Halo Dolly

Melbourne International Comedy Festival 2005

Sex in the City meets Six Feet Under in Fiona Harris’ first solo show “Halo Dolly”

Everyone’s been to a funeral; you just don’t expect it to be your own.  Dolly discovers that as if being dead isn’t bad enough, her eulogy stinks, her sister’s already wearing her clothes and they’re playing a Mariah Carey song – Did these people know her at all?! Dolly is determined to find out why the people who were supposed to know her best don’t seem to know her at all.  She takes a trip back in time to dig through the humiliating and hilarious events that warped and shaped her.  Along the way she discovers the truth about boot-scooting, why she should never have gone paint-balling, and wonders if she will be allowed into the cool group in the afterlife.  Who wouldn’t want to know what people will say about them at their funeral?  Unfortunately Dolly is discovering that there is a down side to being an observer at your own farewell.

REVIEW

Halo Dolly is charming. Fiona Harris’ polished script reveals that funerals can sometimes be hilarious sources of disinformation.Harris, as Dolores Rielly (aka Dolly), finds herself watching her own funeral and sees for the first time the duplicity of those gathered to send her off. She plays numerous other characters, such as her control freak of a mother, her bitchy “good” friend, and a loud American friend. Dolly also has flashbacks to her childhood and to the uncertain teenage years. The re-enactment of Dolly’s unusual death, in particular, is one of the highlights of this excellent comedic theatre.

Reviewer: Joel Crotty

April 8, 2005

Fiona talks about her 2005 Melbourne International Comedy Festival show, “Halo Dolly” on Bert Newton’s GMA

PRESS

Metro: Fast Laugh – “Some very positive feedback about Fiona Harris’ solo show about a woman named Dolly who attends her own funeral. Not to be confused with comics dying on stage. Harris is not one of them.”

Laugh After Death, The Age: http://www.theage.com.au/news/Arts/Laugh-after-death/2005/03/18/1110913752491.html