It’s been five long years between drinks but The Block star turned real estate agent Amity Dry is finally returning to her roots.
Having enjoyed a successful career in cabaret before her meteoric rise to national fame on The Block in its inaugural 2003 season, Dry is preparing to bring a musical to the Adelaide Fringe – her first Fringe in five years.
“I did one small show in that time but really it’s been five years since I staged a full production,” she said.
“I’d spent 25 years in the arts I think I’d done six Fringe seasons in a row at that point.
“The show that I was touring, I think we did a hundred dates of that or something, so I was busy before covid, so it’s been a huge change to go from that being my full-time job full- time passion to now real estate being those two things.
Amity Dry during the first season of The Block.
Amity Dry. Pic: supplied.
“Back in 2017 we did a West End showcase and as early as 2019 I was back and forth from London working on rewrites and it was all in development and everything was looking really exciting for an international debut, and then obviously when covid happened everything just stopped and it’s taken this long to get it going.
“Despite the fact that I’m really happy in real estate and I really enjoy it, this show in particular has always been unfinished business for me.
“I first debuted this show The Perfect Life at the Fringe in 2011 and I’ve been working on it for that amount of time – so the daughter I was pregnant with when I started is now 15 and a half, which is crazy, so with all that time and effort and love that’s gone into this show, it just felt like it was never quite got to where I wanted it, and now this is my opportunity to do that.”
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Now a successful real estate selling multimillion-dollar listings (after returning to The Block in 2013), Dry said that call to return to the stage had never gone away.
“Particularly for this show, because I believe in it so much,” she said.
“I have seen worldwide when we’ve played it, the response that I get from particularly women in the audience, and I think it’s as important as ever to be doing a show that speaks to women about our experiences, and I just believe in that so much, and I just needed to get it back out there.
Dry in her show Fortified
Dry in concert.
“I think I feel more grateful for the opportunity to be on stage because I guess I took it for granted – it was the job I did and one that I would always get to do.
“And then when that was taken away, now every time I get to sing, every time I get to be on stage, I just enjoy every second of it.”
Her musical The Perfect Life explores the messy realities of modern womanhood with humour and honesty.
But a triumphant return won’t come without hard work, Dry says.
“I have to get match fit again,” she laughs.
“I have to make it like five years of not performing never happened.
“Just getting a show of this magnitude back up again takes a huge amount of work.
“I am so excited about the cast – I’ve got national leading ladies, so Helpman Award winner Kerrie Anne Greenland, who was Ellen in Miss Saigon, and Chloe Zuel, who was Eliza in Hamilton.
Amity Dry in The Perfect Life
Dee Farnell in The Perfect Life
Chloe Zuel in The Perfect Life
Kerrie Anne Greenland in The Perfect Life
“This is the best of the best of musical theatre performing in the Adelaide Fringe.
“Just the fact that when I approached them and sent them the script they read it and said: ‘yes we absolutely believe in this show and we want to come to Adelaide and do it’ was exciting and gave me confidence to think: ‘this show needs to be done again’ and I’m really thrilled to be doing it in the Fringe again which is where it all started.”
While the cast is busy learning their parts from their homes in three different states for now, Dry said the rubber hits the road in February when in-person rehearsals start in Adelaide.
“I can’t wait to be in the rehearsal room with this amazing cast,” she said.
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She said while performing on stage was a passion of hers, a large part of that skillset translated across to real estate.
“Both jobs are very much about connecting with people and I think that’s why I took to real estate naturally,” she said.
“I get to fulfil my creative outlet through all the transformations I’m doing for my clients, but this is going to be exciting to having this creative outlet, which I’ve really missed.
“The response from audience members and from people who’ve always come to see my shows has been really exciting and it’s heartening that all of these people who’ve said: ‘we’ve been waiting years for you to come back’ are now buying tickets straight away – that’s very exciting.
Amity Dry of OC
“Because we’ve got a cast full of parents and mothers, everyone’s really walking the talk of the show in that they’re juggling it around babies and two-year-olds.
“Our musical director has a three-month-old so everybody’s trying to work among that, which was really important to me that people involved in the show were living what this show is about, which is relationships and parenthood, particularly because it is so hard to do this job and to tour when you are a mother.
“We’ve got four women on stage who are all juggling young children with touring and being a full-time performer, which is really tricky so I’ve made sure also that I’m providing a work environment that means that people can bring kids or juggle around kids and learn the bulk of the show at home while they’re with their kids, so that it’s also making it possible for mums to continue to work in an industry that they love.”
The Perfect Life runs at the Arts Theatre from March 12 to March 21.
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