Dusty

Dusty, Cambridge Arts Theatre, 2000

Cast: Mari Wilson, Chrissie Cotterill, David Streames, Susannah Bray, Jayne Nesbitt, Tim Clarke, Gordon Kenney, Robert Rawles, Debbie Paul, Elizabeth Hill, Alison Burrows, Claire Bryan, Brian Douglas.

Writer: Paul Prescott

Director: Bob Thomson

I have absolutely no recollection of this at all. I'm not surprised it exists because she had an interesting life and of course the songs are great. But I don't suppose they're the kind of songs that will ever make a Mamma Mia type show. Interestingly there's a couple of pages in the programme about her life written by Neil Tennant of Pet Shop Boys, but if it hadn't said so I'd have never guessed - he writes about her work with them in the third person and there's no personal memories of her in it so it could almost have been written by anyone. I wonder if Mari Wilson, whose early career owed a lot to Dusty, was any good?