In the history of comedy and entertainment there has never been a character quite like her. There can be no imitators for she is truly unique; a cultural and comedic phenomenon. Armed with a crooked, wide-lipped smile, bejewelled gowns, an acid tongue and the most iconic pair of glasses in the world she has been dishing out her goodly brand of housewife wisdom for over fifty years to an adoring audience. She has been granted audience with some of the biggest stars in the world, cites herself as a friend and confidante to the Queen and now has her own line of make-up. And as this hapless journalist was about to find she can also inject a certain spookiness into a routine interview.
If legend is to be believed then Dame Edna Everage was born some unknown number of decades ago in the New South Wales city of Wagga Wagga. Details of her early life are sketchy to say the least, though the scraps of information she peppers her interviews with from her formative years paint a picture of a young starlet budding amongst the weeds of her home town co-inhabitants. Her entertainment career got under way in 1955 when she hit the stage as Mrs. Norm Everage, a housewife from the Melbourne suburb of Moonee Ponds. Soon after she was discovered by budding impresario (and failed comedian as she is quick to point out) Barry Humphries; before long history books were being rewritten to include a Dame Edna chapter. In the past half a century she has become not just a national treasure, but an international one. Her catch phrases long ago entered the lexicon of popular culture, she has become a synonymous symbol of Australia – like Olivia Newton-John, Kylie Minogue and Nicole Kidman one of the iconic Aussie females, and she is one of the few comics who have maintained their exacting level of hilarity throughout a long an illustrious career.
When Dame Edna Everage's voice reaches out from San Francisco, down the phone line to my home in Camden, London I immediately feel like I am chatting to an old and trusted friend. After extending a gracious greeting towards all of New Zealand and in particular to our own stalwart of entertainment, Max Cryer, she informs me she once lived around Camden and we share a moment rattling off street names and familiar eateries. Scant minutes into our conversation Dame Edna leaves me near speechless for the first of many times by picking me for a Pisces. Somewhat incredulously I confirm her suspicion and put it down to some kind of trans-Atlantic cosmic connection. Moments later when we are talking about Auckland city she tells me one of her favourite restaurants is Satya on Karangahape Road, which she holds a soft spot for due to being vegetarian. She has me again, and I am compelled to confess that as a kindred vegetarian it also happens to be one of my favoured eating spots. Wary of our precious time I steer the focus of conversation towards my intuitive interviewee and ask if divine intervention played a role in her rise to fame and fortune.
“Yes I felt that there was something watching over me,” replies the self confessed mega star. “I used to love putting on make-up and dresses. My parents were not well off and I was brought up in a suburb of Melbourne that was a working class suburb, Moonee Ponds. It's become a bit fashionable now, a bit like Ponsonby has but there was a time when it wasn't. I was really a little bit of a star when I was young and I was often in the church plays. We did a passion play one Easter and I played Mary Magdalene. There came the moment when I had to wash the feet of our Lord and he was played by a young Vicar. I remember him, the reverend Tony Morfitt. I had to use frankincense and myrrh and things but you couldn't get them at the chemist so I used Vicks Vaborub and I applied them to his feet. Then I had to dry them with my hair and I can still remember trying to get the stickiness out of my hair. Come to think of it I think there were many girls from Moonee Ponds in my position before.”
The great Dame has come a long way from those fledgling brushes with higher sources. From her early stage performances in Australia and having the distinction of being one of the first people interviewed on Australian television she headed to England in the early 1960's to make her presence known. Fellow comedian Peter Cook had her perform at his West London club and it is him that she credits with helping to launch her international career. Before long the exalted Edna was headlining her own shows and making appearances in movies, though her career focus came at the cost of her home life with her husband Norm and four children all left to their own devices in Australia. She has appeared philosophical about her choice when quizzed on the matter in the past: “My aged mother was going berserk, my daughter had been arrested with a frozen chicken concealed in her gusset and my husband had experienced another spectacular urological episode. And so I made a very important decision - to put my family last.”
Husband Norm's condition worsened over the years, from an increasingly worrisome walnut sized throb to a fatal prostate complication, while the children simply seemed to fade into the background.
As we continue to amble through the many memories of a life of stardom, the great mauve-topped jewel of the Antipodes shares another turning point in her already illustrious life.
“Ten years ago I was in a shop in New York. A department store called Neiman Marcus and I saw a product called M.A.C. It was just in its infancy then but I tried a little bit. And you know how we were talking about supernatural intervention, I heard my skin say 'thank you'. I no sooner had applied it than I got a Broadway contract, a Tony award. Then I got a major role in the series Ally McBeal. Then I became a regular guest on Jay Leno's Late Show. One thing followed another. I am now touring the United States with a new show, I'm in San Francisco at the moment playing full houses for six weeks. Then I go to Palm Springs, then I visit Australia really just to weed my husband's grave and it's all because of that first little touch of make-up. I don't wear much because I don't need to. I think women should let their natural beauty shine through, and all women are beautiful.”
A consummate professional, Edna has no trouble in steering the conversation around to her latest venture; her own line of cosmetics for M.A.C. With the vast majority of celebrities lending their names, faces and bodies to any number of products it was only ever going to be a matter of time before someone snapped up the iconic personality that is Dame Edna Everage. With names that reflect her own tastes it at first seems hard to imagine just who the Kanga Rouge or Possum Nose Pink lippies are aimed at, but then it dawns that like the ageless Dame the products are for anyone with a sense of glamour. For a woman who once used the inventive beauty technique of strapping sardines to her face I wonder what advice she has for young women just beginning to wear make-up.
“I would say try to look as natural as possible but enhance your beauty. I've got some lovely new colours in my range. I've been working on a New Zealand line using an enzyme from an insect called the weta. And people who are stung by wetas, something happens to their skin. So we have to try and narrow that down, we're still working on it. The wee wetas are in laboratories as we speak being milked.”
Of her endorsing other products Edna tells me she has been approached by various fashion houses but they seem to show reluctance, fearing that she will charge exorbitant rates. Setting the record straight (whether for me or the labels in question, I'm not sure) she confides that she doesn't ask or need a lot of money because she gives it all to charity. That charity is Friends Of The Prostate (which I am informed is based at Walnut House headquarters) and it educates people about the prostate, both its location and appearance.
Dame Edna's own appearance is effortlessly faultless; her hair (naturally lilac in colour) always freshly coiffed, her gowns of the most dazzling quality, her face picture perfect. When I inquire about her daily routine she informs me it is nothing more than a shower followed by a towelling down and some Watties asparagus on toast. When I dare to ask if she is one of the types of people who experience a potent whiff to their water after eating the stalky green she levels me with the charge of being a urine sniffer.
At this point during our chat Dame Edna once again turns the tables and asks me about my own endeavours, more specifically a concept band I am affiliated with called the Soldiers of Toast. It is now I realise that being an accomplished interviewer herself, I am not the only one who has done my research for this interview. As the Dame starts reeling off questions about my personal life, its events, and nicknames that allude to certain sexual manoeuvres I begin to wonder if there has been a breach of security amongst my friends, for even with dogged browsing none of these details are available to the general public on line. But then such is the influence and reach of the feted Dame it doesn't surprise me that the tendrils of her intelligence extend into other people's lives.
It is perhaps a trick acquired with age rather than cunning and with that in mind I veer towards the subject of accumulating experience and ask what treasure's it holds.
“Well I saw a Doctor the other day and he told me I was growing older and that it was natural. The thing is that I'm still at the height of my powers and I still have my drives - and my juices according to my gynaecologist. It may interest you to know that while I've been talking to you I've been having an exploratory.”
“Are you in the stirrups,” I venture.
“No I don't need them myself,” she informs.
With a history of frequent sexual gaffes and innuendo on her many shows I ponder for a moment as to the sex symbol status that befalls so many international stars and that would logically also harbour the mega talented one.
“No, I've never had any sex appeal, I don't cultivate it,” demurs a rarely modest Dame. “Since the death of my husband I've never committed an act of immodesty. I've always felt, unlike you, that it is overrated as an activity and it causes trouble. But I'm very pleased to be adored, to be alluring, arousing even.”
Contrary to her admission the Dame informs me that her message light is beeping, most likely a whispered endearment from George Clooney. Taking my cue to wrap things up I attempt the impossible by trying to extract information on Dame Edna's age, telling her that there are legions of fans who want to lay themselves down and worship at her altar.
“Well, I can tell you that my birthday is on the 17th of February and I'll be in Australia so you can send anything you like to dame Edna care of Australia. It will find me.”
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