Meow Meow's Little Mermaid

Meow Meow's Little Mermaid
The Sydney Festival. Magic Mirrors Spiegeltent. 17 – 23 January 2016, Malthouse Theatre, Merlyn Theatre, 28 Jan - 14 Feb 2016 and Perth International Arts Festival, Octagon Theatre UWA, 24 - 28 Feb 2016.

Meow Meow is back at the Sydney Festival with another Spiegeltent sell-out cabaret, this one based on Hans Christian Andersen’s Little Mermaid, but only in name. The mermaid theme does however give her fins to flex, and to soar on trapeze and dive to the depths of imagined worlds, and sometimes dark sentiment. She begins, you see, by mourning her love life.

Buxom and voluptuous, over teased and eye-lashed, Meow is actually quite a catch - especially to us in the audience who pass her swimmingly over our heads.  When she banters with eligible men hauled on stage to be drag-dressed as mermaids, Meow makes this seemingly improvised show look easy.

She is though such a beguiling, lovable creation, even as she snaps at us, and her singing is other-worldly brilliant. Wonderful Life and Megan Washington’s Making Love are poignant standouts. 

Some parts are a little clumsy theatrically, like the meta-theatre introduction of Chris Ryan as a spunky tech in fluros threatening to close down the show. But later as her Boy Neptune love fantasy gone wrong, and as a singer himself, Ryan is a welcome co-star. 

All is inconspicuously directed by Michael Kantor and perfectly backed musically by the busy quintet of The Siren Effect Orchestra.  I remember her two previous Festival shows as having stronger, more calibrated production values, but Meow Meow has the charisma,  the voice and the wit to make magic with any tale.

Martin Portus 

Photographer: Prudence Upton

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