Housewife to Megastar: the man behind Dame Edna’s face furniture  

1: The Death of a Great Comedian

2:  Growing Up in Moonee Ponds

3: The Birth of Edna, Housewife and Superstar

4: Changing the Chat Show Genre

5: Sir Les Patterson

6: The World according to the Dame

 

 

1: The Death of a Great Comedian

One of the great losses among many disturbing events of 2023 was the news that Barry Humphries had died. We are now approaching his birthday, 17th February, ready to commemorate his legacy.

He died in Sydney on April 22^nd. He was 89 and a genuine one-of-a-kind Aquarian maverick. The age is significant as it comes just after the third Saturn return when Humphries would have been aware of all his  behavioural patterns learned from his 2nd Saturn return back in 1993 when his autobiography ‘More Please’ won the Ackerley prize, and hopefully he had absorbed and profited from the hard lessons of Kronos. But had clearly built a solid career from the ground up, so Saturn brings well earned rewards.  Saturn can be strong in its own sign, Aquarius, especially if conjunct the North Node, which would make it even more pivotal if not very easy to manage.

British comedian, Matt Lucas said on Twitter: “I wonder if all geniuses are as lovely as Barry Humphries. Thank you for delighting and inspiring us. Quite simply, you were the greatest.” He made a huge dent  in the comedy universe so large it is difficult to contemplate who could fill it, because it was not just that he created Barry McKenzie, Dame Edna Everage, the ‘priapic and inebriated’ Sir Les Paterson, and the much softer, poignant, wispier Sandy Stone and others, there was his own person of Barry Humphries who was the last one to emerge clearly in the public eye.

The Barry Humphries persona, the dandy, aesthete and raconteur, almost became a stage creation too, as much an ‘invention’ as all the others. It was not easy to tell where the boundaries between Barry and Edna lay- there was overlap. But the loss brought by his death was felt the world over and he was without doubt Australia’s biggest entertainment export.

The word ‘comedy’ barely describes the powerful social, political acerbic wit and insight with which Barry in all his forms, could turn any ordinary word or phrase and playfully twist it around to get people to laugh. It is high level satire in which the phrase ‘pointing percy at the porcelain’ actually became genuine ‘Australianese’ even though Humphries just made it up for his cartoon strip.

The gallery of characters Humphries created are pointed at human foibles. You could call him a kind of ‘mockingbird’ -much like the Kookaburra– as the characters he created are court jesters, poking constant fun at their behaviours, their words, but especially Edna was able to get into the hearts of the public, create memorable phrases like memes, be apparently friends with celebrities and of the royals so the joke is on them. A very strong Mercury might be indicated and it is there next to Mars in Pisces and opposite Neptune.

All that Barry Humphries achieved can be described as eccentric, irascible, grotesque, outrageous erudite and maverick so to discern that the hardworking talent underneath takes some discernment. He loved shock tactics and doing parodies, going against the grain, of challenging the mainstream, which may have been the Dadaist underneath. Dame Edna was not exactly a conventional drag queen as Edna believes she is real, not just a man in a dress and face furniture, but a full-on challenge our notion of what is real and what is imaginary and that pushed his performances and TV appearances beyond drag into its own unique category.

He was a kaleidoscopic man in many ways:  an actor, author, comedian, entertainer, collector or rare books and paintings, a poet, a painter, a raconteur, a social observer and when probed by interviewers who dared to ask, refused to be to pigeonholed by any labels, arrogant in an innocent way and still somehow with a ‘human’ touch. All this is very Aquarian– sometimes riffed as ‘Aqueerian.’ and the word ‘genius’ is bandied about a lot about Humphries.

2: Growing up in Moonee Ponds

In the early 1940s the young Humphries superbright, feared by teachers, who was good at seeking attention and flaunting.  He always managed to get into the newspapers very early on for public trickery and ‘performance’ art, appearing with a valet on a Melbourne train. He was always a spanner in the works, wishing to stand out, and on the ‘Occupation’ field in passport applications he would say ‘Dadaist’. If they did not know what that was, they did not say. But he saw himself as ‘artist’ in the sense of Marcel Duchamp was, twisting and turning objects on their heads, going against  mainstream culture with just a few clever ideas like a pair of shoes joined at the toes into one long shoe. This followed Duchamp’s lead with the famous urinal placed in a museum for the first time- upside down. He was a frustrated artist that can make people very dangerous.

He was born 17^th February, 1934, at 6am so it’s not surprising that he can claim the zodiac sign that rules electricity, oddballs, and someone often born way ahead of their time. But to have the Sun in the 12^th close to the Ascendant would make him bound for stardom, and to have a turbo T- Square of Jupiter in Libra (Air), Uranus/Ceres in Aries (Fire) and Pluto at the apex in Cancer (Water). These three signs are Cardinal so along with a Moon in Aries there is an abundance of force fertile, original and expansive. This could be the source of why he worked so hard as stage shows are physically taxing for so many decades, and never diminished as he grew older, he kept on honing his talent.

The barbed wit and tossing and turning of phrases could well from the conjunction of Mars and Mercury. This proximity gives sharpness to words and so is linked to the art of satire which is more than just a joke, but a whole critique of society. These two are lodged in the sign of wit, but in the sign of Pisces his rising sign, and they draw of deep resources of invention, the many subtle layers of humour and innuendo in what is said and what is not said, only implied. But also it points to his baffling nature. You have to work through all the layers of deceit to find the real person behind the masks.

Beware what fulminates out of the suburbs as Dame Edna and Sir Les were the artistic reaction to the philistinism and lack of culture that breeds there. But it started in the suburbs, where he drew the battle lines early on and overcompensated. He achieved his revenge on all who were either afraid or disappointed in him in Moonee Ponds by becoming mega famous and especially for those whose minds are way too literal to grasp the artistry of humorous satire.

Then, after promptings from friends, around 1955, he created Dame Edna- named after a nanny he once had- and gradually the Dame morphed from being at first shy and tentative, with a shrill voice, to winning the lovely mother contest as an ordinary housewife, then to become the ever more outrageous Glamazon megastar,  legend, an icon, and even, potentially, to become leader of her own religion. There was no stopping Dame Edna. All this was done by making the planned jokes look totally improvised, by the character being fleshed out with a history and family network, by a wit so barbed it clicked with audiences. It all required a fluent imagination – Mercury in Pisces conjunct asteroid Pallas – that strategic wisdom- and this  provocative style was symbolised by the protuberant gladiolus which is not exactly subtle in its appearance.

3: The Birth of Edna, Housewife and Superstar

It is quite spooky to think that the entity that was Dame Edna was most likely a Sagittarian, but it kind of makes sense and matches Barry Humphries MC in Sagittarius. I say this not about when she was conceived, or the Dame Edna born in Wagga Wagga  in  ‘My Gorgeous Life’ but when the character Dame Edna first pulled back the curtains and stepped tentatively on stage. This was 13th December 1955 in Melbourne.

The Sun was conjunct the North Node there. She had Moon in Sagittarius and a Gemini Ascendant perfect for a chat show host whose aim was to interact with audiences as a chatterbox. The waspish sharpness and sexual innuendoes could come from that Mars in Scorpio and Eros in Scorpio.

If we go with this chart Mercury is on the Galactic Centre. In India this is known as the determining point of the Yugas, precessions, and as Vishnanabhi -the navel of Krishna- a fact that would have surely tickled Dame Edna. It is the ‘root’ power bringing insights seemingly from nowhere into the mix.

There’s an element of the hyperreal in Edna, not to mention kitsch. She was too good to be true, all glaringly in your face, but nevertheless hilarious and truthful and the laughter became a conduit of deep insight and revelation. But people are carried along by the more preposterous glasses.

But there is in fact a PNA (Personal Name Asteroid) called Edna (# 445) and who would have thought it. This asteroid was conjunct his Venus in Aquarius at this time. It is almost a cliche to say  Sagittarians are blunt as honesty is their policy as it is with Edna ‘but whatever they say, ‘call them old fashioned but they mean that nicely, possums’. So it’s rare to take offence.  Some did and complained the humour was too risqué, but remember that Humphries was a close friend of fellow outspoken Aussie Aquarian, Germaine Greer.

In the chart of Barry Humphries asteroid Edna is at 6° of Taurus. Taurus is ruled by Venus and that makes a rough square to the position of Edna in Edna’s chart at 13° midway between Venus and Saturn/North Node, ruled by Uranus ( but also Saturn). So there’s a Venus/North Node signature here describing aptly the ultimate glamour-puss, with all that diamante in the glasses, all the  jewellery and finery Edna displayed to make other women jealous. But also what drove her energy as it also points to the dominance of Edna, the ability to draw people in, the power alluring power she had, and her enduring status in the entertainment industry. This is also Barry’s Uranus in Aries at 24° conjunct asteroid Ceres, the grieving mother- an archetype she played along with the glamour-puss and with the loss of one of her children Lois to a marauding koala bear. But with Uranus making it ‘spunky’ in Aries.

Although the sun was in Taurus when Barry Humphries died in April of 2023, asteroid Edna was at 22° of Sagittarius looping back to her first appearance and zodiac sign two degrees from her natal Sun in that sign.

4: Changing the Chat Show Genre

There’s even a bit of and subterfuge with that Neptune in the 7th both baffling and entertaining friends, lovers and audiences. I think Humphries would have made a great spy with that Mars in Pisces opposite Neptune in Virgo which can make up story after story so that people are utterly baffled by what is true and end up believing the falsehood.

Edna was better than any spin doctor mainly at making up her own mythology. After a while no one noticed that Dame Edna had revolutionised the chat show genre in two ways.

Firstly, Barry turned up as a chat show guest as Edna- a fictional character- not as Barry Humphries- defying disbelief, and getting people to act as if she were more real than Barry Humphries, the person behind the mask. No one else was ever allowed to do that, let alone get away with it, but chat shows hosts like Russell Harty, Michael Parkinson, Jonathan Ross and even Joan Rivers (who alone among them could give back as good as she got) lapped it up in spades, couldn’t get enough of the Dame on their couch to do their work for them.

Secondly, Dame Edna changed the entire format of her own chat shows which in her hands was no longer just two people talking on chairs ‘ a monologue interrupted by nonentities’ , but by placing it unto imaginative scenarios and weaving in the guests into the story, giving them roles to play like satellites One was her like her ski resort home in Switzerland, where she visited her money,  or her Hollywood mansion, next door to actor George Hamilton, writing bit parts for all the celebrities she interviewed. Burgess Meredith was her butler. Harrison Ford her carpenter, Charlton Heston her chef, Ringo Starr her orchestra maestro, and Robin Williams as her Pizza delivery boy, treating them all with casual brutality and doses of humiliation that they began to like.

In the Dame Edna Treatment in 2007 the chat show format had morphed even further into a glamourous therapy spa, so her celebrity guests those who dared book an appointment, were designated as ‘patients’ who came for ‘treatment,’ that could be follicle replacement, hot baths or disastrous colonic irrigation with Mr. Bean. She interviewed her old friend Mel Gibson who was half naked in the Sauna. Only Dame Edna could get away with this.

Did not Edna say she was often very ‘psychic’ and that her favourite word was ‘spooky’. Also that she was a ‘Swami’ and did not do ‘shows’ exactly but therapy sessions that were really like benedictions for the audience? Could this be the Sagittarius Sun talking? Humphries said there was a power dynamic going on where ‘embarrassment becomes a benediction’ when they were dragged up on stage and mocked by this ‘vulture disguised as a bird of paradise.’ On one occasion Dame Edna picked on a middle aged woman in the audience and went to collect her to bring her on stage. As she got close she smelled her and looked her up and down. With a broad smile she said approvingly ‘you smell nice’. And a second later – the timing is crucial- ‘I love garlic prawns’. But the woman loved all the attention.

I saw one of these shows myself on Broadway. But I was not baptised on stage, not Ednafied. The Neptune opposing the first house of Pisces might imply all the quasi-religious overtones, even of a ‘cult’ leader Dame Edna often toyed with in ways to self promote.

Not all Aquarians have this paradigm-shifting ability bending genre to suit their own needs. Not many have extra talent which is the ability to make people wince as much as laugh – many are way too serious with that Saturn as traditional ruler. But Barry or as Dame Edna said ‘to heal’ much as a Swami would heal his adoring audience just by being in his presence.

Where did all that come from? Saturn is also in Aquarius conjunct the North Node making career and work the overriding goal and Dame Edna often said she thought it best to put her career first before family and worked tirelessly hardly ever retiring to keep her audiences happy. But there may have been a karmic energy to this nodal drive to be that indefatigable ‘performance junkie’.

Edna is not ‘acting’ technically as she is by definition as real and totally rounded a ‘human’ who just happens to be ignorant and therefore able to say exactly what she wants regardless of whose feelings might be hurt.

There’s an entire family nexus. Edna, housewife, megastar from Moonee Ponds, formerly Edna May Beazley, had a husband Norman ‘Norm’ Everage, whose prostate problems unfortunately got the better of him. She had a daughter Val Mai who is a kleptomaniac, and a son Kenneth Montgomery Everage, who was once described as a ‘homeopath’, successful couturier designer of Edna’s frocks, and secretary of the Barbara Stanwyck appreciation society. She had a mother who had only occasional moments of lucidity kept behind bars at a ‘maximum security twilight home for the permanently bewildered.’

Edna also had with her in tow, a long-suffering bridesmaid and sidekick called Madge Allsop played by actress Emily Perry; and many said they had no idea how Madge (Emily) kept a straight face during all the shows.

Dame Edna had a history of conflict with her Barry Humphries her ‘manager’ who she called ‘a failed actor’, who always seemed to ‘have his hands in the till’.  It’s all written in the autobiography ‘My Gorgeous Life’ (1992). Barry wrote two different autobiographies as two different people and even appeared as an actor as Nickolas Nickleby (2002) in two roles: one male as Mr. Leadville and another female as Mrs. Crumbles in the theatre troupe.  Perhaps it was that watery maverick Mercury made him want to provoke people to think twice- ‘wait so that was Barry Humphries?’ This was something he delighted in doing, being the prankster. Mercury can be neutral,  or just about anything it wants to be as it is in alchemy. Mercury in Pisces can be like a dragnet trawling up one idea after the other from the depths. The element of the chameleon is there too- the trickster- all of which would have amused his Dadaist spirit. But also, the flood of invention and fertile imagination may just be that Pluto in imaginative dreamy Cancer, collector and artist,  and the Sun in the 12th overcompensating for its 12th house sensitivities.

 

5: Sir Les Patterson

Barry’s characters were more real than Barry himself.  Even his own personal character – the aesthete, Oscar Wildish dandy was much less convincing than the brash megastar Edna and the gross Les Paterson. Sir Les some might find too crude to bear as he froths at the mouth and if you are on the front row at one of his shows, you need an umbrella. He is ‘vulgarity on roller skates,’ as Humphries wryly comments, but also a vehicle for a rant against political vanity and Australian masculinity. In fact Les is the alpha male to Dame Edna’s alpha female caricature. If Les has a birth chart is would be Capricorn as his first appearance was in January of 1974. although he is stated as being born April 1st, 1942.   So that would make him an Aries. Sir Les keeps pieces of mouldy cheese in his pocket among other vital equipment and happily recites from a poem “Australia frankly takes the prize as the best place on earth to satirise.” You either ‘get’ the joke or not. But  people recognise the excesses of Sir Les, the cultural attaché in some people they know.

The Australian government were not sure whether to embrace or condemn Sir Les. Barry was the opposite of Les Patterson, but there are a few of his demons in Les that kept Les alive. The references to bodily fluids for one. And the ‘demon’ drink for another. His signature song is a a tribute to wine called ‘Chardonnay’. Here we have the Neptune again, a litany of troubles in relationships, and the Pisces Ascendant allowing him to delve so deeply he became immersed in whatever he focussed on.  Humphries had a phase of alcoholism which almost ruined him and caused some messy disputes with his partners who cared for him, but who  probably could not understand him at all. With the Sun and Saturn in the 12th he could have had some self sabotage issues and a fear of being alone. Plus with Jupiter square Pluto could have blown up all the problems turning molehills into mountains. But that Jupiter, always larger than life, in Libra, the sign of harmony,  was also nicely trine to the Sun. So you get the feeling that the characters Humphries created while controversial and prickly, were designed in the spirit of laughter and grace, and they had the ability to lifting people out of the doldrums and be a counter to depression and sadness.

6: The World according to the Dame

Astro-cartography lines show Barry’s Sun/Ascendant line running near Melbourne and he certainly put the suburb of Moonee Ponds on the map, and even had a street there named after Dame Edna. The Sun/MC line runes through Hollywood, the place Edna sought to bash a few celebrities who thought they were bigger than she was,  but there is nothing highlighted much across the UK where hew as very popular. That could imply that he felt less intensity while living in the UK, no real challenges and he did comment that British audiences generally react well to comedy. They are primed for it. He certainly made a lot of connections in the UK. His Moon line runs across Italy and Eastern Europe so he may have enjoyed travelling in these areas.

There is so much more to say about Barry Humphries as his solar return occurs today towards the end of Aquarius, but Dame Edna will always have the last word and she usually ended with a song and dance. An early classic is where she sings of her single greatest asset: ‘It’s my niceness’ which can help you ‘even when you feel blue’.

The fact is that all Dame Edna’s shows are as watchable today as the were when first broadcast and can have that healing effect that only comedy can which is to bring laughter amid all the troubles. And the man behind the diamante glasses, Barry himself still lurks as the commentator on all that he achieved.