After only a week of being empty, the Queensland Performing Arts Centre’s Lyric Theatre is now home to the current Australian production of Anything Goes, which will be held for a short but sweet period of just three weeks.
Prior to its Opening Night last Tuesday, I had the fortune of attending a media call for the show. In addition to getting an interview with the show’s director Dean Bryant, I also got to spend a little bit of time speaking with actress Debora Krizak – who is taking on the role of Erma. You can read a transcript of the Q&A style interview below:
First of all, can you share a little about your history in musical theatre?
My very first role was performing in the ensemble of the musical The Producers, which was about eleven years ago. I understudied as the Swedish secretary Ulla. From there I went into Titanic the Musical, Respect the Musical and most recently, I’ll tell you my bigger ones, I was in Sheila in Sheila in A Chorus Line and I’ve just finished playing Nickie and Ursula in Sweet Charity, and I think there was about a week’s break before starting this show in Erma.
Just for people who haven’t seen Anything Goes yet, can you can share a bit about Erma?
My character is essentially written as a Gangster’s mole, so she hangs around with Moonface Martin. They have like a brother/sister relationship, so she’s very glamorous and she’s part of the comic duo. Really, she’s trying to wrangle her way on the ship and get to the other side without being discovered. So she’s up to all sorts of naughty antics with Moonface Martin as a way to disguise the fact that she doesn’t really have a ticket to be on the boat.
Having performed in Melbourne already, how has your experience performing in Anything Goes been so far?
Its been fantastic. We opened in Melbourne to a rapturous Opening Night with fabulous reviews, and now of course being here in Brisbane for three weeks is wonderful. We are loving the weather and are looking forward to tonight. Then we will be in my home town of Sydney at the Opera House. Its been six months but it has been a whirlwind and just a feel-good great show.
I have to ask, how did you handle the Melbourne weather wearing that?
Well, luckily the lights on stage are very bright and very warm. But I didn’t really handle the Melbourne weather, I walked from my apartment to the theatre every day in about three jackets, three scarfs, two beanies. In fact, when I walked out the stage door no one recognised me or knew I was even in this show, because I was that covered by layers of clothing.
Why do you think Anything Goes has managed to stand the test of time?
Because its one of those – I don’t like to call it old school musicals because we always put a bit of a modern touch on everything we do nowadays – but it features the music of Cole Porter. There’s no swear words in it, its a family friendly musical and its suitable for everybody. And if you want to have a good time, it features wonderful tap routines and it’s something we haven’t seen in musicals for a very long time. And its bright, the music is great, and the looks on peoples faces at the end of Act 1 after the title number “Anything Goes” really just sums the whole thing up and why we do what we do. People walk away very happy, and its a funny, feel-good musical.
With Anything Goes having already gone through a couple of preview runs in Queensland, what has the response from Queenslanders been like so far?
Previews can go one of two ways. They can either be a very enthusiastic audience or they can be a little quiet and not knowing to expect. We’ve have had three, and they have all been fantastic. Saturday night was particularly great. We had a very raucous crowd on Saturday night, and very enthusiastic in wanting to clap and giving standing ovations. So, I think if that’s anything to go by, then tonight’s opening and the rest of the season will be really, really great.
What advice do you have for those looking to get into musical theatre?
Well, I’ve been around for a while now and done a lot of shows. So my advice is quite different in that every show I learned something new, and you might learn something new about the industry or yourself or a performance skill. But I think the advice would be to keep doing your classes, but also have a plan that works around wanting to just be on stage. So get to know how the lights work, do your degree in speech therapy or do your degree in vocal therapy – whatever it is, keep yourself and your brain active – so you encompass all those areas. So its a little bit easier dealing with the knock backs when you do have something else to fall back on.
Are you excited about the next few weeks in Queensland?
I am. Brisbane is my favourite city in Australia, and I love it, I love where we are staying, I love the theatre. And so its three weeks, and its just enough time to really get in there and experience the best of what Brisbane has to offer – even though we are doing eight shows a week. I am really excited. as like I said, it is one of my favourite cities, so I am always happy to come back to Brissie and look forward to seeing a few familiar faces at the opening night shindig tonight.
Thank you very much for your time!
Special Thanks
I would just like to pass on my thanks to Debora Krizak for taking the time out of her busy schedule on opening day to speak with me about Anything Goes.
I would also like to thank the marketing/publicity teams at QPAC and IP Publicity for helping organise this Q&A interview.
To See Anything Goes @ QPAC
Anything Goes is set to run at the Queensland Performing Arts Centre from now until August 16 2015. Tickets are still available for purchase, and are priced between $69.90 and $129.90, dependent on session, seat and concession status. Tickets can be purchased from QPAC.
