Sydney Life

Revue season is here, folks. With Engo down and Law to come, the only respectable thing a girl can do on the Saturday night in between is...hot-foot it to Med Revue, of course!

The show began with a sexy doctors-and-nurses version of Robbie Williams' 'Let Me Entertain You' - or in Med's case, 'Let Me Infibrilate You' or some such medical jargon.* While the premise was funny, the fact that the audience couldn't really hear the words was a bit of a problem. However, as my friends pointed out, I could have forked out the $3 for a program so that I could sing-a-long with the printed lyrics.

After this rousing musical number, those future Dr McDreamy's delighted us all with their various skits - with stand-out performances from the boys of 'Brokeback Mineshaft,' the spot-on accent and mannerisms of Mr T, who played John Howard, and the two female lead singers, who should seriously consider getting down to the Seymour Centre a few weeks earlier for Idol auditions.

Like all good revues, though, I held out for the songs. I enjoyed 'Goodbye, My Liver,' which was accompanied by video footage. Miss A, sitting next to me, quite rightly commented that 'Med students are creepy,' when the video showed actual livers being placed in/on/beside various musical instruments, park benches and human bodies (live ones, which is probably worse than the alternative.) But it was definitely the West Side Story numbers that stole the show: the feud between the 'Meds' and the 'Dents' (rather than the 'Jets' and the 'Sharks') was a riot because it combined the totally unbelievable (the Footbridge as the locale of song-fuelled combat) with the completely realistic (it's alleged that Med students really do hate Dentistry students.) Mr HH shone as the stumbling and bumbling idiot (make of this comment what you will). It was definitely the highlight of the night.

I like watching revues because I enjoy pointing out those exceptional individuals who will leave their potential careers as doctors, lawyers and engineers (amongst others) to pursue their true passion and talents in the performing arts. The D-Generation (Tony Martin, Mick Molloy, Rob Sitch, Tom Gleisner, Santo Cilauro, Marg Downey and Magda Szubanski) met when they were performing the Med and Law revues at Melbourne Uni in the late 80s. Stephen Fry met Hugh Laurie, Emma Thompson and Ben Elton under similar circumstances at Cambridge a decade earlier. And of course, the Chaser boys met while performing Law Revue at Sydney University only a few years ago.

In terms of the star potential of the Med Revue, there were a few shining lights. But more important than the actual performances was the quality of the writing - the best example of this was the satirisation of the 'Violence Against Women: Australia Says No' campaigns, which became 'Violence Against Men, Australia Says No.' The clever docs used video footage in exactly the same way as those ads, drawing much laughter from the audience.

And of course, no revue is complete without a touch of XXX material. Yep, I'm talking about nudity, kids. I was promised full-frontal, but apparently, decency prevailed and the lucky (or perhaps, plucky) audience only saw some M15+ bits of bod, rather than the R18 I had looked forward to....in any case, the title of this blog refers to my reaction (and the reactions of those around me) when the boys showed their butts. We know it's winter boys, but when you're showing off your derriere, take a trip to the beauty salon and get some bronze on your booty!

*I know that this is incorrect. But I truly have no idea which word was used in the song title. Any suggestions are welcome.