zara cortelle
MUM’S IN (Kings Cross Hotel season)
On arriving at the recently re-furbished Kings Cross Hotel and
getting to the elevators on the ground floor, one is greeted by two of
Mum’s hatted pimps who escort you up to level 5, where another capped
crony check’s you out, gives you a red symbol of a razor gash on the
palm of your hand as the ID for entry, and advises that if one wants a
drink while waiting, “Get it”, over there at the bar. When the hoodlum
cockatoo’s make it is clear that Mum is in, us customers are escorted by
her handsome heavies, via some back stairs, to a small but
atmospherically decorated cabaret room. It feels good.
Some of us have come dressed in ‘period’ clothing, it adds to the
expectancy, and we are seated around tables close to a small platform
stage on a mixture of chair types of varying comfortability. We order
our drink or drinks – a menu and pencil supplied to accommodate the grog
of our choice to be in ready supply. Ross Johnston, the composer and
piano player for the show is stationed by his instrument and The
Director, James Winter, doubling as technician, sits stooled by the
lighting dimmers.
A woman in a simple contemporary black, figure- close dress in
ordinary flat shoes walks from a curtained side-room and stands centre
on the red curtained draped platform. This is Vashti Hughes. I recognise
her from past encounters (SIX QUICK CHICKS). But it is Ms Hughes only
momentarily, for once the lights are dimmed and stage focused, a totally
possessed virago of creative energy transforms without any other
theatrical assistance, in front of your eyes, into the impersonation of
character and narrative of five notorious and uncompromising villains,
breathlessly.
Described in the programme as a “one-woman performance piece lifts
the veil on the Razor Gang era in Sydney during the 1930′s, where sly
grog, prostitution, cocaine and extortion were the commodities of the
East Sydney underground… this dark comedy cabaret features the notorious
gangster characters of Kate Leigh, Tilly Devine, Frank Green, Nellie
Cameron and Guido Calletti”.
The recent television series UNDERBELLY RAZOR, based on Larry
Writer’s 2001 book, RAZOR, has brought these characters to us on the
little screen, but not in the, frankly frighteningly realistic mode of
Ms Hughes. Ms Hughes grabs your attention and takes hold of your collar
and shakes and shakes you, glaring at you with psychopathic wide eyes
and never lets go, with even the blink of an eye to release the tension.
This performance by Vashti Hughes is what I believe all good acting
is: “Possession”. There is no let off for the audience, one is simply in
the presence of these five ruthless people, fuelled dangerously by
cocaine and alcohol, wide eyed with the dare for you not to look. They
all, including the deceased Mr Calletti, reminisce and dream. This is a
spectacular performance by Ms Hughes. I have seen her work before but
this is IT. Something really special. There is a creative identification
with this material by this artist, that thrills at the madness of the
characters and all their ugliness and energy for destruction.
This work is also written by Ms Hughes and there is the veracity of
raw street language and sexual abreactions that are not for the timid to
witness. Prudes stay away from MUM’S place. Best you find she is not
in. Full on. Full throttled. Not even the salacious, prurient producers,
writers of the television series have gone to this level of realism.
With no costume or make up changes Ms Hughes embodies all of these
people that the photographs of the period reveal. No commercial art
direction here, just deeply imagined worlds, by Ms Hughes, that permits
us to endow transformations to occur in front of our very eyes.
There are some songs with chorus for all of us to join in on. There
are jokes and there are good stories and insight to these souls of
another era. There is a bar service. There is a police ‘raid’ and one is
hustled by Mum’s pimps to the back stairs once again and bundled out of
Mum’s place.
Just how much has changed to the human experience, and the character
of the environment of Kings Cross, one may ask as you step out onto the
Kings Cross Streets, and avoid the glare of some of the passing parade
of the people traffic about you. You might grab a cab or you might be
thrilled to find out more….
Well worth catching. A Dark Comedy Cabaret of a completely unexpected kind.
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