PERTH-born actress Kylie Farmer is revelling in her first musical role.
Farmer will join Christine Anu and former Australian Idol winner Casey Donovan in Black Swan State Theatre Company’s production of The Sapphires, a Helpmann Award-winning musical about four Koori sisters who find themselves entertaining troops in the war zone of Vietnam.
“I am excited about showing another side to my craft that not a lot of people have seen,” Farmer said.
“I did my first sing-along with the band the other day, and how awesome for someone to have their first ever band rehearsal with Christine Anu and Casey Donovan.
“It was wonderful, the band was great and we all sounded so good.”
Set in the 1960s after the Indigenous referendum, The Sapphires reflects the changing cultural values of the era.
“As the play is set after the referendum, these ladies can finally be classed as citizens, apply for passports and whatever travel documents they needed at that time,” she said.
“They were probably the first ladies to leave the country of Aboriginal background, and if you take yourself back to that time and place, it is just amazing and mind blowing.”
Farmer said since getting involved with the play, she had found that not a lot of people in the Indigenous community, let alone the wider Australian community, were aware it was based on true events.
“These ladies actually travelled over there at that time,” she said.
“I first heard the story about six years ago from one of my really good friends, Rachael Mazza, who formed the first production of it.
“I have actually seen the full show and I know the writer and one of his cousins. There is an intimate closeness there, not overly, but enough to be fully aware of who these people were and the events that took place.”
Farmer likened the tone of the musical to that of the uplifting Bran Nue Dae, which opened in cinemas last week.
“Bran Nue Dae and The Sapphires are being told to challenge our audiences to look through the same colour-blind eyes that we have,” she said.
While the play has strong Indigenous themes, Farmer said she wanted the public to view it as an “Australian musical.”
“These are genuine stories and Australia should look at this as an Australian musical not just an Indigenous musical,” she said.
“Indigenous stories are stereotyped to be that of stories of the stolen generation or traditional cultural stories, but maybe our wider community needed to hear those earlier stories first before being able to move onto stories that come after that healing journey.”
The Sapphires is at the Playhouse Theatre from January 23 to February 10.