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Airdate: The Man Inside Dame Edna

Barry Humphries tells us he's continued with his beloved characters all these years, just to amuse himself.

Bazza’s emerging from behind his purple wig and spectacles.

The ABC will screen a documentary, The Man Inside Dame Edna , which seeks to shed an insight into what has inspired Barry Humphries all these years. Apparently it’s just “to amuse myself.” A pretty good reason indeed.

His biog also reveals that his driving force is essentially his performance addiction and his rebellion against ‘niceness’.

Filmed during his 2007 Australian tour, this traces Humphries’ roots to his suburban home, Melbourne Grammar and university days and includes chats with Dame Edna and Sir Les Patterson.

Other interviews in the doco are with Philip Adams, Ernie Sigley, Bruce Beresford and Magda Szubanski.

Bound to be a big winner with viewers, it airs 8:30pm Thursday February 12th on ABC.

6 Responses

  1. I taped this on Thursday night as I was watching the Australia Unites telethon and finally got around to seeing this on the weekend. I really enjoyed this doco on the man inside the iconic Dame Edna character. I must admit I knew little about the man himself going into the program so I was fascinated to learn about his childhood, his moving to London so early in his career, his alcoholism and the fact the he wrote and that an early version Dame Edna appeared in the film The Adventures of Barry McKenzie. Narrated by the wonderful Geoffrey Rush, this was a great insight into a man that always lets his characters take the spotlight.

  2. Barry Humphrey’s Dame Edna is up there with Roy Rene’s Mo McCackey, all of NSW’s George Wallace characters and a whole host of comedic acts leading to Dame Edna and beyond. Although I have to admit the modern comedian is more crass and far far less funny than the oldsters.

  3. Whenever I watch Dame Edna I always anticipate a cringeworthy experience, even though it’s never actually turned out that way. Each time, in fact, it ends up as being thoroughly entertaining and hilarious.

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