Urenui for Awesome by Penny Ashton
“…oh and I have to ask, one farmer asked if you wanted summer sheets or winter…don’t be shy, give me your honest answer, I won’t judge.”
When this email arrived in my inbox 6 weeks out from my regional tour of the Taranaki Heartland during their Festival of the Arts, my happiness increased exponentially.
As a solo performer/producer/publicist/stage manager/personal stylist/spinster I tend to have to organise everything myself. From Edinburgh to Ekatahuna to Adelaide I am usually the one putting up posters for five hours, the one flyering people who look at me as if I am offering gonorrhoea on a stick, the one haranguing the media to cover someone other than Danny Bhoy, and the one quietly wishing I had done that chemistry degree after all as there’s more waaaaaay more money in meth.
BUT finally someone ELSE was attending to the details right down to fuzzy sheets warming my weary buttocks.
Which was, in short, awesome.
So by the time came for me to pack my bags once again and head to the airport for New Plymouth, I was rather excited. And justifiably so.
My first two shows were in The Salon Perdu Spiegeletent in its first outing to the southern hemisphere. It’s like it’s famous cousin but is more brown inside…. in a good way.
Opening Night rolled around, as they always do, and I was furiously trying to Burlesqueify my hair with my flash new heated rollers to dubious effect. Dita Von Teased would be a better description but I wedged my voluminous assets into my corset, hid the ladders in my fishnets and licked the lipstick off my teeth before hitting the stage.
My show, Hot Pink Bits, all about the history of the Sex Industry, complete with a one eyed sock puppet and audience volunteer stripper, was off to a ripping start when all of a sudden a noise like I had never heard before screamed through the tent. It was as if it had physically kicked me in the butt and my body involuntarily jerked about like a toddler in a mosh pit.
I would imagine a similar sound could be heard if one tried to get between Joan Rivers and botox but actually it was the sound desk having a major tanty after some charming punter has spilt an entire beer into it.
So I had no sound. No CD tracks. No microphone. No hilarious sound effects. No nothing.
BUT as a girl who’s used to doing everything herself I just soldiered on. If I can perform to 6 people in basically a large Port-a-loo in the Pleasance Venue in Edinburgh, then I can deal with this. If I can do half my show in torchlight in the Saskatoon School Gym then I can deal with this. Well that’s what I hoped anyways
BUT happily Hot Pink Bits Unplugged was the result and seemed to go rather well.
After my two nights in the Big Brown Tent I then headed out into the regions to perform in places with such fabulous names as Rawhitiroa, TeRata and my favourite Urenui, as it means Big Penis in Maori. (There was however no statue, like Ohakune’s big carrot, to commemorate this honour.)
I was performing in communities that consisted only of a hall but still 180 people would materialise from the bush bearing plates and plates of sausage rolls, club sandwiches, good old Kiwi Onion Dip… and the odd crate or two.
Then they would then sit and rowdily listen to me talk about the history of prostitution, pornography and B&D and sing a few ditties. In Kakaramea we were performing in a hall that was 100 years old and had graffiti on the walls in chalk dating back to the 30’s. It also had the charming words; “Patea Boys are W**kers.” I asked if this was still true but as no one was there from Patea, I can only assume it is.
I stayed with Farming Couples on numerous occasions and was stuffed full of so many roasted animals I could hardly lace up my assets. Also every dessert in the country contains apples curiously enough and I felt far too polite to refuse any of it.
On the final night in incredibly remote Makahu, it was as if the residents had been sucking back food colouring and sugar and Ritalin before I got there and were a crazy crowd. One man, convinced I was going to drag him onstage to strip, even showed me the frilled underpants he had worn.
I also met a woman who decided she would definitely marry her brand new husband of 60 yrs old specifically because he was a pig farmer. Which made me wonder if it was time I reassessed my criteria.
What I’m trying to say is as much as I loved performing to a packed Spiegeltent I will never forget that special roar of laughter that comes when you bounce up and down on the knee of a man in a town where all 180 people in the venue are somehow related to him and everyone is high on sausage fat.
So people flag Edinburgh, forget Adelaide and ignore Auckland. Head to Urenui where all you need is flannelette, stewed apples and a really big member.
Ka pai.
- Make mine a Mince Pie Please