'desert' Dancing Queens On The Way
The Age
Tuesday April 24, 2007
DANCING drag queens will hit Melbourne when the homemade musical Priscilla, Queen of the Desert opens in October.
The show, based on the 1994 film about two drag queens and a transsexual travelling across the outback, is filled with disco tunes, including I Will Survive, I Love the Nightlife and Shake Your Groove Thing. It finishes at Sydney's Lyric Theatre on September 9, a month shy of its first birthday. After what is intended to be a six-month run in Melbourne, the show plans to Go West, to London. Producer Garry McQuinn said last week the show was not moving - despite a dispute with Miss Saigon, which was allegedly double-booked for the Star City casino. Yesterday, Mr McQuinn said increasing competition forced the move. "One of the reasons we came to the inevitable decision to move is there's five or six shows opening in the next few months," he said.He declined to name the Melbourne or London theatres being negotiated, but the Regent Theatre is the most likely local venue. With The Phantom of the Opera at the Princess Theatre from July until summer, Monty Python's Spamalot at Her Majesty's from December, and opera and ballet ruling out the State Theatre, only the Collins Street venue would be large enough. Marriner Theatres runs the Regent, and general manager Jason Marriner said he had been pursuing Priscilla for a long time. The Regent seats 2200 people and recently hosted The Lion King.
© 2007 The Age