Review: MEOW MEOW'S LITTLE MERMAID

At its heart, THE LITTLE MERMAID has always been a tail tale of woe. Only Disney would frame Ariel's fatal quest for love as a happy ever after story. Though it appears Meow Meow, our resident mistress of cabaret, is game to try the same. Tonight, perched on a rock, all big hair and glittery eyelids, she opens MEOW MEOW'S THE LITTLE MERMAID with a declaration that this is a story about happiness.

But it should perhaps be considered a warning, this declaration, because we're in the hands of Meow Meow here. Subversive, wickedly clever (though is it only ever women who are described as wicked before clever??) Meow Meow, a performer with so much talent as to pull seemingly boundless tricks out of her corset hat every time she takes the stage. The thing is, if you've ever seen Meow Meow perform, you know she's going to tell you something about herself that will ultimately feel a little bit like your own revelation - and so it goes with MEOW MEOW'S LITTLE MERMAID, a tale she might book-end with an assertion about happiness, but fills with sadness, discomfort, desire, and nostalgia through every minute in between.

On this whimsical little stage at the Malthouse, decorated with prom-night tinsel and pretty shell lights - and later, a replica sex doll and a series of disembodied male parts - Meow Meow is really talking about love, that original siren call. She's looking both into her own depths and out into the audience for evidence of its existence, and she's willing to do whatever it takes to find it. It might be twisting and turning, Pink-like, above the crowd, or surfing that crowd, carried around the theatre by her own need for adoration. It might be talking dolphin, or donning a tail and compelling three (awkwardly brilliant) men from the audience to join in her Mermaid fantasy, or it might be swapping the tail for a red pointe shoe and a Hollywood heel, neither of which make it any easier for her to dance.

Mostly, though, it's about her voice, a rich instrument that seems to go wherever she sends it, and to do whatever she asks of it. MEOW MEOW'S LITTLE MERMAID contains original works from no less than the likes of Megan Washington, Kate Miller-Heidke, and Amanda Palmer. The best cabaret bridges humour and heart, and the songs our mermaid sings tonight are deep, funny, and resonant. Meow Meow as a persona trades in the outlandish, a kind of Ab-Fab mix of excess and ego, but when she sings, she can also pull her audience down into a pin-prick moment of truth - it might only be one line out of twenty, but it's the kind that takes you from laughter to held breath in a second.

Her collaboration with these artists finds that moment more than once, and though the narrative thread might get tangled from time to time, the unravelling is always worth it.

While Meow Meow would be a one-woman show even in a cast of hundreds, her supporting players also shine under the sea. The Siren Effect Orchestra join in her antics, playing with the kind of skill that makes my cloddish fingers ache. And Chris Ryan, by turns the beloved and rejected paramour, could sing to me any day. It's clearly Meow Meow's world, and she's chosen the best to be part of it.

That world - on stage, under the sea, up in the air, or aimed square at the heart, is one worth visiting. It might not be about happiness exactly, but when the bubbles start raining down toward the end of the show, I dare you not to feel a little burst of joy at this mermaid who knows the value of her voice.

MEOW MEOW'S THE LITTLE MERMAID

Malthouse Theatre - Melbourne

28 January to 14 February

For tickets and more information click here.

Images: Supplied

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