Jackie Clarke will be paying homage to the great divas of the 20th and 21st centuries in her Jackie Goes Prima Diva show. Photo / Supplied
Jackie Clarke will be paying homage to the great divas of the 20th and 21st centuries in her Jackie Goes Prima Diva show. Photo / Supplied
When Jackie Clarke decided to put together a show, she turned to the women who had inspired her the most.
Growing up, the self-confessed “couch potato” would sit and watch MGM musicals on television.
“I was addicted to all the old musicals. I loved them all. I can remember the visceral physical feeling and the feeling I had when I saw Barbra Streisand in Funny Girl.
“People like that are just pure energy and they leave nothing on the floor. They don’t make them like that anymore, I tell ya that.”
Clarke will be performing her show, Jackie Goes Prima Diva, at the Old Dairy Factory in Norsewood on June 2, part of a tour organised by Arts on Tour NZ.
The show would pay homage to Judy Garland, Shirley Bassey, Peggy Lee, Barbra Streisand as well as more contemporary performers such as Dolly Parton, Kate Bush and Lady Gaga.
While many of those women were considered divas, it has become a term that has a negative connotation.
“It has become a kind of strangely pejorative term,” Clarke said.
“I don’t buy into that at all. I’m very direct in asking for what I need.”
She said she tried to be nice at all times but did expect people around her to give the same professional respect she gave them.
The idea for the show came about during the peak of Covid.
Clarke said the women who came to her mind were those who had been “absolutely inspirational”.
“They’re the sort of singers that I’ve avoided through my whole career because they’re so amazing, but I feel like I’m at an age and a stage where I can do them my own way. I can Jackiefy them and still feel that I’m totally doing them proud.”
Jackie Clarke has always had a 'gotta be me' approach to performing. Photo / Supplied
Jackie Clarke started her career in the late 80s / early 90s and was “fresh out of the box”.
“I didn’t know that I couldn’t be myself, so I’ve always been just delightfully me from day one.”
She always had her own style, from her approach to music and comedy to her “op shop eclectic” style of dress.
“That whole thing of ‘I gotta be me’ was something I just naturally did.”
She co-founded pop-comedy group When The Cat’s Been Spayed and also performed alongside Tina Cross and Suzanne Lynch as The Lady Killers, and worked with some famous names in the New Zealand music scene as well as performing in musical theatre.
Clarke said in those early days it was a very different time.
“So you could kind of put your stake in the ground.”
However, she never had any grand plan for her career.
“Everything I’ve ever done has been some random organic one thing leads to another.”
She said in New Zealand, people in the creative industry could make their own way and do their own thing, but these days it was harder.
“Every artist that’s trying to do something now, they’re kind of directly in competition with the whole world. Which in many ways is wonderful, but in many ways it’s easy to start but really hard to carry on.
“And so I am a hardy perennial which is somebody who’s managed to carry on for decades, which is kind of rare.”
Clarke’s focus for doing the tour was going to small places she wouldn’t normally go and taking the opportunity to go the “untravelled path”.
She was looking forward to doing the show in Norsewood.
“I’m expecting it’ll be a lovely little soiree and it’s actually dinner and a show, which is even more up my alley. It takes me back to those classic showrooms.
“I’m taking these songs and these vibes and this passion, pure female wahine toa energy into the tiniest little nooks and crannies and basically letting it rip.”
Jackie Goes Prima Diva will be at the Old Dairy Factory in Norsewood on June 2, starting at 7pm. Tickets are $99 and includes a two-course meal.
