An Interview with Christine Basil
Great Title, but what is it? I hear you ask? I wondered the same thing and when I read that it was a show with 3 hugely talented acts I became very excited. Jeremy Lion is a character act performed by Justin Edwards, who does sketches and sings songs as a drunken children’s entertainer. He’s the only performer I haven’t seen, but comes from the UK with a great reputation including Perrier award nominations to his credit and recently winning the Chortle Award for best Sketch, Character or Variety Act” (beating our own Tim Minchin who was nominated). The brilliantly caustic witted Christine Basil is the Australian performer of the group who most of us should know well, having performed on TV and around town dropping many jaws for years. Finally, very much out of the closet are Topping and Butch who sing politically satirical songs while wearing lots of shiny red PVC and are a sort of cross between Julian Clary and Noel Coward. I saw them one late night in Edinburgh and they had me in stitches. I was particularly impressed at how topical some of their lyrics were, referring to news from that very day.
I was rapt when Christine Basil was kind enough to have a chat with me recently. I asked her whether she was familiar with her co-stars in “The Lion The Bitch and The Closet” – “No idea, but I like that. They sounded a little bit left field, so straight away I was interested.” She’s looking forward to being in a show at the Festival where someone else does all the organizing and she just has to turn up and perform. I asked her if she’d ever put on her own show at the festival ” I’ve written one, but never done it. I admire people who do, its sitting there…one day…But I like what I’m doing now.” Christine is planning to bring a lot about her big extended family into this show. I’ve often wondered if it was difficult for Christine to bring up her own family while working on her stand-up career and she heartily disagrees “No, I think its given me something else, cause we all kinda need something. I’m glad I stayed at home to raise kids, cause that was great and I wandered into this ‘cause I saw some tryouts at Le Joke and I thought I’ll write 5 minutes and give it to someone else to do (I think I was pregnant at the time!). Then I thought Nuh! They might not do it how I want to say it… and it became a hobby for me, that turned into a (well obsession might be a good word!), but it became a job and I love it! It’s the best job in the world. It’s a wage for me now, which is always a bonus and still is. How many people get to do what they like? No peak hour traffic, I can smoke, its everything I need! And travel, I got a phone call asking if I’d like to do a couple of gigs in London – Would I like to? – ‘No I haven’t finished the ironing, let me think?’ That was a great opportunity. Comedy’s good for that, I’ve seen all of Australia doing gigs, while my husband had to do it with his parents in a hot car!” I thought Christine might be disappointed that her photo wasn’t in the curious ad for the show on the Festival poster that came in The Age, “No, I get to be that sexy girl silhouette off truck mud guards – How Cool is That!!!”
Go and see The Lion, The Bitch and The Closet They are having some cheap pre Festival previews on April 7th, 8th and 9th and are otherwise on from Wed 12th of April at the Athenaeum Theatre.