It's not kind of like the other now Ripples Drag
Speaker 5: Race is one of the highest rated you know, reality
Speaker 5: shows ever, Yeah, and has been longed mainstream. It's now
Speaker 5: no longer in the shadows. So I think it's honestly,
Speaker 5: it would be it would be not right of me
Speaker 5: to say that it feels hugely vulnerable to do drag,
Speaker 5: because I actually feel it's a very safe thing to do.
Speaker 5: I also feel very privileged in that way that I
Speaker 5: live in you know, in a city in Melbourne and Sydney.
Speaker 5: You know, it's different when you're in the regions. But yeah,
Speaker 5: very much down on the shoulders of giants.
Speaker 6: I think we definitely do. There has been times like
Speaker 6: in Perth Fringe recently, I would receive some comments on the.
Speaker 5: Street from twelve year old boys, yeah, or.
Speaker 6: Just like people who would say certain things as you're
Speaker 6: walking down the street. But then you walk into the
Speaker 6: venue and they come. The same people come to your
Speaker 6: shows and their minds have been slightly altered or it's
Speaker 6: okay because they're in a relaxed environment, they're seeing something entertaining.
Speaker 6: So I still think, you know, it was a bit
Speaker 6: challenging with those two contrasts, if that makes sense. Yeah,
Speaker 6: but I do think I don't know it was it was.
Speaker 6: It was challenging, but I thought it was still important
Speaker 6: because I felt that I was opening some minds or
Speaker 6: changing some opinions.
Speaker 5: I do think also drag queens typically and drag kings,
Speaker 5: and you know, drag artists are often mascots for the
Speaker 5: queer community in a way because we're always on not
Speaker 5: typically on stages, performing and speaking, hosting. So the opinions
Speaker 5: of drag queens do kind of speak often as a
Speaker 5: representation for the queer community. I think it's important to
Speaker 5: sometimes advocate for you know, trans riots and lives and
Speaker 5: any kind of LGBT movements that are being squashed in
Speaker 5: also other parts of the world, you know, like the
Speaker 5: UK has been having a bit of trouble with you know,
Speaker 5: trans voices being squashed. And we take it for granted
Speaker 5: because I feel we've grown up in a time when
Speaker 5: we're very lucky. It's becoming more and more accepted.
Speaker 6: But being in Australia, and being.
Speaker 5: In Australia grew up in South Africa, you know, it's
Speaker 5: a different place as well. But I when I speak
Speaker 5: to queer elders, they often say, you know, the fight
Speaker 5: has to be continued because you can't just relax because
Speaker 5: then you see the rise of certain voices that try
Speaker 5: to bring in whether it's autocracy in fascism you know
Speaker 5: that's rising in the States or even other parts in Germany.
Speaker 5: It's not just a given that it's going to remain
Speaker 5: safe for you know, marginalized community. So I think the
Speaker 5: fight is ongoing, and I do feel like, you know,
Speaker 5: I feel like, okay, I need to step up, and
Speaker 5: that's a part of my responsibility as a drag artist
Speaker 5: in the queer community.
Speaker 6: Yeah, and I was just thinking that think really well said,
Speaker 6: there is a level of responsibility. Sometimes I feel like
Speaker 6: when I'm in drag, I'm it's almost like I'm representing
Speaker 6: a company, or if I'm facing something challenging, I'm like, Okay,
Speaker 6: my reaction to this is really important to.
Speaker 3: Represent, to represent.
Speaker 6: I don't want to say the wrong thing, like it's
Speaker 6: important the next few steps of this interaction.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I understand that, because also you in the drag
Speaker 1: community or in any community that isn't it is sort
Speaker 1: of on the edge of creativity, is up for judgment,
Speaker 1: and if you've got you know, it's really easy for someone.
Speaker 2: To it's not in the arena.
Speaker 1: It's not in that arena exactly to make cast judgment
Speaker 1: or dispersion against you. And suddenly you know that becomes
Speaker 1: a thing and it's like, nah, I'm not gonna let
Speaker 1: that's not on my watch.
Speaker 6: And it's not for everyone, especially being in cabaret where
Speaker 6: the fourth wall is broken so often and you see
Speaker 6: people and they maybe have been accidentally put in the
Speaker 6: front row and they're not very comfortable with what they're
Speaker 6: the level of involvement or what they may be seeing,
Speaker 6: and that's okay. That's also part of the understanding that
Speaker 6: I have to face as well. It's like that's not
Speaker 6: for everyone, and if people have different opinions, that's okay.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 5: You go to like your show, like the Burning This
Speaker 5: Club Cabaret, and you just you can't help but leave
Speaker 5: and feel that this is completely beautiful. How can I
Speaker 5: not celebrate all these bodies and voices that are on stage.
Speaker 5: There's you know, the songs are so beautiful and they're
Speaker 5: all about togetherness, and you leave feeling inspired and like
Speaker 5: you feel like you want to hate less and love more.
Speaker 5: So I think that's a good way it's about to
Speaker 5: bring people together.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, as you said as well, I mean this
Speaker 1: is such a joyous thing to be around, and like
Speaker 1: when I asked you about on the street, I'm hoping
Speaker 1: that people respond in a positive way because I know
Speaker 1: how I feel when I come up in front of
Speaker 1: people in drag and it's always such fun, you know,
Speaker 1: specially when they go I see you, Cameron Da. I mean,
Speaker 1: it was so fun.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it's grown adults and wigs and make up. You've
Speaker 5: got to have a laugh as well.
Speaker 1: Yeah, a lot of footy clubs, you know, there are
Speaker 1: the boys on their pine getting dressed up as girls
Speaker 1: and doing the can can.
Speaker 3: That's like, yeah, that's great.
Speaker 2: Fun fun, so true. We do something called the Rapid Heartbeat.
Speaker 2: Is that what we call it?
Speaker 1: Let's just I just saw that when you wrote it.
Speaker 3: I like it.
Speaker 5: I've been doing this for months.
Speaker 4: That's what I thought it was. But then I went,
Speaker 4: but I always thought that. I think that's a really
Speaker 4: good name. It's called the Rapid Heartbeat, yout Wich figuring it.
Speaker 4: So we're just going to ask you both the same questions,
Speaker 4: So just keep your answers short and then we'll.
Speaker 2: Finish off there.
Speaker 1: There you go. I'll go first, what brings speaking your joy?
Speaker 5: What brings you joy?
Speaker 3: Dressing up? And then.
Speaker 6: Is making people laugh? That brings me enjoy.
Speaker 5: Being with my family which includes you.
Speaker 4: Yeah, is there one moment in your life that you'd
Speaker 4: like to relive again?
Speaker 6: Wh No, because it's all part of the journey, and
Speaker 6: if it's not been so positive, it's a learning experience.
Speaker 6: And yeah, as we said before, we both are very
Speaker 6: fortunate and very grateful for our families and our liights.
Speaker 5: So yeah, I'd love to rewin the search for a
Speaker 5: Little bus Star and get that trophy and that big
Speaker 5: fudge chocolate basket that I got as a prize.
Speaker 3: Where is that?
Speaker 5: I love it, I hate it?
Speaker 1: Finish the sentence. What the world needs now.
Speaker 6: Is another pride festival.
Speaker 5: Kind of what I said before, to accept each other
Speaker 5: for our differences and be able to live with two
Speaker 5: opposing ideas inside our heads and not combust I think
Speaker 5: that was f Scott Fitzgerald's.
Speaker 2: Ye, last question. One word to describe each other.
Speaker 5: Honest, caring.
Speaker 6: I always say there's like a golden Retrie, because I mean,
Speaker 6: he's got long lash's blonde hair, but he's just like
Speaker 6: so open and caring and like just a big ball
Speaker 6: of love.
Speaker 2: Beautiful. Oh, this is so joyful.
Speaker 4: I love talking to them both, and you, thank you
Speaker 4: so much for your time, Thanks.
Speaker 1: For having skank skank and yeah, fantastic, so good. I
Speaker 1: can't wait to see.
Speaker 3: You guys and we can go.
Speaker 5: Yeah, that's the responsibility of a drag que joyous