From judge to chimneysweep
Matt Lee’s spent almost his entire life on stage, having started his professional dance career at the tender age of five.
But it was his stint as a judge on the Channel 10 talent show So You Think You Can Dance that elevated his public profile to the extent that he’s now been able to ‘cross over’ to his first ever leading role, as chimneysweep Bert in the Australian production of Mary Poppins.
“I’ve been the understudy for 16 years now, so to finally be able to have a character I can call my own is awesome. Of course, everyone now thinks I’m just the guy with the hat who sits behind the desk [on SYTYCD] and has a lot of opinions,” Lee told the Star Observer.
“It’s nice to be able to get back on stage and show people ‘Hey, this is why I was chosen to sit behind that desk in the first place!’ ”
We spoke to the amiable performer after he’d come off stage from a midweek matinee performance of the show. He’d spent the previous night living it up at one of Kylie Minogue’s Sydney concerts — thankfully, he didn’t have to tackle Supercalifragilistikexpialidocious with a hangover.
“I was a good boy, I was home in bed by 12! I had a few dancer friends in the show, so it was good to support them,” he said.
The Australian production of Mary Poppins debuted in Melbourne almost a year ago before moving to Sydney in recent months. It followed an exhaustive search for the lead actress, with relative unknown Verity Hunt-Ballard landing the plum role.
Lee insisted the well-documented hunt was no publicity stunt.
“They really had a hard time finding that Mary Poppins who’d be practically perfect in every way, but I think they really have in Verity. We’ve had many bigwigs from Disney International tell us that Verity is the best Mary they’ve seen from the stage productions around the world.”
A glowing appraisal, considering Ballard-Hunt had big Julie Andrews-sized shoes to fill. Lee had perhaps a slightly less daunting task ahead of him, with the original Bert, Dick Van Dyke, pilloried after the film’s 1964 release for his questionable attempt at a cockney accent.
“Van Dyke got such a hard time for his accent in the movie that I knew I didn’t want to mimic that at all,” Lee admitted. “I did want to see the show on Broadway before we started though, but the producers were adamant that Verity and I didn’t see it, because they wanted us to create our own fresh roles.”
It challenges the perception of American ‘McMusicals’ arriving in our theatres with a strict template for Australian performers to adhere to.
“A carbon copy of how it’s done overseas? They definitely didn’t want that. We were free to develop our own characters. All I can do is my best, and if people enjoy that — wonderful. If they don’t like it, I’m sorry, I can’t really do much about that!”
info: Mary Poppins is now playing at the Capitol Theatre. www.disney.com.au/marypoppins
