HOUSE OF ROT

We started talking about this show in early 2025, on a day off in Adelaide during our tour of Hedwig and the Angry Inch. Both semi-tipsy in a pool, Dino told Vicky that they had been thinking about a show inspired by Grey Gardens for some time, and that Paul and Addy would be perfect. Vicky exclaimed “let’s gooo…!” Much laughter ensued. A wine glass may have gone underwater. A show on brand from the outset.

This work began with an impulse and an emotional trajectory before we found its bones. What does it mean to live inside collapse, and what parallels can be drawn between the evocative world of Grey Gardens and the contemporary queer experience? HOUSE OF ROT is by no means a recreation of the documentary; no one could ‘play’ the iconic Big and Little Edie better than themselves. There’s no point. How could we create something that honoured the spirit of those women, their legacy as accidental queer cult icons, their existential chaos and humanity captured on film, while creating something especially for Paul and Adam? These are two iconoclastic performers on opposite ends of their career arc, both navigating moving through the world as human and artist as outsiders. Both willing to push performance to its edges, and both champions of liveness and aliveness as survival tools.

HOUSE OF ROT aspires to play out on these multiple levels, though a style of performance that fuses the language of absurdism with the high-camp of repertoire from the cabaret canon. Ambitious in scope, to be both cinematically epic and painfully, comically intimate. We utilise songs that have been built (and broken down and built again) to re-focus the melodies and lyrics, allowing them to resonate through cycles of time, location and viewpoint whilst remaining unequivocally – staunchly – in the room. Anachronism is a cabaret-maker’s ultimate weapon in demonstrating how our world shifts, while still staying awfully the same. Questions of legacy, aging and inheritance are all folded into the mix. It’s a layered experience.

The creative brains of our co-collaborators is a deeply indelible element of this world: the intricate threads of queer history and fashion as symbolism in Nicol & Ford’s handmade couture; the incisive rigour of our dramaturg Leila Enright; invocation high and low through Brockman’s lighting design; and portals of consciousness explored on film, created in conjunction with Babi Bertoldi and with deep thanks to the generous Andy Cook.

Our thanks as well to our production wrangler Thomas Bensley; to audio-smoothing mixing producer Jarrad Payne; to the three key orgs who have supported this debut tour: Adelaide Cabaret Festival, Malthouse and Hayes Theatre Co; and our industry-changing, tirelessly supportive producer, Green Door Theatre Co.

It’s hard to talk about a new work, especially before it’s had any witnesses beyond the rehearsal room. But for us, ultimately, this is a queer love letter: to all of us who put on a giant hat and still search for the sun.