Feast Festival. Nexus Cabaret. 16 Nov 2014
Bling go the strings of my heart.
It's Willsy, bedazzling in the ultimate be-spangled garb, the human mirror ball of Feast Festival 2014.
Anne Wills is out of retirement and, with Peter Goers as director, host and compere, she has emerged as the new queen of the gay night. She's had so many husbands, she's settled for gay men as the companionship of a sensible life, she declares. And she has claimed Goers as father of the grown child of her senior years, the divine Matt Gilbertson.
Matt is a gay icon at one end of the Adelaide spectrum and Willsy at the other. With the wit and wisdom of Goers, radio icon of the Naughties, this show is the almost too hot to handle. But wait, there's more. Sister Susan sparkles out to trill as the girls did in Vietnam and then, none other than Mark Trevorrow, Bob Down's alter ego, who left Mr Kitsch at home to do a showman's tribute to Willsy. Consummate performer that he is. And the show's nothing less than an icon overdose.
The hour opens with a comfortable interview routine, Goers prompting Willsy to tell stories of her career. Goers warns that Willsy is a funny girl and Willsy confirms it with a torrent of self-derogatory tales of weather girl experiences in the wild old days of nascent TV not to mention adventures with assorted superstars - Michael Parkinson and William Shatner most famously among them.
Willsy makes her own costumes, which explains the uber-bling and she wears shimmering follow-me-home shoes which, she says, are sitting shoes, absolutely not meant for walking. She has them off before the show is over.
The audience is in seventh heaven. They're mainly Boomers, just like Willsy. Love is in the air.
Then the faux love child swans out. The vastly tall and utterly adorable Matt Gilbertson has left his fish-netted performance persona, Hans the German, on some cabaret catwalk to be the other Matt, the talented pianist. He sings as he accompanies, duets of love with his ersatz stage mum.
Lightning on-stage costume change. A Feast show needs feathers. Willsy flutters coquettishly in a sparkling fluffy confection of a coat and is joined by sister Susan, who emerges in twin garb and flouting a scrap of material which was what passed for a frock back in the mini-dress 60s. The audience is right there on the nostalgia ride. The sisters, looking more and more like their late mum, Queenie, sing a couple of sentimental songs to show they still have the 70s "it".
Mark Trevorrow bounds forth as the climactic act. Willsy, of latter years, has done guest spots on his Bob Down stage shows and he's reciprocating. He's got all the moves. He's stand-out showbiz - capping a fantastic cast. They partner expertly
At show's end, Goers has morphed into Barry Humphries mode, funny and long-suffering amid a song-and-dance grand finale lineup of ebullient good spirit. Retro reigns in all its glory - and then Gilbertson twerks Goers.
Samela Harris
When: 16 and 19 Nov
Where: Nexus Cabaret
Bookings: feast.org.au
