In this episode, I have the pleasure of chatting with Gale Edwards. Gale is one of Australia’s leading and most acclaimed international theatre directors. Her career spans forty years. Gale talks about her journey as a director and shares an intersting story about a famous music theatre composer and a chainsaw!
Professor Gale Edwards is one of Australia’s most acclaimed international directors of theatre and opera, and one of the most distinguished graduates from Flinders University’s School of Humanities and Creative Arts. She is known nationally and internationally for her work directing drama, comedy, established classics and large-scale musicals, as well as for the development of new Australian work. She was the first Australian, and the first woman to direct on the main stage at the Royal Shakespeare Company, and to open a musical on both the West End and Broadway. Gale spent a year as Associate Director to Trevor Nunn on Les Miserables on Broadway, and oversaw the production in Australia. She spent seven years as Andrew Lloyd Webber’s chief collaborator, directing productions of Whistle Down the Wind, Aspects of Love and the revival of Jesus Christ Superstar. She has also directed the Australian feature film, A Heartbeat Away, and won an International Emmy Award for her televised film of her stage production of Jesus Christ Superstar shot at Pinewood Studios for The Really Useful Group and Universal Pictures. Gale graduated from Flinders University in 1974, and began her career at Adelaide youth theatre company Energy Connection. From 1986 to 1989 she was Associate Director to the State Theatre Company of South Australia followed by the Melbourne Theatre Company. Over the past 25 years has worked for almost every other subsidised and commercial arts companies in the country including Opera Australia, for whom she directed The Magic Flute, Manon Lescaut, Sweeney Todd, La Boheme, Salome, the spectacular Carmen on Sydney Harbour and, most recently, highly acclaimed AIDA on Sydney Harbour. She has directed over thirty productions in Australia during her career; including the legendary original version of The Boy From Oz, Jerry Springer, Coriolanus, Arcadia, God of Carnage, The Rover, The Tempest, Much Ado About Nothing, Festen, King Lear, The Way of The World, A Doll's House, The Winter's Tale, The Shaughraun, to name a few. Her international work includes Whistle Down The Wind, The Far Pavilions, Jesus Christ Superstar and Shaw's Saint Joan on London's West End; The Taming of the Shrew, The Duchess of Malfi, Don Carlos and The White Devil for the Royal Shakespeare Company; A Midsummer Night's Dream and The Merchant of Venice at the Chichester Festival; as well as Maria Stuarda at The English National Opera. In the USA Gale has directed Romeo and Juliet for the Chicago Shakespeare Theatre, Macbeth for The Oregon Shakespeare Festival; Hamlet, Richard 111, Titus Andronicus, and Edward 11, for The Washington Shakespeare Theatre. Both Don Carlos and The White Devil were also invited to the prestigious Brooklyn Academy of Music (B.A.M.) in New York. In 2011 Gale spent a year as a guest of the Chinese corporation W.A.N.D.A. in Beijing, creating, writing and directing China's first International Scale Musical - in Mandarin. This production is currently touring to 44 Chinese cities.
Gale Edwards has been the recipient of three Sydney Critics Circle Awards, five Green Room Awards, two Mo Awards, an Emmy Award, two Helpmann Awards, two nominations for the Helen Hayes Awards and a 2000 Centenary Medal ‘for Service to Australian Society’. She received a Convocation medal from Flinders University for outstanding professional achievement in the field of dramatic art, and an Australian Export Award for International Achievement in the Arts representing Australia. Her career and her many achievements in the performing arts were celebrated in a 2013 exhibition “Gale Edwards: The Girl from Oz,” held as part of the Adelaide Festival Centre’s 40th Anniversary celebration. Gale has taught acting and directing all over the world, from her early practice at Secondary Schools in South Australia, which gave birth to her first theatre company, Energy Connection in 1980, to holding the position of full time Acting Lecturer and Play Director at the National Institute of Dramatic Art for five years from 1982. In 2014 she renewed her connection with Flinders University by taking up a position as Professor of Drama for several months, during which time she taught a number of specially-targeted master classes as well as regular topics in the Drama program, and also commenced research on her forthcoming autobiography.
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Adam
This episode deals with topics concerning mental health and domestic violence. If you find any of this podcast triggering, please call lifeline on 131114. If you're in Australia or your local mental health provider for the National Sexual Assault and Domestic Violence Counseling Service, call 1800 737 732.
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Adam
Lovely and I.
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Adam
Welcome everyone to episode six.
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Julie
Episode six amazing.
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Adam
Thank you for being with us today and we have a very special guest today, by the name of Gail Edwards. Gail, I've had the opportunity to work with on, a few occasions with State Opera, just a few basic steps. yeah, that was, it just began her career. Adelaide youth theater company Energy Connection from 1996 to 1989.
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Adam
Oh, sorry. That's when she began. I think so, but from 1996 to 1999, she was associate director of the State Theater Company of South Australia, has been an artistic director of the Melbourne Theater Company. She has worked with every other major Australian theater company, including the Sydney Theater Company and Opera Australia. Internationally, Edwards directed at the 1996 London revival of Jesus Christ Superstar, which opened at the Ford Center of the Performing Arts on Broadway in 2000, and for which she won an Emmy Award for the televised recording of the production.
00;01;58;05 - 00;02;27;07
Adam
Edwards contributed to the book of the musical Whistle Down the Wind, for which she directed the Western production. She directed Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice and a midsummer Night's Dream at the Chichester Festival Theater in 2003 and 2004, respectively. Edwards has directed for the Royal Shakespeare Company and Shakespeare Theater Company, Washington, DC. She directed the premiere production of The Boy from Moss for Upper Straits.
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Adam
She directed Aida in 2015, la boheme to 2016 to 2023, Carmen in 2017, and Salome in 2019. She co-wrote the book and lyrics of the musical Eureka, which premiered in Melbourne in 2004, and Edwards credits directing for film and television include the 2007 Australian film A Heartbeat Away, and the pride segment of the 1993 television series Seven Deadly Sins, as well as filmed versions of stage presentations.
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Julie
So whoa, wait, that's amazing.
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Adam
We could do a whole podcast just going through her stats. So if you want more details, just go to Wikipedia like I do. But, this is a little bit of a different interview compared to the previous ones. So this is really I let go take charge. Yeah. In what was what was going to be covered. And it's really just covering her life and her career.
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Adam
But one thing I did want to sort of talk about was, Developing starting her career opportunities as a female in what I would think, rightly, fairly male dominated area. So, she gives a little bit of insight from her perspective of, developing her career during that time and some of the challenges that she was faced with.
00;04;00;25 - 00;04;04;14
Julie
She's had quite a journey, hasn't shown up. We're really interested to hear everything.
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Adam
So let us now go to the interview. We've got.
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Adam
Thank you gal, for for for being here today. It was a little bit of a journey to get to this stage, but thank you. how are you going first off?
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Gale
Right, right. I'm going really? Well, yeah. I've got everything's working for this morning. Oh, one coffee at hand.
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Adam
Perfect to begin with. Gail, what's your earliest memory?
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Gale
theater or otherwise? Otherwise, my first memory. I must have been in my bedroom with my mother in a single bed on one side, and my father in a single bed on the other side. And my cot must have been in the middle. That's how early it was. And I remember staring out into the darkness because I was a little baby, and seeing the red glow of my father's cigaret.
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Gale
At. Wow. So he was in a room with a baby smoking in a closed room all night. Of course, I didn't think that at the time. I just thought I was fascinated by the red glow of this light in the dark. That's the earliest thing I can remember in.
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Adam
And the detail too. You just remember the the detail of it as well.
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Gale
It's fun. Well, I have a very detailed, memory of things and, especially long term memory. And, I also have a very good, I mean, I won't say photographic memory, but when I went to, America, to Broadway to learn, like, miserably from the great Trevor Nunn, who was directing it. And I was sitting through eight weeks of his rehearsal because we were going to do it in Australia.
00;06;06;22 - 00;06;34;26
Gale
Yeah. And of course, I didn't read music, and I discovered that Trevor Nunn did not read music either. So I used to turn the page of my score when everybody else turned the page. Yeah, but I looked at what he did and I photographically memorized it. So some weeks just memorized. And there's 30 people on stage, the moods of every person on the barricade.
00;06;34;28 - 00;06;56;22
Gale
and, a year later, when he came to Australia to do it with me as his associate director, he couldn't he he was amazed that I could. I knew exactly where everyone was at every moment. And you know how complicated the show is. So I have a very good eye for detail and for remembering detail.
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Adam
When did you discover your purpose? The date question.
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Gale
I was very, very bright at school. I mean, incredibly strangely and rather weirdly bright. I mean, I came top of the class and dux of the school and,
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Adam
What school was that? What what school was that?
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Gale
We were working class people, and I first of all, I went to a place called Port Adelaide Tech. Yes. And then to do matric, I went to Tapper real high. And I was in the honors list in South Australia. And top of the state in geography you'll be pleased to know. That's useful. But that's not what I'm trying to tell you about being bright at schools.
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Gale
Irrelevant. I was academically very bright, not at maths or arithmetic. I failed miserably, but everything else, English and all that. I was brilliant at. And I was always putting on plays in my lunch hour, and I was a prefect and I was always running the choir and running the. I just love the theater. I mean, I had a home that had little connection to the theater, except that my grandmother was an usherette at Hoyts Cinemas and took me every night.
00;08;12;01 - 00;08;37;04
Gale
but I was always putting on plays and, I seemed to be drawn to it. So when I finished high school and my teacher said, look, you know, you've got such extraordinary marks in your, you know, what ever you call it. It was, you know, was matriculation in those days. Anyway, you can go to law school or you can go to medical school.
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Gale
No worries. You just get into it. And I said, I want to go to Flinders University and study drama. And there was a lot of chortling that went on and desperately tried to discourage me because what a waste. What a what a terrible thing to do. with this brain, you know, how could I possibly think that? And, of course, I went to Flinders University and did drama and and English and history and then, got into the drama center and cut off other subjects until I was just doing drama and majored in drama and so on.
00;09;14;05 - 00;09;16;05
Gale
The rest is history.
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Adam
What gave you that sort of that drive, when obviously you weren't getting supported by the people around you to, to pursue this line of passion of yours? What what do you think sort of gave you that, dogmatic ness, I guess, to, to keep pursuing your passion?
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Gale
I had a very, very bad childhood. I won't go on about it. My father was an alcoholic. He beat my mother up a lot. When I say alcoholic, I don't mean a social alcoholic. I mean a full down in the gutter alcoholic. I mean, stagger down to the back shed to sleep. Alcoholic. and, I was abused by him.
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Gale
And at the age of nine, one of the episodes when he hit my mother accidentally resulted in her death. so that was a hideous nine year old child to go through. Yes. And I think, the theater, somehow the illusion, the storytelling, the, I don't know, for no reason because it came from nowhere. I just was very attracted to the storytelling aspect of the theater.
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Gale
And the fantasy, all but the illusion of it, but also the theater explores things that we don't want to explore in real life. Yes, that's what Shakespeare's about in every play is about ambition, tyranny, deception, betrayal, love, love triumphs. love doesn't triumph. Tragedies, ego, violence. So Shakespeare understood that people came to the theater to see these stories enacted in a way that they could watch and participate in emotionally and mentally, and share in and be transported.
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Gale
And we know they were, you know, they didn't throw rotten tomatoes at Shakespeare's plays in the globe as far as we know. And they wouldn't throw on Rotten Tomatoes if they didn't like it in those days, because, you know, the the bare pit was next door where the Terriers were. But, you know, biting the bear, I mean, stuffed tough times.
00;11;34;19 - 00;11;55;20
Gale
You had to really be a good storyteller. so I think from a very early age I had a rich I was an only child. Yeah. I had a rich, imaginative life. I made up stories. I made up people. I spoke to imaginary people because I was very lonely. I went to live with my maternal grandmother. Right.
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Gale
So. Yeah, sure. Quite, But it's just my grandmother and me in a great big house with a big property around it, you know? And my parents had been very poor. She was sort of say, the gentry and, and I made up stories. I had people at the bottom of the garden, and I had sections in the garden I could escape to, and I kind of lived inside a very, very, diverse, rich, fascinating fantasy world.
00;12;28;19 - 00;12;51;14
Gale
And yet, on the other hand, I'm doing brilliantly academically at school. Yeah. Which just sort of makes sense because dreamers usually don't can't apply themselves to study. but I had tremendous focus, and I love studying. And I would come home from school every night. No one had to make me do my homework. I would sit there and do three hours homework.
00;12;51;16 - 00;13;10;25
Gale
So there was this strange dichotomy, on hand. I was a fantasist. And on the other hand, I was an academic. I loved the research. The detective work, I loved reading, I loved learning. So they were two opposites in a way, and they happily coexisted.
00;13;10;27 - 00;13;27;06
Adam
I'm fascinated to hear a little bit about your time with the energy connection back in the early 80s, and how that came about, because you founded that group, didn't you? I.
00;13;27;06 - 00;13;58;00
Gale
Did well, I had no connections to the theater. when I graduated, I went to university, when I, when I graduated, yes, when I was teach. I'm trying to remember the the chronology. So when I finished university, I got a job teaching. High school. And I became the drama teacher. And fortuitously, I ended up at a place called Memorial to High School.
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Gale
This was Don Dunstan's showpiece, this big open space school with no fences and no bells. And it was all meant to be about, you know, the, the, the students took responsibility for them, you know, being in the classroom at this and at this time. And I was very enlightened and ahead of its time. And I taught there.
00;14;18;21 - 00;14;45;27
Gale
I sort of ran the drama department there. for three, four years. And I taught a lot of very bright and wonderful students. And, part time, I started calling them, oh, I left, I left that school because I wanted to go to London and study, and I did go to London and lived there for a year. and I had this yearning, this call in that somehow teaching wasn't going to be the end of it.
00;14;46;00 - 00;15;15;05
Gale
And I saw every show for $5 sitting in the gold. And I rented a place somewhere, in Muswell Hill. And, I went to, an inactive center there. Yes. To try to improve and I met I met a lot of students. Nobody influential. I wasn't anywhere near that kind of level. I was later, but not at that point.
00;15;15;07 - 00;15;48;25
Gale
I was really just, backpack on my back, and, I came back and went back, for a year. And I went back to that school burning with ideas and passion for the theater. I mean, the year away had really consolidated everything I'd ever dreamed of. So I called together a group of my ex-students from the previous 4 or 5 years, and I said to my star drama students, and I said, what are you all doing?
00;15;48;27 - 00;16;13;21
Gale
And I'm going to form a theater company. I said, cold energy connection. the audacity mean the audacity I knew really knew nothing. I mean, except I'd done drama for, you know, three years of university, but the audacity of saying that and I remember Tony Poly was one of them, and he was selling fruit and vegetables to my mouse and shopping center.
00;16;13;21 - 00;16;37;08
Gale
And I went to the shopping center and met him in his break and said, now, listen, Tony, you're very talented. And we got into fullness, you know, Mark Pegler, Laverne McDonald. all these people, I went and found them in there. Matt Pegler was on a salmon trawler in North Queensland, and they were all getting on with their lives.
00;16;37;10 - 00;17;05;19
Gale
But the call came, do you want to come back to Adelaide and join this company? There'll be no money, but we'll we'll work every day and we'll do great things. I mean, I just, I just laugh at myself. And we did put on shows and eventually we got given theater 62 by the South Australian government. And we did festivals, we did the Festival of Arts, we did the comic festival.
00;17;05;22 - 00;17;52;08
Gale
We put on huge shows that we created ourselves, which involved dance and music and speaking, and we were a tiny phenomenon. Yeah. And, we, we sat on my floor because they were all 17, 18, but now we sat on my floor with pieces of paper creating these shows, and I flagon for that date sat right. and I used to make big saucepans of spaghetti bolognese to feed everybody, and we would create what we thought were the most important dialogs and shows that had a dialog about life.
00;17;52;11 - 00;18;24;27
Gale
We had themes saying, and, and we created them together, with me sort of guiding, but they all contributed, and we, we were highly praised, highly noticed, and eventually funded. We were funded for an arts tour of South Australia. We went to Sydney. We we took this company to Sydney. I mean, it was unbelievable. And eventually we got a little tiny bit of money so I could supplement the dole.
00;18;24;29 - 00;18;53;24
Gale
and that's what we did. And John Clarke and Elizabeth Butcher, who ran Ida in Sydney, had established almost establishing Ida and run it for 30 years and were the sort of the great kingmakers of theater in Australia at the time. If you got an idea like Geoffrey Rush did, you, you were destined for a possibility of of a career.
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Gale
And as you know, it's very hard to have a path into the theater. Yeah. And nor did they do you the stamp of approval. So John and and Elizabeth came and saw these shows in Adelaide when they were on tour, when they were touring, and they came up and met me and said, you know, this is really great.
00;19;13;00 - 00;19;39;15
Gale
They saw standing ovations and such excitement and they said, you know, you've got a lot of talent. And John Clarke said, yeah, but you don't know anything, right, man. So I think you should come tonight and learn a few things, girlie. and and I as a result of that encounter, I auditioned for Nahida and I did the directors course.
00;19;39;15 - 00;20;00;23
Gale
I left South Australia and I went away for a year, and I did the directors course and subsequently, I think, 4 or 5 members of energy Connection subsequently went to Niro and were taken in. And as you know, the competition is very high. They took 2020 out of 2000 a year, one of them went to legs on the wall.
00;20;00;26 - 00;20;30;03
Gale
They all they all sort of many of them went off and had great careers in the theater. And So that's what Energy Connection was. And we lived it. We drank it. We ate it from morning till night. That's what we did. Yeah. And we did that for 3 or 4 years. And then when I went to neither, of course, we, I returned and we did another couple of shows, but by then it had lived its life.
00;20;30;05 - 00;21;13;22
Gale
It had. You know, either had to metamorphosis into something much greater or we had to let it go. And I was invited to join the staff at neither. As the second acting teacher next to Nick Enright, the great late Nick Enright and I took the job at night, and left energy Connection behind. But it is still in my mind, the golden era of my life calls sometimes not knowing things with a great advantage, sometimes not knowing everything because you're, you're, you're working from passion and intellect.
00;21;13;22 - 00;21;41;18
Gale
I was always working from intellect but passion and you know a cavalier kind of determined will. But when I went to Noida for five years on the staff, I was able to work in rehearsal rooms with great voice teachers. For example, the great music teacher Keith Bain. I would always have a text person next to me when I was directing a class Shakespeare.
00;21;41;20 - 00;22;06;18
Gale
So while I was directing, I was really learning, other staff around me, and I often joke and say, I'm the only person who's done a five year night, a course because I'm a teacher. I learned all about the classics. I learned all about Australian plays. I learned all about Australian history of Australian plays. I learned in a laboratory with actors where we were.
00;22;06;20 - 00;22;40;19
Gale
I was able to watch actors and watch their vulnerabilities and what they needed, and, you know, John Clark was incredibly perceptive. And Nick Enright, of course, was a genius. And so, I was in the presence of people who could analyze and see and see ruthlessly. Later, I worked with them. when Nick left, I worked with Kevin Jackson, who was a ferocious critic and teacher and with a wonderful, kind, loving heart.
00;22;40;22 - 00;23;05;14
Gale
And so I was able to learn from these peers and and mentors of mine while having the privilege of being in a room with actors all day. it was the best. It was the best education anyone could ever have as a director. And the show, to all those student shows, you know, there'd be Shakespeare, Chekhov. I directed Richard Roxborough in, Uncle Vanya.
00;23;05;16 - 00;23;15;25
Gale
Yeah, I mean that these were, people that went home, you know, to become stars. And then we were doing Uncle Vanya together.
00;23;15;28 - 00;23;21;01
Adam
The one area that just fascinates me about you is.
00;23;21;03 - 00;23;22;21
Gale
You.
00;23;22;23 - 00;24;06;15
Adam
Have quite a wealth in the theater industry. Anyway, you're very well known. And what always fascinated me was the obvious to female. but how did you manage to sort of carve your way? particularly during the 80s, when really it's a very heavily male dominated, area and being becoming a director and so on. how was that experience for you to sort of carve your way through, to sort of get to the level of prominence that you have in a very male dominated field?
00;24;06;17 - 00;24;36;15
Gale
well, that's, it's a very complex question. Yes. And requires a complex answer. I was, I, I was into a, a die hard feminist. I mean, I didn't have time to think about feminism because I was always forging ahead, you know? so I often was very unaware of myself within the industry, and I didn't look to the left or right very often at that point.
00;24;36;17 - 00;25;00;03
Gale
I did later. at that point, I just said yes to anything I was offered. John Gayton John Gayton was the first he was running the South Australian Theater Company, great actor, great artistic director. And he said, because I was an Adelaide girl and I was a director, would I come and be his associate director at the State Theater Company?
00;25;00;05 - 00;25;28;28
Gale
Well, of course, you know, I jumped at the chance. And again, I had such happy, happy years with him. I directed him as King Lear and Geoffrey Rush as the full and the great John Howard the actor, not the politician as, as Edmund and, I mean, I got to work with stars from all around the country who in those days it was much more flexibility about moving people around and much more money for living away from home allowances.
00;25;29;00 - 00;26;12;20
Gale
And so I was able to work at the State Theater Company in South Australia, for several years, with John as my buddy, my boss, my inspiration. And he was a truly generous man. And, so I did The Winter's Tale with him as Leigh on Tis So. I was just given mainstage Shakespeare's to put in the Playhouse with substantial budgets and, and, and a, entire production company downstairs under the ground because it was only one building in the Festival Center in those days, and a fabulous costume shop and everything at our disposal.
00;26;12;20 - 00;26;39;26
Gale
I mean, we did lavish, beautiful productions, of the classics, of new works, of of everything. And, I mean, I can't even remember the list of names of plays I directed there over the years. One was The Rover, but F Robin, written in the middle of the 1600s and that came subsequently, was picked up by the Sydney Festival and came to the York theater.
00;26;40;01 - 00;27;07;12
Gale
And the whole productions transferred and 30 actors. I mean, when do you hear about that happening these days. Right. Six actors, not 30. And this giant amazing set by Mark Thompson and Ken will be and you know it was we were in New York and it was a huge romp and it got rave reviews and so John gave me John ahead and gave me that first step.
00;27;07;15 - 00;27;32;12
Gale
I was not very recognized by the Sydney Theater Company, by which is where it's at, which was which is where it's era. and I was the only woman, I mean, Robin Nevin, who is a great actress, would dabble in directing in those days. This was well before she was artistic director of, the Sydney Theater Company.
00;27;32;15 - 00;28;06;29
Gale
so she would occasionally direct something, smallish. but it was not there was nobody, there was Chris Johnson, who ran, theater and education to be taking things to schools. but there were no women directors, shooting as that sounds. I was it. And so Roger Hodgman offered me a job as the associate director of the Melbourne Theater Company, and I directed The Tempest on the mainstage.
00;28;06;29 - 00;28;34;10
Gale
I directed, you know, new Australian plays. I directed all, you know, anything I wanted with Roger Hodgman. So I had a whole period in Melbourne at that State Theater company, and I worked my butt off because I loved it. people often say, gee, you must have been ambitious to have gotten where you got so quickly. And I think ambitious never even occurred to me.
00;28;34;12 - 00;28;59;21
Gale
I just loved what I did. I never planned a thing in my career, I never planned, oh, I'll write a letter to Roger Hodgman and see if he'll take me at the Melbourne Theater Company. I never applied for things or strategized. The work spoke, and the work was the undeniable thing. And to be honest, I was too naive to even know how to negotiate a career.
00;28;59;21 - 00;29;36;06
Gale
I was in my late 20s. I didn't have the nous to negotiate a career, but I was asked to do things and it was amazing, you know, the opportunities I was given. And then the commercial theater arrived in the sense that I was asked to do, like, miserable in, first of all, go to New York, learn it from with Trevor Nunn, because live music was originally created by two directors.
00;29;36;08 - 00;30;07;00
Gale
and only one, Trevor, I think one of the greatest living directors alive. Only Trevor was coming to Australia, so he would need a really good assistant director. So we met in New York and in Washington, and I sat quietly in the corner and photographed things with my memory, and, one night we accidentally found ourselves in a taxi, going to a restaurant with some other people, and he walked me back to my hotel and we got talking.
00;30;07;03 - 00;30;26;24
Gale
He didn't know anything about me. I said I'd just done King Lear, Geoffrey Rush. His name meant nothing in those days. nothing. And, he started talking about. Yes, Lear. I've done it five times and I've never quite got it right. And I thought five times, God. In Australia, if you get to do a classic once, you're lucky, you know, once.
00;30;26;26 - 00;30;52;17
Gale
And, we got talking and then he said, you're clearly not an assistant director. You're clearly an associate director. So when I come to Australia, you will be my associate and you will run a separate room. and a year later, and I had to do all the auditions for ladies in Australia. So I spent months actually auditioning thousands of people.
00;30;52;19 - 00;31;25;09
Gale
And Trevor, only when he arrived, he only wanted to see 70 people for the 34 roles. So I had to present him with 70 possibilities from which he chose one of two for each role. and, we became very close. We became very good friends. I just, you know, had to pinch myself to believe I was sitting in the room with Trevor Nunn and, often going to dinner with Trevor Nunn and talking about the theater.
00;31;25;11 - 00;31;52;10
Gale
and, so it was an extraordinary time for me being his associate. I did run another room. He had no me role playing Jean Valjean and the grateful ghost played, and Debbie Byrne playing Fontaine. And mate, of course, was not an actor you'd never met. Didn't know anything about acting. great performer, great man, great singer.
00;31;52;10 - 00;32;22;15
Gale
But this is a very different thing. And so Trevor had to invest a lot of time working with more me on scenes, the little scenes where Valjean interacts with people. So the big parts of like, miserable, like the ghetto, you know, the, the big barricade scenes and the wedding scene and the big scenes got left to me to do in the next, because spending more time than he thought he would with, helping me.
00;32;22;17 - 00;32;49;04
Gale
he was terrific. and, so he learned to trust me because, of course, it's. No, if you done the wedding is on the did on the barricades or on the barricade. If you don't have. You don't want your son's death. He has a bomb. And and then he'd come in and watch it, and he'd put his little magic spell over it and so together we did that like miss in Australia.
00;32;49;07 - 00;33;13;25
Gale
The in Sydney and Trevor went back to England and obviously said very nice things about me because I got a phone call from a private producer who was about to do Saint Joan on the West End with Imogen Stubbs as Saint John. And Imogen was married to Trevor Nunn. his second or third wife.
00;33;13;27 - 00;33;37;29
Gale
And Trevor had said, there's only one person in the world who should be directing this guy Littlewoods, and so produces a play shape where she from the Antipodes. You've got to be kidding. You know, like. And, anyway, I got the job and I directed Saint Joan on the West End, and then I'm at the RSC. I'm here on there.
00;33;37;29 - 00;34;02;27
Gale
I'm. I'm everywhere. Yeah. so I was, as you can see, it was an extraordinarily meteoric fast rise. Yes. I was so totally available to it. I was unencumbered by family, children, partner. I was unencumbered, I was available. Where do you want me to go? You want to go here? I'll go. You want me to go there?
00;34;02;27 - 00;34;32;00
Gale
I'd love to. I just said yes to everything. Yeah, and it was never about the money. It was. It was just, the great adventure. And it was a very unique career. You ask me about being a woman. Well, it didn't stop me. but as I got older, I started to realize that it wasn't a gender going.
00;34;32;02 - 00;35;00;17
Gale
Often. I was in rooms with people who had never had a woman sitting out the front. So when I went to the RSA to do a chiller, classical, Don Carlos, a very famous actor who was playing King Philip of Spain on the first day, we're all sitting at the table. The first stage is very important. You know, we read the play and the director speaks and all the rules were established and the creative goals very important.
00;35;00;17 - 00;35;43;03
Gale
De and this old gentleman who's very, very famous said, yeah, they do Shakespeare in Australia. Do they? Meaning what are you doing at the RSA, the Royal Shakespeare Company, and you've come from Australia. And of course, the unspoken thing was, and you're a woman, he'd never been in a room with a woman. So as the director and I said, oh, yes, we do when we do, when we're not touching those kangaroos coming down, we're doing always doing Shakespeare.
00;35;43;05 - 00;36;17;25
Gale
And he shut up. And people sort of wouldn't laugh too much because he was too heavyweight. And I had to fight every day to be listened to and not patronized. And about. On the week three of a three month rehearsal period, everything changed. And he worked out that I was really helpful. And then I was really good on the text, and that I love literature, and I loved language, and I understood language and I could help him.
00;36;17;28 - 00;36;47;01
Gale
And I wasn't some dimwit girl sitting out the front with red lipstick. And he turned around and as he turned, the whole cast turned. And I had a wonderful, wonderful leading man, Rupert Henry Jones, who people will know from television. Handsome young boy. He was still is. And, he, he was the first to, embrace me as a director and go.
00;36;47;01 - 00;37;08;29
Gale
Yes, whatever you want. Absolutely. what do you think about this? What do you think about that? So we had a dialog and the room changed, and, the show was chosen by bam, which is British Academy of Music in New York, which chooses shows from all over the world and gives them a a display in New York.
00;37;09;02 - 00;37;33;29
Gale
And that production was chosen by bam. And so the whole thing went to New York and was put on its very prestigious venue and got rave reviews. And of course, this old boy is play is suddenly in New York playing the lead, a second lead. And when I went around and knocked on the doors to say, good luck tonight, everyone.
00;37;33;29 - 00;38;00;27
Gale
You know, as you do as a director, he was sitting in his dressing room with his feet in a basin of hot water before he went on, and he had a towel around him and I said, oh boy, toy, you know, good luck tonight on luck. And he said, okay, I like I'm of an age where I'd like to play King Lear at the Royal Shakespeare Company.
00;38;00;27 - 00;38;35;06
Gale
And, I wondered if you'd like to direct. So we went from they did Shakespeare Australia. Do they to would you direct my Lear? So I always had to go on these immense journeys through the rehearsal process and I always had to be patient and pleasant and firm and clear and never vulnerable. I could be wrong. I could declare my I could say, I think that's the wrong idea.
00;38;35;06 - 00;38;59;18
Gale
I think that's wrong. Can we go down a different path? So I always could do that. but I felt enormous pressure. And every time I started a new play, I had to go through this process again somehow and win every one of those. And that went on for years until I got a reputation as being clever or accomplished or in one of your awards or something.
00;38;59;20 - 00;39;26;09
Gale
And finally, after about ten years, I could walk into a rehearsal room as if I was a male director and be endowed, endowed with possibly knowing what I was doing. In other words, you know, being innocent until proven guilty if you see what's coming. William going oh well you know he probably knows what he's doing.
00;39;26;09 - 00;39;46;02
Gale
He's the director. We better you know at least start from a position of doing what he says with me was the opposite. Until I reached that point in my career where Gale Edwards would walk into the room and everyone would go, oh, she knows her shit. You know, she she knows that shit. But it took years to win that position.
00;39;46;04 - 00;40;09;14
Gale
Yeah. Which would have been given to a young male director. Yes. Yes it would have been given to them. I applied to run the Sydney Theater Company twice as artistic director. Never got the job. I applied in my lifetime to run the Melbourne Theater Company twice. I never got the job. I applied to run the South Australian Theater Company.
00;40;09;14 - 00;40;36;21
Gale
Never got the job. I applied to run to three times because I would have been a great person running neither because I had such a good skill. This is when I'm older. When I was in the 50s, I didn't get the job. So I have never actually been given a job. And now you know this 20 young talented wonderful female directors.
00;40;36;23 - 00;41;15;02
Gale
And there is a woman you know there have been women running state theaters and women running all sorts of things. But in back in my time 20 years ago that was not the case. Yeah. So then after 20 years in England and I owned an apartment in the West End, and I've lived this extraordinary life of Andrew Lloyd Webber flying around the world in Lear Jets and opening shows on Broadway and and still doing the Royal Shakespeare Company and the serious plays alongside of the huge musicals that I was now doing around the world.
00;41;15;05 - 00;41;46;26
Gale
And, I had sort of at around 45, I decided I've had enough. it was an extraordinarily glamorous life. Looked terrific from the outside, from the inside. I was in rooms with 100 people every day. I was in production meetings till midnight. I was in costume meetings and set meetings and. My whole life was taken over by it.
00;41;46;29 - 00;42;17;11
Gale
I was working with high, high voltage people like Andrew Lloyd Webber, who's, a handful, I told him, I mean, I absolutely adore him and admire him, but he could be a difficult personality at times. I just say that's the understatement of the, And, not to me. He was always a wonderful collaborative with me, but he could be a terror.
00;42;17;13 - 00;42;41;12
Gale
actually, in those days. And, it was a very, exciting and unique life. But I was tired of it. And I yearned for Australia. I wanted to come home. I'd been there for 17 years, and so I came home. And everyone in England, everyone, lots of people were shocked and said, well, what do you mean, going home?
00;42;41;12 - 00;43;11;01
Gale
Why would you go home? My London agent said, why would you go back to that country when you can have all of this? and I have to say, you know, the theater is not better in England. It's just that there's more of it. Yeah, yeah, there's about 50 times more of it. Any night in the West End, there are, say, 100 plays on in any capital city in Australia.
00;43;11;01 - 00;43;41;03
Gale
There were five. Yeah. Awesome. So it's not that the theater is better in. It's the truth is about 15 to 20% of the theater that you see is great. Great is out of the box. And the next 25% is okay. And the bottom stuff can be really bad. those percentages apply in Australia and those percentages apply in England.
00;43;41;06 - 00;44;04;09
Gale
it's just that 20% of a hundred shows on tonight. Is more than 20% of five shows on tonight. Yeah. That's why you think oh wow. We saw terrific production of blah blah in England and all the theater. So much better when the is great in Australia, it's great when it's great in England it's great. But there's more of it.
00;44;04;12 - 00;44;37;06
Gale
Yeah. So I came back to Australia and started applying for jobs, which I was turned down for, and that there was a very different atmosphere. The atmosphere was partly what do you doing back? The atmosphere was partly all but you be, you know, you're too big for your boots now for us, and perhaps even a little bit of, well, you got all these opportunities.
00;44;37;09 - 00;45;13;02
Gale
We didn't. There was a lot of strange undercurrents, and I was grown up, and I think I was probably tougher, and I think I was probably more forthright. And that's not a good thing in a woman. And, so it began this, the stone began to roll down the hill and stone was she's difficult and demanding and high maintenance.
00;45;13;02 - 00;45;53;14
Gale
And those are the favorite words that are attached to women. Hysterical. Really resented that one because I am very clear about things. Yes. And hysteria suggests a kind of woo hoo hoo. And that stone gathered moss. To the point where it affected my employment, you know. And I would be I'd even hear things back like. Yes, she's brilliant, comma, but not worth the effort.
00;45;53;16 - 00;46;30;24
Gale
And that was a terrible show. And I realized that I was never going to access the state theater companies running a state theater company running Nyada. That's when the rejections began. And I was still doing things like I did the two big operas on the harbor, Carmen and Aida. And, you know, I was still doing things, but the career path in Australia, which had been so open and enthusiastic and embracing in England.
00;46;30;27 - 00;46;42;06
Gale
Wasn't here. And my English agent used to ring me and say, oh darling, darling, the Paris's on the phone saying where are you, where's Gail?
00;46;42;09 - 00;47;14;04
Gale
Then in 2008, the big global recession happened. And so flying people around the world became harder. You know, I was flown to America, to the Oregon Shakespeare Festival previously to direct the Beth. I was flown to, Chicago, to the Chicago Shakespeare Theater, very famous theater in America to to direct. And Juliet, I was I was flown to England.
00;47;14;04 - 00;47;41;26
Gale
I was flown everywhere. But the global recession changed everything. You couldn't afford to fly people. I mean, to do to do Romeo and Juliet in Chicago. I'd have to do four trips across the world. To talk to the designers, to do the casting, to talk to the costume designers, to see the development and then finally fly back for rehearsals because of 6 or 8 weeks and the opening night, and then I'd be flown back again.
00;47;41;29 - 00;47;58;02
Gale
So the luxury of flying people around the world closed off and in Australia, it was a sort of we don't really know why she's back, but.
00;47;58;04 - 00;48;28;08
Gale
It's difficult. And, I actually I actually went and saw the general manager of the, Australian Opera. once not the artistic director. The general manager. Because I said, you know, I opened Carmen on the Harbor by Aida Carmen, which was, and when I went to for the second night to see the second cast, my pass had been canceled.
00;48;28;11 - 00;48;48;25
Gale
So I couldn't get onto the site and I, so I just rang the girl and said, oh, there must be some mistake on the director and I'm here to see the second cast. And she rang the important people and the important people said your contract with the Australian Opera ended last night. You no longer have security clearance.
00;48;48;25 - 00;48;53;09
Gale
You are not allowed on the site.
00;48;53;12 - 00;49;17;28
Gale
I was absolutely floored. I could not believe it. Then I was stopped at the gate and told to go away. I destroyed and I walked to my car and got into my car in tears and drove home. And you that things were bad? I can't think of, I don't think that would happen to any director anywhere in the world.
00;49;18;01 - 00;49;57;17
Gale
So. It became obvious that there was a change of climate and it became so hurtful. And I felt just. I'll tell you a funny story. I directed The Rocky Horror Show, a brand new version with the fabulous iota playing Frank and, Paul Cassis and Tamsin Carroll and, you know, Sharon Millichip playing Colombia. I mean, it was the most amazing cast, and it was a fabulous reinvention of the show because you could turn out the old one.
00;49;57;17 - 00;50;13;18
Gale
Although they do. This is a totally new concept. And, you know, opened and it was a big success. And we were having a barbecue in my backyard with the cast, and it was very late and people were very drunk. And I'm going to say a four letter word.
00;50;13;20 - 00;50;15;15
Adam
That I can go for you.
00;50;15;17 - 00;50;37;22
Gale
You may wish to bleep out later. And I, Otar, who's wonderful, said, I want to propose a toast to Gail. When I told people that I was going to play Frank-N-Furter in Gail Edwards production of The Rocky Horror Show, I was told, oh no, she's a cunt.
00;50;37;24 - 00;51;08;00
Gale
But I've worked with Gail and she's taught me more than blah, blah, blah. She's taught me as an actor, blah, blah, blah, blah. She's changed my life as an artist, blah blah blah blah blah. But of course, all I could hear was the word cunt. I couldn't he was saying it as a as an irony. Yes. He was going on in his speech to say I was the greatest thing that ever happened to him, but I was stuck back on that word.
00;51;08;03 - 00;51;37;08
Gale
I thought somebody said to you don't do this job. She's a cunt. I had to go into therapy after that because I couldn't. Bear that idea. That somebody who loved the theater as much as I did and somebody who dedicated their life to the theater and somebody with a track record like mine, because by then I'd been.
00;51;37;12 - 00;52;11;29
Gale
I'd been to London, I worked at the RSC on Broadway, around the world. I'd won Emmy Awards and awards everywhere that someone would actually say to an actor, oh, don't take that job. She's a c, u and t. And that made me step right back. Because what? How do you fight that? How do you I mean, you can't take out a full page ad in the Sydney Morning Herald or the Australian and say, I have the goods here.
00;52;12;01 - 00;52;37;20
Gale
I am not a cunt. You can't. I mean, how do you fight that. And then you get less and less jobs. So there are less and less people coming out of rehearsal room saying we're having the most wonderful time. She's wonderful. Da da da da da. It's fabulous. We're investigating the text. You're getting less buzz because you haven't got a platform to work from and how you.
00;52;37;27 - 00;53;19;25
Gale
Oriana, is it you don't give them the platform. And I got to a stage where. I was only 60 and I had in my opinion a million England. The directors are 87 up 90. There's no stopping. and I realized that I turned a corner that I could never get back around. I spent a long time being unemployed and then finally I couldn't drive around Sydney seeing my shows advertised on the sides of busses.
00;53;19;27 - 00;53;49;07
Gale
Yes. And on the backs of taxis, you know, labyrinth. Impressive. Fabulous production at the Sydney Opera House. Nice. Yeah. Immaculate production. Stunning. It was my show. And I would beg to go in and remounted. Please let me go in and redirected. One year I offered to do it for nothing. I said I'll just go in and direct it because my name is on it.
00;53;49;08 - 00;54;12;09
Gale
I could have taken my name off it. But there was no advantage to that because I just felt stubbornly like it was important that my name was on it. And I'd get emails from members of the chorus saying, where are you? We need you. You know, we've got somebody or other staff director redirecting it, and I don't know what they're doing.
00;54;12;12 - 00;54;38;21
Gale
Please come in. Just come in for a day. And I wasn't allowed to. That's like that's like stealing somebody's child. And saying you can't visit. So I would say they show my shows advertised and my agent would fight for me to be paid a royalty because clearly something like La Boheme had gone into the commercial world.
00;54;38;23 - 00;55;05;22
Gale
You know, it was being on every year, it was being pushed out like a musical. It was no longer an opera contract, but they would never issue a commercial contract. And none of us were ever paid a cent for the 12 years. So that show was revived and revived and revived and made the company millions. And the creative team were not paid.
00;55;05;24 - 00;55;30;05
Gale
But we kept our name on the show. Now, can I just tell you that if you're a serious artist, not being able to supervise your own work or make sure that the story is being told the way you need it to be told, and if details are getting lost and skewed, and some of these people who are directing it were never in the room hearing the original director.
00;55;30;08 - 00;56;01;23
Gale
That's enough to make you very mentally ill. And I was struggling and so I left Sydney and I bought a house in the Southern Highlands where I'm talking to you from, and I got two dogs and fluffy dogs and I have walked away from the thing that I have done and loved since I was 25.
00;56;01;26 - 00;56;33;15
Gale
And that took a lot of therapy because I wasn't anybody's mother or anybody's daughter or anybody's sister or anybody's wife. I was an international theater director with shelves of awards. And yet I was what's the word now? There's a word for it now in modern language. Cancel. Canceled. You know there's this word now. He's been canceled.
00;56;33;18 - 00;57;20;20
Gale
Well that wasn't a, that word wasn't around ten years ago. but I was canceled. I don't know what happened. I don't know who rang who. I don't think anybody rang anybody. I think this the, the village here in Australia, the theater is a village. It's very small and. I was canceled with more awards, more I think about 90 productions, original productions and many, many repeats of them in my lifetime in America, all around America, Washington, DC, many times all around, England, a few in Europe.
00;57;20;22 - 00;57;27;04
Gale
Every state theater company in Australia. Yes.
00;57;27;06 - 00;57;51;13
Adam
Yeah. So as you're saying with the the numerous awards you've received, I'm just looking at the list here. So you've got three Sydney Critics Circle Awards for Melbourne Green Room Awards, an Emmy, two Helpmann Awards, two more awards. You're a member of the Order of Australia.
00;57;51;16 - 00;58;04;06
Gale
I got to say I've got a Centenary Medal for, in the year 2000 from the federal government for outstanding service to Australian society through the arts.
00;58;04;08 - 00;58;09;11
Adam
What else would you love to achieve?
00;58;09;13 - 00;58;39;21
Gale
I would I would love to be doing the thing that has been the purpose of my life. I think this is a very a just country. I think it's also a very still unfortunately less so, but still quite, I mean what I'm about to say misogynistic. tell me, who is the new Gail Edwards?
00;58;39;23 - 00;59;09;01
Gale
Couldn't say what. What woman? Young woman in their 40s or. And there were 20 of them. What woman has directed at 35 years of age? Commercial musicals on Broadway. The Royal Shakespeare Company. Worked around England. Worked around America. Worked at every state theater company in the country and can work across three genres. Who is the new guy? Lebowitz?
00;59;09;04 - 00;59;39;18
Gale
the answer is there isn't one. And the reason is not because they're not, they're. I don't believe that there is not. Ten Gail Lebowitz is out there. But so I don't say this in a boastful way at all. I actually say it in disgust. The opportunities have closed down. there are lots of women who work now in state theater companies.
00;59;39;20 - 01;00;16;24
Gale
there are women resident directors at the Australian Opera. there's 1 or 2 women directors of opera in the country. but there's no one who does a massive commercial musical for Cameron Mackintosh or Andrew Lloyd Webber. And we haven't talked about Andrew Lloyd Webber. I had a whole lifetime with Andrew Lloyd Webber, and Shakespeare and developing new plays and developing new musicals from scratch, like The Boys from there's nobody in This country, male or female, who's had that career.
01;00;16;27 - 01;00;56;00
Gale
So there you go. So I have a very happy life now. I try to fill my time with sculpting and painting and nature. I've made a whole garden of landscape to garden. I planted trees. I my house is my creative canvas. And I try not to go to the theater because unless someone tells me something's really fabulous, like, you know, some of Williams's, filmic work like Helen Hyde and Portrait of Dorian Gray, which are multimedia events.
01;00;56;03 - 01;01;15;17
Gale
If someone says, this is fabulous and it's new and it's the future, you should go and see it. I will go, but I'm not on any invitation lists. Any company in Australia, including the Australian Opera or the Sydney Theater Company. I mean, I must have directed 20 shows for the Sydney Theater Company. I'm not on the invitation list.
01;01;15;19 - 01;02;02;01
Gale
So, this is what we do? Yeah. This is what's happened. And inside, I'm 68 or 69. I must turn 69 this year. Inside. I'm 29. I have so much energy and so many ideas. But the idea is after 40, you probably aren't cutting edge anymore. You probably don't have anything innovative to say. The opera world doesn't believe that by the way, because they bring out people like Mexicans, you know, from England who's much older and still having an international career.
01;02;02;04 - 01;02;30;24
Gale
Maybe men are allowed to age and women aren't. I'm not sure, but it's like after 45, you're probably old fashioned. You're probably going to do old fashioned crap. I never did old fashioned crap. Whatever. All my shows I researched and, I mean, one of the things I've loved about the theater is each new project takes you down the wormhole into another cosmos.
01;02;30;26 - 01;02;58;05
Gale
You know, I used to do a lot of preparation for whatever the play was. So if it was a Russian play, I did, to go near that Chichester in England. And of course, I read all about to again, you know, and Russia and Derrida detected masses of research and masses of meeting with the designer and to create that, they don't sort of I think people think you open a box and a show pops out, doesn't it?
01;02;58;07 - 01;03;33;26
Gale
It doesn't come with a box. It's it's somebody is interpreting the writer's words. And I hope honoring the writer's words, which doesn't always happen. and but bringing those words to life in a contemporary, accessible, relevant way to a new audience. Otherwise, it's what I call museum theater. So I don't think I've ever done museum theater. I hope not.
01;03;33;29 - 01;04;04;08
Gale
I always try to bring an original, fresh take to everything I did and still, you know, the last thing I did was craps. Last time at the old Fitzroy Hotel with Jonathan Biggins. Plane crash in Beckett's famous play, famous absurdist play. And, Jonathan and I, it was just just a one man show. And, Jonathan Wilkins was phenomenal in it.
01;04;04;11 - 01;04;31;02
Gale
he's a phenomenal satirist. And, writer and so on. But I don't think we realized what a great, serious actor he also is. And he really he really dug his fingers in and Greg Kay, our AWP was an extraordinary creation. And you know we had lineups around the globe and I was going to go on a national tour and then Covid happened.
01;04;31;08 - 01;04;53;08
Gale
Yeah. but again, it was but again, Brian Thompson, Brian is someone I've collaborated with on many, many shows in my life. I love Brian's mind and the way it works. And, you know, it was it was fabulous. That's the last piece of professional theater I've done.
01;04;53;11 - 01;05;02;21
Adam
I can't finish this conversation without asking just one question. And I'm a little bit scared by what the answer might be. But is Tosca still around?
01;05;02;23 - 01;05;25;19
Gale
Tosca was my dog for 30 years, and no Tosca died four years. And that really in when I was still living in Sydney. And in a funny kind of way, because Tosca had been my pal and my lifeline. I don't have a partner or children. You dog becomes very important. And Tosca had seen me through 13 years of a lot of hard times and a lot of stress.
01;05;25;19 - 01;05;51;09
Gale
And anyway, Tosca died. So I had actually had a beautiful death, with me keeping vigil for seven days and, with her holding her and when she died, that's kind of when my heart broke. And it was around then that I went. Okay, Gail, you really have to seriously think about what you're going to do with your life.
01;05;51;12 - 01;06;18;05
Gale
And it was only about 18 months later that I bought the house in the Southern Highlands. Yeah. I've kind of reinvented a Gail who is definitely not in retirement because I am so busy with classes and sculpting and painting, and I'm a sort of, made inroads into the community here. Not in the theater. I don't tell people about to take something very fun.
01;06;18;07 - 01;06;39;13
Gale
One of my neighbors said to me the other day, did you work at the theater? I said, yeah, I worked in the theater. You know what? You should go down to the Mittagong plants down the corner, and you should put your name down for something you could do. But my looks choose. You should put you like that and say, you know, you've worked enough in the theater.
01;06;39;13 - 01;06;41;16
Gale
You could do costumes.
01;06;41;19 - 01;06;42;09
Adam
If only then.
01;06;42;09 - 01;07;25;06
Gale
You just say thank you so much. That is such a great idea. Really. Thank you. I couldn't say, oh, yeah. Yeah. You know, because I don't talk about the theater. I'm just. I'm just someone now who paints and sculpts. I want to write a book. I want to write a book about my life, which is not about I did this and I did that, but it's about the journey of being a pioneer in this country because I was a pioneer, came up at a time when there was no precedent for me to follow.
01;07;25;08 - 01;07;52;05
Gale
Nobody's who were women directors, not no idea what I was doing, just and how my political awareness bloomed and came to be as I got older, how I came to see things differently. And I began to understand there was an agenda going on, but I hadn't realized it for the first 10 or 15 years of my career. So I think it would be a very interesting book.
01;07;52;11 - 01;08;14;18
Gale
I also had some very funny stories to tell, so I don't want it to be a and this happened, I have some very funny stories to tell about disarming or Andrew Lloyd Webber on stage in the West End when he took it live. Chainsaw in his hands to cut the set. It was midnight and I got a phone call saying, you better get here fast.
01;08;14;18 - 01;08;35;20
Gale
Andrew's got a chainsaw in his hand and he's going to cut the whole set to pieces. And, I put my boots on over my pajamas and a coat on and got a taxi into the West End, and I walked up the aisle of the Strand Theater with all the men in suits pushed against the walls, unable to get near.
01;08;35;20 - 01;09;08;13
Gale
Andrew, who was raving drunk and furious and with a huge chainsaw, was got me not touching anything, just whizzing it around. Lady Madeline, his wife, sitting in the stalls with the head, no hands and and I famously walked up the aisle of the Strand Theater saying the words Andrew put the chainsaw down. Andrew put the chainsaw down to Andrew Lloyd Webber.
01;09;08;15 - 01;09;20;09
Gale
I went up the steps onto the stage where he's said, Andrew, we're going to have to turn the chainsaws.
01;09;20;11 - 01;09;53;05
Gale
I can make the claim to fame for all of history that I disarmed Andrew. Of a live chainsaw, at midnight on this on the Grand Theater stage. And of course, I adored him. And he adored me. And of course, the chainsaw went down, and within seconds he's laughing and we're, you know, and everyone's gone. But.
01;09;53;07 - 01;09;58;05
Adam
I want to thank you so much for sharing a little bit of yourself with me.
01;09;58;07 - 01;09;59;05
Gale
I talk to you.
01;09;59;12 - 01;10;08;04
Adam
And, I hope that we might be able to touch base, but I. I would love to hear the progress of your book. Stay. Well.
01;10;08;06 - 01;10;11;15
Gale
Thank you. Darling. It's been a great pleasure talking to you.
01;10;11;18 - 01;10;19;24
Adam
Thanks a lot, Gail.
01;10;19;27 - 01;10;21;05
Adam
So there you go.
01;10;21;07 - 01;10;35;14
Julie
Oh, my goodness, what a journey she's had. And it was just good to hear because she's had successes and, the last part of her career has been a bit more challenging. and it was just, just really interesting to hear that journey that she's gone through.
01;10;35;16 - 01;11;01;22
Adam
I mean, it is we really, scratched the surface a little bit and, I mean, you could almost to a two parter. And I know that Gail seemed to enjoy it, quite a lot. So maybe later down the track might be able to a second part. Yeah. To sort of kind of get a bit of, more detail on working with, working on West End and.
01;11;01;25 - 01;11;15;04
Julie
Yeah, I mean, it's interesting how now she's just tries not to even go there with the creativity because that's why she's coped with it. Yeah. Which is a bit sad in a way. But I guess you have to do things to protect yourself too don't you.
01;11;15;05 - 01;11;43;11
Adam
That's right. Yeah. That's right. So thank you for listening. And as always if you haven't done so already please subscribe. Do it. Do it now. Do it. You won't regret it. Well, it's not going to cost you anything either. So what do you got to lose? so. And spread the word around. it'd be great if, we might somewhere down the track to a another season.
01;11;43;14 - 01;11;50;02
Adam
So thank you for listening. Thanks. And, we'll see you again. Bye bye.