When we speak to the duo, they are just a few days out from previewing the show at Williamsburg’s new aerialist and workshop space The Muse, and are psyched to be combining elements from previously successful outings like Gypsy Little: Sexual Psychic and The Kama Sutra Brought To Life On A Trapeze. “We’re so ready for this,” Trixie enthuses, with an almost unbelievable amount of energy for a performer sitting on the couch in the midst of a press junket. “We’ve never been to Australia, in any capacity, so it’s going to be so much fun to just get down there, and start doing our thing in the summer sun… I just [hope] everyone else is ready to go too!”
The duo have built up an enviable live reputation from shows that combine striptease, trapeze and cabaret with a uniquely dynamic performance chemistry. “No show is ever the same,” a remarkably costume-free Monkey says, from the next seat on the couch. “I honestly don’t think it could be, because we’re just always looking at how to take it to stranger and more maniacal places. We’re not really a scripted act, as such, because we like to keep the crowd participating and adding their interpretations to what we do. It’s always a ‘strap-in, let’s go!’ experience, and people always have a great time. You can walk into our show having absolutely no idea what’s going to happen, and wind up spanking a monkey. There’s not a lot of shows where that kind of business goes on.”
The cute mythology behind the act tells of a little girl called Tiny T and her pet monkey Muddles who grew up together in the circus as victims of cruel treatment from T’s mean Uncle Tosso – a knife thrower, naturally. After being struck by a bolt of unusual pink lightning one evening the two became trapped in their then roles. Trixie was fortunate to increase her performative stocks with the retention of her childlike height and gigantic cuteness, while Muddles got the rough end of the electric shock and became the Evil Hate Monkey of the title.
Not that Monkey himself has any issue with the way things have turned out, excitedly telling me about the twists and hijinks of their previous festival appearances. “We’ve played the Virgin Mobile Music Festival here in Baltimore for the last four years and it’s been so much fun every time,” he says. “The last time I caught a ride on The Flaming Lips golfcart…”
“You mean you hijacked their golfcart!” interrupts a laughing Trixie, before she allows Monkey to sheepishly qualify: “Well, I don’t think they knew it was going to happen. And I did jump on board their cart a number of times throughout the day, without being asked… I guess you could say I hijacked it. But that’s how it is with us because you never know what you’re going to get,” he says with a wry grin. “You never know when a monkey might climb on the roof of your golfcart. Anything can happen.”
Bootleg Alley promise to provide a heady mix of the weird and wonderful has got the Americans excited, with Trixie firing off a jumble of questions: “have you spoken to the other performers yet? What are they like? Have you seen the Australian performers before?” Is it fair to say that she envisages spending all her non-performance time wandering through the crowd, checking out all that Le Boudoir and Happyland have to offer? “You bet! We’re gunna see ’em all! Like I said before, we’re just so excited to be coming down to Australia and we want to be as involved as possible, and we want to make as much trouble as possible. Actually,” she pauses, as if considering the legal ramifications of her last statement, before continuing, “we wanna make enough trouble that you remember us, and ask us back. But we want to actually be allowed back in to the country. After all, the Harvest people are sending you the best and strangest entertainment money can buy, so we hate to crush you all by not coming back!”
Monkey is circumspect when it comes to honing their show for an antipodean festival crowd. “We know that festival crowds have a very different set of expectations, because they are not as captive an audience as what we’re used to. We understand that we have to work harder but it’s also exciting because there’s the possibility of catching people off guard in a moment they would never have encountered before. People are really not sure what they’re going to get when they walk into the tent, and neither are we, to be honest. The truth is we revel in the off guard, the off script moments where the crowd is participating and interpreting. That’s what we actively go searching for, and that’s what makes it new every time, and that’s why it’s always exciting.”
BY BENJAMIN COOPER
