EastEnd Cabaret on costumes, characters and Yeti’s Demon Dive Dive Bar

The two members of EastEnd Cabaret, Jennifer Byrne & Vicky Falconer-Pritchard, are currently in Australia performing their show Yeti’s Demon Dive Bar – a musical sketch show which delves into the lives of characters enjoying themselves within a bar set-up on stage.

“We did three sort of work-in-progress shows back in London at Soho Theatre, but Australia is the official debut of Yeti… we’ve been coming to Adelaide for the four years with EastEnd Cabaret, we’ve had such an amazing support and following,” says Vicky

Us audiences down here hold a nice little place in their hearts, as we are the first to see many of their productions that they tour around the world, including their previous work Perverts, which the duo decided to perform for a second time as part of the 2016 Adelaide Fringe. Vicky adds that as well as performing the newly written Yeti that “we should end with a bang with a bit of fun and debauched late night evenings.”

In many ways that is what the duo is all about. “Debauchery is our thing,” Jennifer pronounces over the phone. “The idea of how this came out of a drunken evening which the three of us including (producer) Tom Velvick were drinking and we thought it might be hilarious to set the new show in a bar run by a Yeti.”

Yeti is the latest in a string of productions that two performers try to make stand out within the comedy festival programs of this year. And when we talk about standing out, we mean a type of ‘what wacky-idea-can-we-come-up-next-with’ type of standing out. Jennifer reflects, “somehow we came to the idea that mops look kind of Yeti-ish but they are also quite cheap and readily available… obviously mops are quite useful in the bar too, so it’s there for practical reasons.”

And how does one exactly go about putting mop heads on their own person? With the help of family of course: “Jen sewed one for herself, and the other one was sewn by our director’s Mum in Yorkshire! It was a very specialised project for her” Vicky explains

The duo is not afraid to wear whatever it takes to bring out whatever characters that are in their heads. As well as said Yeti, ‘demonic divas’ and ‘half-werewolves’ were conjured up to feature within this world. The costume changes “We go all over the place for costumes. It depends on the thing that we are looking for. It’s not like that we have a high concept for each character. [They have] their own set of specific costumes though. The quick changes are ridiculous. What we are doing is just throwing the stuff over the top of the leotard.”

Even though the duo finds the costume changes (plus characters) ridiculous, Jennifer finds the audience are more often than note willing to accept them and give them as performers the best chance to be comfortable on stage “When you make time to be in their company, you make these ridiculous characters normal really. That’s the beauty of it, because comedy has to come from a place people can relate to.” Jennifer says.

“As ridiculous as everything that we’re doing is, I think because they can see it’s just Jen & Vic – two best friends picking about on stage making each other laugh and making the audience laugh – it makes the ridiculous seem really normal.”

EastEnd Cabaret is currently on show at Adelaide Fringe until 13 March. They perform Yeti’s Demon Dive Dive Bar every day except Mondays in the Deluxe Spiegeltent in the Garden of Unearthly Delights. Tickets for that show here. They will then move to perform at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival at Roxanne Two on 2 Coverlid Place. Tickets to those shows here.

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