Dancing With The Stars sounded like a particular highlight of her arrant array of television appearances. “I loved every single second of it. It’s the first exercise I’ve done in my whole life. You have to work out with a fit, gorgeous, Adonis, 27-year-old man. It’s the only way you’ll ever get me to exercise again.
“I think when you first do stand-up, nothing will ever frighten you as much again. I didn’t get nervous because I never said I was a dancer. What’s the worst that could happen? You could fall over, who cares? Having already done stand-up it’s almost like I’ve seen the fires of hell.”
In perhaps a slightly less enjoyable quest and with far less sexy guidance, Fiona also attempted Celebrity Apprentice. She was kicked off the show first, describing the experience as ‘disappointing’ but not an ‘unhealthy amount’.
On being disappointed, Fiona said she was mostly dissatisfied at: “not being paid for the next week! But I knew I didn’t have a hell’s hope of getting past week one. That side of my brain just doesn’t activate.”
Fiona is indeed more creative than business. As such, I wondered what she thought of education failing to properly nurture creativity, in favour of more academic pursuits.
“I think in a hundred years we’ll look back at what we were doing and realise it’s nonsensical. Basically it’s still the same format as it was 100 years ago. They put kids in a room, facing the front, and looking at a board. The world has changed so much since that first classroom was set up, it’s unrecognisable. I don’t understand why we are still hanging on to this archaic institution, it seems crazy.”
Fiona admits she personally doesn’t have a magical solution; she will leave it to the academic-types that the education system benefited most. Instead Fiona remains content in telling her kids “the education system is a toothless tiger, don’t let it frighten you.”
While her children are encouraged to enrich their lives with creativity, Fiona admits: “it’s hard for your loved ones to see you, it’s pretty terrifying. I’ve heard it all from my children. Generally they argue with me about stretching the truth. It didn’t happen on this date, or it wasn’t that Uncle.”
Fiona admitted she felt nervous having her mother seeing her perform too. “My mother was quite critical of me. I remember once she said to me, ‘Why can’t you be more like Joan Rivers?’ I thought why can’t you be less like Joan Crawford?”
Fiona’s mother was at least prepared for her career choice. “I don’t think it was much of a surprise for Mum and Dad. There were seven of us but the seven siblings just spent our lives trying to make each other laugh, that was our culture.”
Fiona’s sister also pursued comedy, launching her career as a comic actress simultaneously to Fiona at the Adelaide Fringe. “Mum and Dad were getting on a bit when they had her. I always liked to say she looks beautiful but she’s basically just made up of old sperm and old eggs”.
Describing her sister as a concoction of antiquated eggs and sperm does conjure up an image of familial tomfoolery. This playful nature seems to have been passed down to Fiona’s daughter, who has a show in the upcoming Melbourne Fringe called Funny Rabbits.
How does Fiona feel about her daughter now using their relationship as material? “Proud, excited, nervous. I saw her do a show for the first time in Edinburgh last year.
“She opened her show with a beautifully, well-constructed joke about me. The comic in me thought it was gold, but the mother in me was thinking, ‘I’m gonna kill you!’ I get it from both sides, I get critiqued and now I get to be a nervous mother as well.”
When she isn’t fretting about, or threatening to kill her daughter, Fiona toured with The Divine Miss O. Fiona has decided to opt for more light-hearted material this year, shifting focus to ageing and being “a cranky old lady”.
Crankiness as a theme is indeed lighter than her last show, which was about her experience as an alcoholic. Many might assume that such material is psychologically arduous to revisit every night.
“On A Wing And A Prayer was completely autobiographical so I could spin it and say it was emotionally draining, but it just wasn’t. They were some of the funniest stories that I’ve got. Every night was really cathartic, I loved it.”
BY TESS WOODWARD
