When Sydney Theatre Company announced their musical adaptation of Australian screen favourite Muriel’s Wedding, the main question was obviously: who can play Muriel Heslop? Who can capture the gloriously goofy, cringe-worthily gauche bogan from Porpoise Spit who stole our ’90s hearts, and was secretly every one of us?
Writer (and original film director) PJ Hogan and director Simon Phillips found the answer in LA – “where this young woman was pretentiously studying”: after 11 months of looking for their Muriel, a tape arrived of 20-year-old Melbourne born and raised actress Maggie McKenna (daughter of Kath and Kim star Gina Riley) auditioning. “We thought by George, we’ve got her,” Phillips recalls.
McKenna, who did a pretty good impression of Toni Colette’s famous tongue-out face at the Sydney cast announcement, said of the character: “Muriel is an outsider, a dork, likes a bit of a laugh – I think people can relate to that. And she’s not the typical ‘leading lady’, and I think audiences will really like that.”
Playing Betty Heslop, who Simon Phillips describes as the “emotional epicentre” of Muriel’s Wedding, is beloved stage and screen star Justine Clarke.
The rest of Muriel’s “wastrel family” will be played by Briallen Clarke (Joanie), Michael Whalley (Perry) and Connor Sweeney (Malcolm). Helen Dallimore plays the beauty consultant and perennial bad penny Deidre Chambers. Tania Degano (Queen bee of the local bitches) will be played by Christie Whelan Browne.
You can read the full cast list here.
Tickets for Muriel’s Wedding The Musical are already on sale. Read more about the production – which will be set in the YouTube present.