From her attack of the guilts last year, Cal Wilson has recovered sufficiently to wonder what her life might have looked like had she taken different paths. It Could Have Been Me, Wilson’s MICF 2014 show, explores the day-to-day existence of some alternative Cals including a discontented wife, a performance artist stuck in a small town doing fairy parties, an earnest feminist poet and a ‘very sleazy’ male author who tries to chat up the others. Wilson’s background in theatresports gives her the ability to change characters easily. The challenge in this show is not so much to do with managing the different personalities she performs as managing the number of props the show requires. “I’m never going to do a show that requires two suitcases of props again! There are little costume changes, and little gag props as we go along.”
“There’s not too much self-reflection in the final product,” she says. “It was a really thoughtful process going through it. But I’ve pared away too much introspection.” Wilson has approached this year’s show differently in that this time she’s working with a director, Anne Browning. “She’s pushed me, with the structure of the show,” Wilson notes. “It’s much better than previously; we’ve pushed the characters; I’m playing with the poignant moments.”
Working with a director has made Wilson look at patterns she might have fallen into when creating comedy. “Normally when I’m writing a show I come up with bits and put them together. I follow the same pattern. The show was originally a set of different monologues. Anne suggested having the characters interact with each other. They all come from me, the parts of me, the me that never made it out of Christchurch. The kids’ fairy is very concerned with safety and danger. I come from a family of worriers. She’s still doing awful gigs, like those corporate gigs where bank managers think they can touch you; she’s basically jaded and realising she’s never going to make it out of having to do those hard jobs. The author is a writer of erotic science fiction – he writes really awful erotica. I loved reading science fiction as a kid and I’m fascinated by the whole 50 Shades of Gray phenomena. Badly written but so popular. And I used to write poetry.” The characters get to challenge their creator as well as each other. “They each ask me why I made them this way,” Wilson continues. “I do love them all; I play with them all. They are exaggerated but I do love them ‘cos I’ve made them. They’re strong characters.”
After receiving an invitation from Karen Koren of The Gilded Balloon, one of Edinburgh’s top comedy rooms, Wilson is taking It Could Have Been Me to this year’s Fringe where she will re-enact her experiences of starting out ten years ago. “I’ll be doing my own flyering,” she says, “Trying out new audiences. It will be like starting again. I’m really excited about it.”
Wilson says she’s pretty happy with the choices she’s made in life. ”I’m happy I took the risk,” she says, about her comedy career. “One of the choices I’m happy about is that I stopped finding the bad boys interesting,” she adds. “The good guys are the nice men.”
BY LIZA DEZFOULI
Venue: Melbourne Town Hall – Powder Room, Cnr Swanston & Collins St, CBD
Dates: Currently playing until April 20
Times: 7.15pm (Sunday 6.15pm)
Tickets: $26-$32
