The cabaret star on how much life has changed and why she loves London’s queer community.
It was hard for me to pack my bags this time. Trying to figure out what I needed to pack for three climates and seven weeks abroad proved more emotional than it should be. Read: collapsing in tears over an overstuffed suitcase. You see, I’m living in an apartment in Brooklyn with my name on the lease that I truly enjoy spending time in. This is a first for me. I’ve been flopping around like a modern day Sally Bowles forever, but life with a baby has given me different restrictions/mature adult joys.
One of the things that kept me positive during the packing was that I was really looking forward to returning to London for a three-week stretch, which in a way has become a second home for me.
My life has changed in comparison to the first time I came to London just five years ago. I was in a long-term open marriage then and had many lovers, male and female, I embraced them and the nightlife and most often falling into bed at 4am. Now I’m monogamous plus a toddler in tow.
Even though I currently find my wake-up time just two hours later than when I used to go to sleep, I find that I’m still the same person at core. I love connecting with my London fellow feminista performers – proud to count super-sheroes Bishi, Shingai Shoniwa (noisettes), Ophelia Bitz and Bourgeois & Maurice as my friends. The London gypsy / queer / showbiz community has welcomed my breeding status wholeheartedly; perhaps more enthusiastically than in the US where there seems to be more disassociation with any heteronormative activity.
I’m excited to bring this new show to the Soho Theatre (who have always presented me with incredible care). I felt I had to make politically leaning show as my head is swimming with the election of the angry apricot / cinnamon hitler / man-sized sebaceous cyst. There is a solace in my heart when I think of presenting my songs and confusion about patriotism to an audience I'm assuming will be comprised of liberal metropolitan Brits. There is a similar crisis of ideology rising here with thoughts and laws rising out of ethnocentric, anti-immigrant fear. Together, we are experiencing what I like to hope is the last pus of misogynistic, homophobic, racist leaders surfacing in a boil. Hopefully after this giant pimple explodes we can truly progress as humanity.
Lady Rizo: Red, White and Indigo is on at the Soho Theatre Friday 14 July – Saturday 5 August, 9.30pm (75mins)
Tickets cost from £15 and are available here.
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