Bernadette Robinson's White House Songfest

Bernadette Robinson's White House Songfest

Bernadette Robinson speaks to David Spicer about her latest one-woman songfest drama Pennsylvania Avenue, this time set in the White House, which is touring Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane.

In Songs for Nobodies Bernadette Robinson channeled five singers and the impact they had on complete strangers. Audiences were stunned at the authenticity of her impersonations that ranged from Maria Callas to Judy Garland.

Now Joanna Murray-Smith has penned a new drama for her, featuring even more voices including Barbra Streisand, Sarah Vaughan and Diana Ross.

“It’s all about a character named Harper Clementsfrom Thunderbolt Dodger. She has a big journey to work in the White House when she is 18. She is trying to escape a dim dark secret.

“She started as a Baptist girl who wore a dress below her knees. She was a good girl. She had soft little dreams. When she goes to the White House she starts seeing all sorts of things.

“The play starts 40 years later when she is packing up to leave.

“She reminisces of her whole time spent in the White House, the Presidents she has worked under and the various singers that have come in and out their life.

“She started as the assistant to the assistant to the assistant….

“By chance she runs run into JFK one night. Through that he remembers her and gets her a small promotion leading her into the entertainment department.

“It starts off with Marilyn Monroe and her breathy voice and finishes with  Aretha Franklin performing for the Clintons.”

Bernadette admits keeping a one-woman show going is ‘very challenging’.

Joanna Murray-Smith “stretches me a lot”. Bernadette laughs when I ask her if she has an understudy.

Her writing “is quite poetic in parts but also very funny. She creates different characters with many different accents. She has lovely turns of phrase. I find her writing moving. After (I have performed it a number of times) I say now I know what you mean by that. It is quite layered.”

The play is set in the Blue Room of the White House. Pictures of Presidents and events of the time are flashed onto the walls.

“She gets to see the protests against the Vietnam War.

“I get to sing Sarah Vaughan (jazz singer) and they find her crying in the dressing room. She says she is so happy, as when she first came to Washington she couldn’t even get a motel room.”

Another favorite moment for her is the reference in the play to the Clintons’ marriage problems. It’s a prompt for her to sing ‘Stand By Your Man’.

Audiences are expected to be standing by this play for an extended run.

Pennsylvania Avenue plays at Arts Centre Melbourne from Jan 21 to Feb 14, Cremorne Theatre, Brisbane from March 3 to 13 and Sydney Opera House from April 28 to May 22.

Photographer: Jeff Busby

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