Sly Me To The Moon

Well, there you have- I have at long last broken my Sly Fox peformance virginity! Not that many people where there to witness it, as for some reason most of my friends piked at the last minute and most of the usual faces I see week after week were absent. Big big big thanks to those who were there and cheering (you know who you are- Scrag, Ali, Wife, the USyd queer crew, MimInBoots, Lee, Schmingi...not sure if my secret initialled admirer was there after all the comments, but if so zie did not make zirself known and thus the mystery continues). Still, not having a front row full of my nearest and dearest was not such a bad thing in that it felt more like a 'real' show, in that I was having to play to an audience who didn't know me or my work or my humour and couldn't rely on those friendly faces to get me through.

Think both shows worked quite well, in different ways. The first one was to The Cramps' 'Garbageman'. Came onstage in boots and socks, boxer shorts TCM gave me yonks ago, taped-up nipples (though apparently the tape was uneccessary) and a yellow hanky around my neck. Picked up two full garbagebags, swaggered about with them, ripped the first one open and emptied a selection of items onto the floor. Sorted through the junk, putting on a variety of things- tshirt with 'trash bag' scrawled on it in yellow and white paint, leather skirt with yellow spraypaint dripped down it, frangipani lei. Sniffed a 'dirty' adult nappy and threw it into the audience, stuffed newspaper down my boxers, ate a banana, stuck a beanie on my head (and possibly my blonde wig?), fooled around with a rubber chicken and generally just got dirty and silly. Stuck a 'bloody' tampon in my mouth and then spat it into the crowd. Bit into a couple of condoms full of milk and water. Ripped open second bag, dragged out Mechtild the lactating love doll (well, not currently lactating) and a bottle of chocolate sauce, tipped the sauce over myself and rolled around with Mechtild and then can't really remember how it all ended other than I was very messy and sticky and the stage apparently took a while to clean up!

Second show was considerably darker, using the Birthday Party song 'She's Hit'.

There is woman - pie in here
Mr. evangelist says she's hit
The best cook ya ever had
Ya can't blame the good woman now, Dad

Walked slowly through the crowd in boots, long white nightgown with red ribbons at my waist, black wig in red and blue curlers and a blue headscarf, red lippy/blue eyliner/pink rouge and carrying a foil-wrapped cake tin full of cherry jelly. Stage was set with a high table, on which was placed a chopping board, a knife, couple of spoons, measuring jug full of more red jelly, a bowl of apples and strawberries and a pair of boxing gloves. Came onto stage, placed cake tin on table.

Uptown one hundred skirts are bleeding
And Mr. Evangelist says
She's hit ev'ry little bit
She's hit she's hit

Started cutting up apples and strawberries, chewing them and spitting them into the cake tine, poured jelly into mouth, chewed and spat that into tin too. Offered it to the audience, put back on table. Took ribbons from my waist, wrapped my hands in them. Put on gloves, dipped them into the 'pie' and punched myself in the face, breast, crotch. Fell on floor, crawled about a bit, stumbled slowly back through audience to the dressing room. Didn't work as well as I had hoped, few issues with the way the stage was set (my doing-stage manager was perfect) and the timing, but still not too bad and a few of the stranger 'artier' folk seemed to appreciate it. Was pleased that I managed to stay in character for the duration, didn't start to giggle or make too much eye contact with crowd- was wanting to be more of a vacant housewife who was almost numb. Liked the show overall, and think I may develop it for a future Hellfire piece (or othere vent). Needs a bit of work but I believe it could be truly stunning. Overall, not a bad night.

And that was just the beginning. My friend Mistress O'Mayhem, aka Scrag, was in attendance, and it was the first time I had seen her since she returned last week from a six month jaunt overseas. Needless to say, we had MUCH catching up to do, which we achieved by consuming all of my free drinks and then some, dancing with total abandon, little rhythm and a lot of lewdness, eating large amounts of chocolate, attempting to do a pissing photo shoot in an alleyway (camera flash wouldn't work though- boo! hiss!), drinking peach schnapps (?) and tea with her loud and lively musician neighbours, then stumbling to her room to skankify her sheets and wake up her housemates. Eventually we slept for a while, then scoffed a bacon and eggs and mushrooms and tomato fry-up for brunch, downed two cups of coffee, and spent most of the arvo showering, lying around, having more Hitachi joy and more chocolate and generally being lushy libertines. Welcome back Scrag- you have been sorely missed!