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Cooee Cabaret in WA

Unearthing young talent

Beth Taylor

After successful tours of Victoria, New South Wales, Queensland, Tasmania and South Australia, the Cooee Cabaret stage show is going out with a bang. The final tour will take place in Western Australia from May 22 – 30, with dates in Mandurah, Margaret River, Bunbury and Perth.

As always, we’re including local performers in every place we visit, and the line-up for Western Australia is looking particularly youthful and fun.

Caitlin Cassidy performing as Disgrace Kelly. *Image taken by Tobey Black*

One of the exciting performers to be featured is contemporary opera singer Caitlin Cassidy, performing as Disgrace Kelly (pictured top left). Caitlin will be singing an operatic version of Kylie Minogue’s ‘Can’t Get You Out of My Head’ (2001). Caitlin promises echoes of Glenn Close’s Alex Frost in Fatal Attraction (1987) in her interpretation, enhancing the already-intense sentiments expressed in the song:

‘There’s a dark secret in me / Don’t leave me lost in your arms / Set me free / Feel the need in me’

Caitlin, who is 24 years old, studied opera at the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts (WAAPA), recently completing her masters. She is currently a Young Artist with the West Australian Opera Company. On the side, she also performs as the cheeky and irreverent Disgrace Kelly with the burlesque troop Sugar Blue Burlesque.

Caitlin says that although she is passionate about conventional opera, ‘there’s only so many opportunities’, so her cabaret work is ‘a way to extend my possibilities as a performer’.

Kate Wilson performing at the Fairbridge Festival. *Image taken by Nathan Barnden*

Kate Wilson is a performance poet based in Bunbury, Western Australia. Kate won her first poetry slam in 2008, and ever since she’s been performing around Western Australia with her fast-paced poetry designed to ‘make your heart race’. Her poetry-driven advocacy for women’s issues earned her a place in the WA Women’s Hall of Fame on International Women’s Day in 2011.

We are thrilled to have Caitlin, Kate and the other performers on tour with us.

We will be publishing a selection of local performances from this tour on the NFSA’s YouTube Channel in June. In the meantime, you can watch some of the fabulous performances from past tours here: