First Lady

by Alison Mau

  Even the fairytale world of the theatre was not without its prize bitches. The worst of it was there had been no payment — not even a deposit — and on top of the cost of making the gowns and the hours of work, I’d paid the airfare to Wellington and the hotel tariff. I let them use the costumes for the final dress rehearsal, and once the finale was run and the actors disrobed, I scooped them up and took off. I knew they’d never see the light of day if they were left backstage. Rumours flew that I’d stolen the costumes and sold them to a glamour floorshow act. Not true; but Eliza’s finery was taking on a life of its own.

  This little episode, while costly, did at least give me a glimpse of a new career. I moved to Australia and set up a workroom making costumes for opera, ballet, ballroom dancers and, of course, many, many brides.

  I was completely unknown in Melbourne and had to go stage door to stage door asking for work. The reception I got was mostly very good, and over the years I made costumes for almost all of them. But my first bite, no pun intended, was from Dracula’s Theatre Restaurant, a vaudeville-type dinner show. I was paid per costume and all went well until they found out I was also making for rival shows. To this day I don’t know what the issue was; all the costumes were completely different and all made to the same exacting standards — but they dropped me on the spot. Some creative people suffer from a peculiar form of paranoia, I think.

  I had no such problems at Melbourne’s Tivoli Theatre Restaurant where the famous Australian showbiz couple, Carole Ann and Terry Gill, welcomed me with opens arms and became my lifelong friends. Terry was an actor, a regular in shows such as Prisoner, Blue Heelers, The Flying Doctors and Cop Shop, and Carol Ann had been a West End theatre actress (with the voice of an opera singer) before moving to Australia. They worked in theatre all their lives and even as they aged they had an exuberance that few could match. Their dinner shows were slightly nostalgic, 1950s style, and they would change them several times every year. Always plenty of new costumes needed.

  The pair of them gave me so much help over the years, particularly when I was preparing my revue in Melbourne in the early 1990s. I had always promised myself I would never get involved in the drag scene as a business venture, but through my costume work in Melbourne I stumbled on the opportunity to buy up the contractual rights to the Les Girls show. It didn’t cost a lot of money, and seemed a good bet, particularly as I’d be able to create all the costumes from scratch.

  It was the kind of lesson you really don’t need in your life. Auditioning the performers was the easy part and, one by one, I put a troupe together. There was dear little Millie Minogue who was an absolute charm to work with; then the one who called herself Kitten Caboodle who committed suicide when she was only thirty-five, I believe because she couldn’t stand the idea of growing old (very sad, she was the most stunning act) and the beautiful Vivian St James, with the most amazing legs I have ever seen in any drag show. I also had two male dancers, both very good, one of whom was also a gymnast who always got a fantastic reception from the ladies in the audience. Then I was talked into hiring an American girl who was supposedly an incredible Cher lookalike. I imagined a tall, dark and lithe person, but into the workroom walked a very large woman who didn’t look at all like Cher. I’d committed, so I kept my promise and took her on. She was trouble from the start.

  The show was to be performed at The Lido theatre but, frustratingly, the owners refused to allow us to rehearse there. They wanted us to use their dancers in the show — mine were far superior — and the argument raged back and forth and almost ended in fisticuffs. My friends Carole Ann and Terry came to the rescue offering The Tivoli theatre stage for all our rehearsals.

  If you want to retain your dignity I would not advise you put on a show with drag queens in tow. I wasn’t sorry in the end to shut the troupe down — it was not the kind of life lesson I needed.

  When you’ve been around as long as I have you hear all the time about ‘the beautiful so-and-so . . .’ and it’s almost never true. I’ll say I have maybe come across five genuine beauties in the drag scene over the years. In London there was Storme, who was magnificent; and Caroline Cossey of course, who was very beautiful. In Australia, Carlotta was head and shoulders above anyone in the business and Vivian St James would have come a close second; and in New Zealand there was the beautiful Angie from Christchurch who had a face, and an act, that were beyond belief. One in a million, truly glamorous and a beautiful person, too.

  Of course they all think they’re gorgeous. There’s one in Christchurch who always says to me, ‘When I have my surgery I’m going to be beautiful!’

  I always reply that she must give me the name of her surgeons because they’ll have to be very, very good to achieve that.

  As well as staging Les Girls, there was still plenty of work to be done during the day in the costume workroom. Around this time I met Christian Wagstaff, the Artistic Director at Melbourne’s Crown Casino. For the next six years running I dressed most of their shows, and became close friends with Christian, who was always an absolute honey to work with. I also worked closely with choreographer Tony Bartuccio, another great fun personality. These were massive floor shows, expensive and so glamorous, every costume dripping with beads and feathers. Often a single outfit would cost thousands of dollars to make (one I remember took $1000 worth of ostrich feathers for the headdress alone) and some of them looked as though they had been sprayed head to toe with diamantes. Each stone had to be hand-stitched to flesh-coloured net, which was invisible to the audience. One of the shows required a troupe of actors to be dressed as trees. We made them from latex, foam and hand-stitched silk leaves and each was around ten feet tall, with a battery-operated fan hidden inside to keep the performer from passing out from the heat! A massive job, but lots of fun. I’d never done anything quite so big budget — it was stuff I’d only been able to dream about until then.

  Reference from Christian Wagstaff, Marketing Services, Crown Ltd, Melbourne, 4 March 2002

  To whom it may concern

  Liz Roberts and her Costume Creation team have worked with Crown over the past 18 months on various projects, with the most extravagant being that of costumiers for our 2001/2002 New Year’s Eve themed gala ball. This annual event is one of our most important and one that attracts guests from all over the world.

  In my 8 years at Crown with the past 4 years as Art Director for the company, I have never worked with such a creative and talented group, led by a highly regarded and talented individual. Liz Roberts is world class.

  Liz and I have developed a great friendship in the short time we have known and worked together. I would not hesitate in recommending her to any entertainment professional, as I know she would successfully fulfil any creative design and manufacture of any size with aplomb and finesse.

  I look forward to working with Liz on future events, some of which are already in the pipeline.

  Fortunately, I did not have to achieve all of this on my own. My dear friend Du Ferras Carrington (or Ferris as we knew him) agreed to come from the Blue Mountains, where he had retired, to work with me. I’d known Ferris since I was sixteen; we worked alongside each other on and off for forty-five years in the end, and there was never a cross word between us. He was a genius in theatre detail too.

  Ferris was a master of his field. He would spend all day in the workroom, topping up his wine glass regularly, but never missing a single bead, sequin or line of stitching. He was enormously good company: kind and funny, but prone to losing the plot around ten o’clock each night. By that time the glass of wine had turned into many glasses, and he became something of a Jekyll and Hyde character. I would make myself scarce to avoid the fallout. By morning he was always back to his lovely self, and hitting the cask all day never ever affected his craft. Sadly, he passed away two weeks after I returned to New Zealand.

  Just before he died in 2006 he sent me a big box of patterns, gorgeous designs
going right back to Schiaparelli and Chanel in the early part of the century. I am so proud to have that memento of a proven friend.

  While in Melbourne, Ferris and I were approached by Debbie, the frontperson for a large production company. She started small and at first asked for just a few costumes. She was delighted by the results, and soon asked me to consider a major job. She showed me the sketches for an upcoming production; there were more than 1,000 pieces including elaborate headdresses. The contract was worth $250,000. Of course I said yes. Then I walked out thinking what have I done? I called my sister Faye to tell her about it, and nodded wisely as her husband warned me to make sure I had an ironclad contract.

  A couple of weeks later Debbie asked me out to lunch and turned up with the contract, and a deposit of $20,000 cash. I’d never seen that much money in my life, and should of course have read the contract more thoroughly before signing it. There was a tiny clause I’d missed; it said that under no circumstances was I to have any direct contact with the show’s management.

  Ferris and I set up the workroom and got stuck in, taking on extra staff, buying fabrics and making the first of the costumes. Oddly, we never saw any of the cast apart from one visit by the principal female dancer for a measurement. Debbie insisted all the other costumes were to be made in a straight size 12.

  We soon ran into trouble. Debbie arrived and insisted on taking the first lot of outfits away to check. Ferris pulled me aside and reminded me that this was not the way things were done — we did not start a batch and finish them entirely before making the next lot. I told Debbie this but she insisted. She began to complain that the costumes didn’t fit the dancers — I replied that she’d never brought them in to measure; all the work had been done exactly to the sketches she’d provided.

  We were paid part of the money due in instalments as we worked, but when the last lot were finished Debbie turned up to collect them without our final payment. It was a substantial amount, more than $50,000, and I refused to hand them over without it. Debbie refused to pay. I had a solicitor send a letter to management and she replied that she was not intending to let me set the method of payment, and that the contract was rendered void anyway by the letter.

  Once again I’d been screwed. Eventually she agreed to insert a small line in the programme that acknowledged our involvement. We got paid in the end, after sinking thousands into the lawyers’ coffers.

  * * *

  It was the horrific results of gastric surgery that drove me home to New Zealand, and I was sad to leave. The last big show I did was The Boy from Oz, with Hugh Jackman starring as Peter Allen. We were told our contribution would be just six showgirl costumes, but when they saw what we delivered another twenty-five over-the-top creations for the finale came our way, $95,000 worth of work in all.

  Not once in seven years of work in Melbourne was I judged against my early life. Not once was I subjected to any bitchy slight — we were known for our work and our work alone. No one cared what I had once been. I wish the same kindness by omission had been waiting for me at home.

  Back in New Zealand, when I was able to take up working again, I was approached to sew for the Court Theatre under their designer Pamela Maling. I got steady work from Pam as she knew I would always bring it in on time, and properly done. This caused ructions in her workroom which was full of girls who worked at a snail’s pace. I’m assuming they did so because it meant there’d be a lot of overtime for them as the shows’ deadlines approached. I remember one afternoon a group of them went out to buy buttons at one o’clock and didn’t get back until five-thirty! One of the girls did beautiful work but whether it would ever be finished in time was always in the lap of the gods. Pamela herself could be both honey and vinegar, but she was a force in the costuming world and her designs always, always worked.

  This being ‘the theatre’, there were outrageous players and even more outrageous (true) stories. In Christchurch I recall being asked if I would kindly procure a harem of pretty boys to entertain a visiting director after the show. One memorable evening a theatre benefactor’s generously proportioned wife and her equally ample daughters were visiting their father, all squished into the tiny backstage kitchen at the Christchurch Repertory Theatre. A handsome actor shot through the door from the alley outside, late for his curtain call and desperate to get side stage.

  ‘Stewart, darling!’ the wife grabbed his arm to hold him back, ‘You’ll not have had the honour of meeting my husband.’

  ‘Met him? I’ve fucked him!’ the actor grinned as he wriggled out of her grasp. The kitchen cleared pretty damn quickly.

  I was lucky also to have the support of old friends, like dear Robert Gilbert, who has always given me work whenever he could. At the time I moved back to Christchurch he was running a theatre company and teaching theatre skills to waifs and strays, and also running shows at Excalibur Theatre Restaurant. I have continued to work for Robert over the years, dressing performances of the plays he has directed at the big Christchurch schools like Aranui and Rangi Ruru. Amid the bitchiness and the jealousy, the friendship of people like Robert has kept me going. Theatre has been very good to me in the end; it’s kept food on the table and paid my rent, and that’s all I’ve ever really asked.

  It also gave me a chance to rub shoulders with the greats: Kristian Fredrikson (another Kiwi), Tony award-winner Rodger Kirk, Kenneth Powell, Desmond Digby and John Truscott, for example.

  Unlike those true luminaries of the costuming art, I never would lay claim to the title of ‘theatre and costume designer’. I’m just a bloody good tradesperson, happy to do all the fiddly work it takes to bring their breathtaking designs to life.

  With Edward and Sophie.

  Liz Roberts Collection

  Carol-Anne and Terry Gill, owners of the Tivoli Theatre Restaurant in Melbourne.

  Liz Roberts Collection

  Vivian St James

  Liz Roberts Collection

  The cast of Les Girls. I’m in the middle.

  Liz Roberts Collection

  Me with Lou Santorini (left) and Christian Wagstaff at the Crown Casino in Melbourne on New Year’s Eve, 2000.

  Liz Roberts Collection

  With Tony and Carolyn Bartuccio at a high rollers’ function at Melbourne’s Crown Casino, 2001.

  Liz Roberts Collection

  Finale of a lavish show at Jupiter’s Casino, Gold Coast, 2001.

  Liz Roberts Collection

  A costume I designed for a show at the Royal Palace Casino in Italy, 2003.

  Liz Roberts Collection

  Costumes for Silver’s Circus in Melbourne, 2005.

  Liz Roberts Collection

  On stage for the last night of Les Girls, 2006.

  Liz Roberts Collection

  19

  WEIGHT AND ITS PROBLEMS

  As much as I had planned for it, dreamed of it, wanted it, there were consequences of my sex-change surgery I hadn’t counted on or prepared for.

  My weight ballooned from my normal range, around 61 kilograms, to more than 110 kg. Contrary to the rumours that swirled around my social circle, this was not the result of overeating. The weight would pile on, then mysteriously drop away again. At my largest I imagined I looked like a large, contented cow. I was not happy!

  In the early 1980s, living in Australia, I embarked on what I thought at the time would be the easy option. Gastric surgery, and particularly stomach stapling, was fairly new, but I was unafraid of being an early adopter and ploughed ahead with the idea. My first operation was done at Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Adelaide in October 1982.

  It did not go well. After the surgery I vomited uncontrollably, and m
y weight plummeted from 92 kilograms to 54 as I simply could not eat. My stomach had been stapled so tightly that eventually a single currant became stuck in the opening, blocking my intestine completely. In September 1983 in Wollongong, endoscopy surgeons tried to clear the blockage but could not reach it, even with a paediatric catheter. They had no choice but to ‘unpick’ the surgery with what they call a gastrogastrostomy. I spent more than a year recovering.

  I’d returned to Dunedin and was working hard, in fact I may have been overestimating my capabilities a little. Two hairdressing salons to run during the day, a dressmaking workroom above one of them (The Clip Joint in St Andrew Street) and a role managing the dining room at the Cherry Court Motel.

  My days started with breakfast service at 7 am, off to the salon and dressmaking until 6 pm, then back to the motel for dinner service until 9 pm. A seven-day week, where food was definitely not a priority. But still, once that stapling was reversed, the weight piled back on.

  There was some talk among the doctors that it might have been a thyroid condition, but they were never really sure. I hated being overweight with a passion, and when I hit 90 kilos, I again sought the help of the surgeons.

  Another ‘stapling’ (vertical gastric partition) followed at Mater Hospital in Dunedin in September 1984; this resulted in more persistent vomiting, so another surgery followed in December to dilate the stomach with a gastric balloon. The surgeon’s notes show he couldn’t find any other abnormalities and thought I’d be good as new after that.

  Not so. My weight continued to plummet, through the doctor’s suggested ‘ideal’ of 61 kg, to a dangerous 51 kg by the middle of 1985. A surgeon at Christchurch Hospital, Professor MacBeth, conducted an exploratory surgery on 12 June and found what appeared to be the source of the problem — a piece of surgical mesh left inside my abdomen from that first stapling procedure in Adelaide three years before. My notes from the surgery tell an odd story; Professor MacBeth claims to have found ‘three fundal pouches’ or, essentially, three stomachs.