Peter Goers: Farewell Phyl, you shining star of the stage
Phyl Skinner performed on stage for at least 91 of her 98 years. Peter Goers shares his memories of a born entertainer – and a true Adelaide original.
Opinion
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Phyl Skinner was the last Australian vaudevillian. With her passing on her 98th birthday – and that’s timing for you – vaudeville is dead. Long live vaudeville.
The vitality of vaudeville in the limelight that Phyl so loved lives on. The Fringe is the vaudeville of the great unwashed.
Phyl had a wonderfully long run. She was on stage for at least 91 of her 98 years as dancer, comedian and entertainer. That’s where she belonged. She was adored. She was also a loving, good friend to many. I admired her my whole adult life, and she was friend for the past 30 years. I feel her loss terribly.
In her last years, a fall made her immobile and the fog of dementia descended quickly. I’d visit her weekly in her nursing home and one day, about six weeks ago, she didn’t know me. My heart broke in that very hard moment.
I tried not to let her see me cry. But, as I left, I gave her the set-up for a gag and she came straight in with the punchline – with bright eyes and a big smile she played to the gallery. I’ll never forget that moment of joy as she left me laughing.
Her energy, her comic attack and her love of an audience were sustaining and glorious. She had that rare gift of making people feel better about themselves. Her instinct was always to entertain. Even as she delivered Meals on Wheels for two decades, she’d leave the “dear old people” (who were younger than her) with a high kick and a gag.
As a young dancer in vaudeville on the Tivoli, Fuller and tent circuits, this red-haired firebrand had the high honour of being chosen to perform comedy with the greatest comedians of the day – Roy Rene (Mo) and George Wallace. They loved her. When she tap-danced with Bob Hope in the jungles of New Guinea in World War II, entertaining the troops, she taught him a tap break which he later used with James Cagney in The Seven Little Foys.
Phyl was a living history of Australian people’s theatre and her lesson and example – always look your best, always have a good opening gag and always know when to get off – remain crucial.
In 2017, she was among a star-studded cast in the “galah” concert that closed the old Her Majesty’s Theatre. Infirm and at nearly 96, her appearance was not easily achieved. I was very worried it would be too much for her. I was wrong.
As soon as the stage lit up, so did she. Phyl was alive with the power and love of the stage. She did a classic comic routine and a high kick from her chair, to a standing ovation. It was the greatest curtain call for a life I’ll ever see. She was needed and loved.
Phyl’s favourite picture of that final performance was of her sitting alone on stage waiting for the curtain to go up. It’s a sacred moment every performer both fears and cherishes.
She was always funny. When telemarketers or scammers phoned her, she’d tell them her great age, feign close interest in what they were offering – and then proceed to die on the phone. They never rang back. If she couldn’t get to the dining room at the nursing home to see the visiting entertainers, they’d go to her room and give her private concerts. She was rightly honoured.
I’m sad she never saw the new Her Majesty’s Theatre where she’d worked more often than any other performer. But she’ll always be there in the dancing motes of dust on the stage and in the plush and in the gods. She had no fear of death, but I had a fear of her death, of a light going out in the world – but it shines on because she left that light in so many, and she left us laughing and wanting more. Thanks, dear heart, thanks.
Peter Goers can be heard weeknights and Sundays on ABC Radio Adelaide.