Christina Davis - The secret diaries of an Un-named Fraser - 30/04/06 @ Melbourne Town Hall - by epod

The fact that Christina Davis was a Big Brother evictee nearly caused me not to see this show. I urge you strongly to please not make the same mistake.

Christina's show was performed with shitloads of confidence, was very well written, as well as sweet, charming, interesting and funny. I believe that she has a great deal of potential as a comedian, and hope that she achieves the mainstream success that she deserves in the future.

The show took place in what is called, "The Wee Room", which is a rather small room right at the very top of the Melbourne Town Hall which seats 30 people. There were about 10 people there the night I saw the show. Despite reading a couple of promising reviews of Christina's show, I do admit that I did walk into the room with low expectations - which were instantly blown away when the show started. From the moment the show began, Christina had totally engaged me in the stories of her life.

Christina's show was a combination of her reading diary entries (which she said were true), and then further clarifying things that happened in a normal stand-up comedy type routine. I think that this format worked really well.

Firstly, she explained that she was adopted and was named on her birth certificate as "un-named Fraser", hence the name of the show. She talked about how she had always wanted to be in the Royal Australian Ballet, and how she was told by someone in management there that to get in she really should get a nose job. Christina talked about jobs she has had performing Ballet both in Australia and overseas. She came to describe her stint on Big Brother.

This was described with such venom, and was worth the price of admission alone. She talked about how Big Brother had called her into the diary room about week six of the show and had told her to be funny as she was not being funny, although she had been funny in audtions. Furthermore, she was also told at the same time by Big Brother that she had not mentioned the fact that she was adopted to any of the other housemates, so could she please do so, as that was one of the reasons why they chose her for the show. Christina ended up telling fellow housemate Sarah-Marie, and her impersonation of her was well worth seeing.

Christina had tried doing stand-up comedy a few times prior to entering the Big Brother house and some time after leaving, she decided to continue with her stand-up. For this, she recieved some very scathing attacks in the press, being labelled a try hard (and worse) through various media outlets. Newspapers were actually naming the places where she was doing open mic and asking people to come along and review her. I have done open mic and know how terrifying it is, let alone having to deal with that sort of attention.

It really is a testament to Christina's strong character that she continued to do stand-up even after all the negative press attention she got from it. As Christina said, "How many other open-mic'ers need to perform and then worry about the review that they will get in the paper the next day?".

Christina read out some of her fan mail, most of which was positive...until she got to a death threat she recieved. After recieving that, she decided to go and live in the USA for a while where no-one would know who she was or be able to recognise her. She moved in with two flatmates, one of whom was a witch - but the witch was the normal one. Her other flatmate got arrested and used Christina's ID when she got charged, something Christina knew nothing about until she was contacted by the Australian Consulate. Christina moved back to Australia after her stint in the US.

The show was completed by Christina writing a diary entry for the 30/04/06. I really enjoyed this show and hope that Christina recieves the support that she deserves. Why pay double the amount to see one of the big name acts, and have to stand outside in a massive line, in the rain at Melbourne Town Hall when you can walk straight up the stairs (er...a lot of stairs) and check out Christina in the Wee Room. Highly recommended!