Dame Edna Everage
Dame Edna Everage, often known simply as Dame Edna, is a character created and portrayed by Australian comedian Barry Humphries, known for her lilac-coloured hair and cat eye glasses ; her favourite flower, the gladiolus ; and her boisterous greeting "Hello, Possums!" As Dame Edna, Humphries wrote several books, including an autobiography, My Gorgeous Life; appeared in several films; and hosted several television shows.
Humphries regularly updated Edna. Starting as a drab Melbourne housewife satirising Australian suburbia, the character adopted an increasingly outlandish wardrobe after performances in London in the 1960s, through which she grew in stature and popularity.
Edna was known for her outlandish spectacles. Humphries claimed the eyeglasses, and other aspects of Edna's personality, were inspired by Stephanie Deste, a Melbourne eccentric, beautician, radio broadcaster, actor and dancer.
Following film appearances and an elevation to damehood in the 1970s, the character evolved to "Housewife and Superstar", then "Megastar" and finally "Gigastar". Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, Dame Edna became increasingly known in North America after multiple stage and television appearances.
Edna described her chat-shows as "an intimate conversation between two friends, one of whom is a lot more interesting than the other". The character was used to satirise the cult of celebrity, class snobbery, and prudishness and was often used by Humphries to poke fun at the political leaders and fashions of the times. Her exuberant persona and scathing commentary on society and celebrity, as well as her habit of treating celebrities like ordinary people and ordinary people like celebrities have become signatures.
Although Humphries freely stated that Edna was a character he played, Edna referred to Humphries as her "entrepreneur" or manager. Humphries and his staff of assistants and writers only referred to Edna as "she" and "her", never mixing the character with Humphries.
In March 2012, Humphries announced that the character would be retired at the end of the current stage tour, but later in 2013 he decided to bring her back. Humphries died in April 2023, having played Edna for almost 68 years.
Character story
While Dame Edna was a fictitious character, so complete is her identity as an individual that Macmillan published My Gorgeous Life, Edna's "autobiography", on its non-fiction list. Humphries also wrote an "Unauthorised Biography" of his life as Edna's manager: Handling Edna, published in 2010.According to My Gorgeous Life, and statements Edna made over the years, she was born Edna May Beazley in Wagga Wagga, New South Wales, with a sibling who would give birth to Barry McKenzie. Everage started her stage career in a sketch entitled "Olympic Hostess" in the revue Return Fare on 19 December 1955 as Mrs. Norm Everage, an "average Australian housewife" from Moonee Ponds, a suburb in Melbourne, Victoria. The character gradually evolved over the course of decades from being a typical suburban housewife into being an Australian showbiz personality, who became increasingly festooned with honours and established herself as part of the social elite. She spent her time visiting world leaders and jet-setting between her homes in Los Angeles, London, Sydney, Switzerland and Martha's Vineyard. She was a friend and confidante of Queen Elizabeth II and advised prime ministers and presidents. Edna once took an on-air phone call from President Ronald Reagan to assure him that he was, indeed, still the president; and at stageshows she claimed to be giving former Australian Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, elocution lessons.
The character had three adult children, Bruce, Kenny, and Valmai. Her first daughter, Lois, when still an infant, went missing and was believed to have been abducted by a "rogue koala" during a family camp in the outback, à la Azaria Chamberlain. In Handling Edna, the Unauthorised Biography, Humphries absolves the koala of any role in the affair and reveals the true fate of Lois, who in fact survived abduction to become a Catholic nun. Edna's surviving daughter, Valmai, assisted Dame Edna on her most recent programmes for ITV1, including The Dame Edna Treatment and assisted on her live tour shows. Edna takes great pride in her two sons: Bruce, who works as an engineer in South Melbourne and is married to Joylene from Ivanhoe, and her youngest, Kenneth, who is a fashion designer in London and the designer of all her frocks. Dame Edna refers often to him and his partner, Clifford Smale, both of whom Edna believes are searching for "Miss Right", although she admits they are looking "in some very strange places". Kenny appeared in Sir Les Patterson's documentary Les Patterson and the Great Chinese Takeaway as a boutique owner in Hong Kong.
Dame Edna's mother was incarcerated in a "maximum-security twilight home for the permanently bewildered". Valmai and Kenny are the only family members who appeared on stage or screen with their mother. Her husband, Sir Norman Everage, died in 1988 after many years in hospital with prostate problems and a "testicular murmur"; Edna founded the non-profit "Friends of the Prostate" in his honour. Dame Edna was not with Norm when he died. And due to his insistence that all his organs be donated, by the time she reached his bedside, Norm had been "globally recycled" and all that remained was "a dent in the pillow". As a result, Dame Edna almost believed that Norm's cremation was a "waste of money".
In the 21st century, Edna demonstrated her social conscience and sensitivity, telling audiences of her intention to adopt an African child from "the country where Madonna shops for her loved ones".
Dame Edna spent many years accompanied by her bridesmaid and constant companion Madge Allsop, a New Zealander from Palmerston North who assisted Dame Edna with her appearances and television shows.. Madge never spoke a public word, and while she was often the butt of Dame Edna's jokes, the two were devoted. In Handling Edna, the Unauthorised Biography, Humphries gives Madge a voice and explains the sad loss of her own husband in New Zealand's boiling mud, whilst the couple were on their honeymoon. When Dame Edna appeared on BBC Radio 4's Desert Island Discs in July 1988, she was permitted to take Madge Allsop to the desert island as her luxury, assuring Sue Lawley that Allsop was an "inanimate object".
On some of her shows Dame Edna was joined on stage by 'Chuck' where he would be mildly humiliated and mistreated.
Dame Edna was praised for her insights into her homeland. When asked why Australians are so good at sport she commented: "the climate, the diet, the outdoor life, and the total lack of any intellectual distraction".
Dame Edna launched a campaign to be appointed as a BBC newsreader in 2009 after the corporation announced it wished to seek a female newsreader over 50 years old.
Dame Edna claimed to have various medical conditions, such as Asperger syndrome, bipolar disorder, gluten intolerance, restless legs and attention deficit disorder.
In 2016, after Humphries made comments that were criticised as transphobic, Dame Edna's official social media accounts made a post in which she distanced herself from the comments, stating that she had fired him years earlier but that he "refuses to accept dismissal" and opining that he "is losing the plot" and "deserves our pity not our disapproval". In the same message, she also claimed partial Aboriginal Australian and Jewish ancestry.
Honours
On 7 March 2007, Melbourne renamed a city street in her honour: Dame Edna Place, formerly Brown Alley off Little Collins Street, was officially opened by the Lord Mayor of Melbourne, John So. Dame Edna Place is opposite Royal Arcade and The Causeway, between the major roads, Elizabeth Street and Swanston Street; it was, until its renaming, a service alley for adjoining buildings. Dame Edna was not at the renaming ceremony but was represented by ten look-alike Dames. Everage Street in suburban Moonee Ponds has also been named in her honour.In 1982, Dame Edna's alter-ego Barry Humphries was made an Officer of the Order of Australia for "services to the theatre" and on 16 June 2007 he was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire for services to entertainment.
In MAC Cosmetics 2008 Winter Line-Up, a Dame Edna collection of cosmetics were released including eye shadow, lipstick, powder, and nail polish.
A bronze statue was unveiled at Melbourne Docklands in January 2009. It is located by the Yarra river near Harbour Town which also includes statues of singer John Farnham, Dame Nellie Melba, and Graham Kennedy.
In 2020, a species of brightly iridescent Australian soldier fly was named Opaluma ednae in honour of the character, "whose signature hair has a striking resemblance to the colouration of this species." Other species described in the same article were named O. rupaul and O. fabulosa.
Invention of the character
Barry Humphries was invited to join the fledgling Union Theatre Repertory Company early in 1955 and toured Victorian country towns performing Twelfth Night, directed by Ray Lawler. On tour, Humphries invented Edna gradually as part of the entertainment for the actors during commutes between country towns. Humphries gradually developed a falsetto impersonation of a Melbourne housewife, imitating the Country Women's Association representatives who welcomed the troupe in each town. At Lawler's suggestion, Mrs Everage made her first appearance in a Melbourne University's UTRC revue at the end of 1955, as the city prepared for the 1956 Olympic Games. The sketch involved a houseproud "average housewife" offering her Moonee Ponds home as an Olympic billet, spruiking her home as possessing "burgundy wall-to-wall carpets, lamington cakes and reindeers frosted on glass dining-room doors".At this time the character was billed as "Mrs Norm Everage" and had none of the characteristic flamboyant wardrobe of later years.
His mother was a major inspiration for Edna, although he denied it when she was alive to protect her feelings. Her first monologue in 1955 was about her "lovely home", reflecting young Barry's own site visits accompanying his builder father. Originally she was a "mousy" character and too quiet to please the raucous crowd at The Establishment club in London.
According to John Lahr, Edna came into her own during the 1980s when the policies of Thatcherism—and what he described as the "vindictive style of the times"—allowed Dame Edna to sharpen her observations accordingly. Lahr wrote that Edna took Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher's "seemingly hypocritical motto" of "caring and compassion" for others and turned it on its head, Edna became the voice of Humphries' outrage.
In a 2011 interview with CUNY TV, actor Zoe Caldwell claimed that the character had been written with her in mind, but that she turned it down as she did not believe she could make it funny. She then suggested to Humphries that he perform the role himself.