My name is Bonnie and I’m a comedian and a producer.  

So, my parents were both youth workers, and so we had lots of young people that didn’t have anywhere to go living with us. Dad is like a, he’s like a six foot giant Santa Claus-looking guy, and he actually grows his beard to look like Santa Claus. And my mum is a tiny, little skinny, little redhead dot of a person, like she’s really tiny, but you wouldn’t mess with her.  

Dad always said something that really stuck with me. He said that everyone is born with an emotional bank balance. So, when you’re born you have an emotional bank balance, and as you grow, like if you grew up in a loving and beautiful family and community, then that bank balance grows and grows and grows. And then by the time you’re an adult, then you know sometimes it depletes but you’ve kind of got a good bank balance to start with and you know, you make money with money. And he said that a lot of our friends, who I consider family, when they grew up their bank balances were in the negative already. And they didn’t have anyone to get any positive bank balance from because no one else around them had it. So, it’s hard to borrow if your friends if they haven’t got it, and they don’t know how to manage that emotional bank balance either. So then by the time they reach adulthood, they’re in the red.  

In a way my family was a bit of an emotional bank balance for people to be able to build up themselves, and then to be able to survive and do everything they shouldn’t be able to do.  

Theresa was my sister. Like I loved her. When I met Theresa, she had her hair dyed red, and I’ve got my hair dyed right now, and she had kind of like freckles, and she wore cool clothes, and she listened to music, and she was learning fire twirling so I learned fire twirling. And she just took me under her wing and I didn’t really realise how troubled she was at that age at all. I just adored her. But yeah, over the years she was going through quite a lot of things. She had some abuse when she was younger, as a kid and then had been homeless for a number of years, and her brother had gotten into trouble and he had gone into jail as well. He’s still in there for murder, and didn’t talk to her family at all. And so, she was really alone and struggling with so many things.

And I remember at one point, Mum had told me that Theresa had thought about suiciding, but she’d said that thinking of me as a little girl, as a little kind of, I think I was only about eight or nine at that stage, she said that thinking of me as a little girl made her stop, because she didn’t want me to be sad. And so, as a little kid that suddenly gave me my purpose. I was like, great, I have just got to be here for Theresa. I’ve got to be the reason that she’s alive. I’ve got to be happy that she’s here. I’m going to share all these stories with her. And no matter how bad it got for her; she’d always bounce back. She was always going to survive. She was such a survivor, because she’d been through so much and so many of her family had fallen away.  

And then one day, I got the phone call from Mum. And at that point, I think it was about 11 or 12. And a lot of people had started passing away, from drugs or alcohol or suicide, so many different things. At that point I kind of knew, just from how Mum would say hello.  

She went, ‘Hi Bon.’ 

And I said, ‘Who’s died?’ 

And that was a common interaction. She’d go ‘Hi Bon,’ and I knew by the way, she’d said it that someone had died. But I never thought she was going to say Theresa.  

And I remember she said, ‘It’s Theresa.’ And I just didn’t accept it. It wasn’t real. 

I remember getting my first boyfriend when I was 19 and thinking, ‘Oh, this is what Theresa used to ask me about. Do you like any boys? Or who are you friends? And we’d have all those chats that, you know when someone when you’re a kid and someone treats you like a real person? She treated me like a real person, and she was like so close to me. So, she was a huge part of my life.  

When everyone laughs in a room, the whole room is connected by that laugh. It’s like an electric jolt through the room where everyone, for that one moment, where they all laugh at that one joke, they all understand, on the same level. And that’s quite amazing. So, when they all understand you on that level, that’s phenomenal. Like it’s just an amazing feeling. But then if they don’t understand you connect to that, then your soul gets ripped through your feet. 

I was asked to host a big burlesque gala. It was a Hollywood themed kind of thing. And they were looking for more emcees. And usually, it was kind of big characters, or American style kind of characters that would host. And I met with a producer, and I’m quite casual. Like I’m not … I like me, but I’m not like fabulous. I’m not really glam. And I suggested to the producer, maybe I can do a character for the show.  

And she said ‘That’d be great. Do you do characters?’

And I said, ‘No. But I’ll do one for you!’ 

She said, ‘Oh, what are you thinking?’  

And I said, well, my two conditions would be that she’s Australian because there’s enough American and English accents. We always turn into other countries whenever we want to be someone important. I was like, no, she has to be Australian, and suburban. And she has to change outfits all the time. They’re my two conditions. Otherwise, throw me, whatever you reckon.  

And she said, ‘Well, why don’t we make her a talent agent, because then she’s bringing on all the different acts of Hollywood gala style stuff.’ 

I was like amazing. Perfect. So, then I debuted a character called Sharon. I spelled her name wrong. I spelt it with one ‘R’, at this big Hollywood gala and there’s a couple hundred people there, and I’d never done a character before. I had two jokes, and then I had to improvise the rest of the night.  

And I remember being backstage and I’d had my hair done by one of the hairdressers there. I’d had makeup done by my housemate. I had my housemate’s clothes and bits and pieces and whatever I could throw together and also you know, best intentions, you think you’re going to plan and get everything sorted. But then life happens, and you’ve only got, you know, 40 minutes to put everything together and then run to the gig. And I was backstage just thinking ‘I’m such a fricking idiot. Why did I think I could do this? I’m such a fricking idiot. There’s no way What the hell am I doing? I can’t put myself into these situations anymore. I can’t keep doing this. I’m such a moron.’ 

And then the music came up, and the lights went up and I had to go out. The crowd just got it. I just loved it. Like they’ve never loved anything else I’ve done before. And halfway through, they were yelling out Shazza while other acts were on, trying to get Sharon back on stage. At one point, Sharon, like Sharon is the character I was playing, kind of made an offhand comment about her husband Darren, and someone in the audience went ‘Dazza’ and she went ‘Oh my god, you know him?’ That’s amazing. Like it was just people were in on the joke from the beginning. And that was the beginning of Sharon, who then completely transformed my life. 

People when they meet me, are usually a little bit disappointed because I just not as glamorous. I had one lady, saw me post show and she realised by some freak of nature, she suddenly made the connection which is very rare. Normally I can walk out after a show and no one will know, because I look like a sweaty hot mess of no makeup or sequins, and usually we’re black. I walked down and she actually came up to me went ‘Oh’. She grabbed the side of my face and she went ‘Oh, bring back the feathers.’ 

Actually, it was kind of interesting. When I was first in comedy. I had a moment in Edinburgh, I went over as an open mic comedian and that was such a great experience for me. And I remember going and seeing amazing comedians on stage and all of them were talking about being depressed or alcoholic and having huge problems and I … and just thinking, I think I’m in the wrong industry. I’m not – I’m happy. I like life. And I loved people as well, whereas a lot of comedians don’t want to hang out with the punters after the show. You know, they’re like ‘ah, audience, meh’, kind of talk down about them, but that’s the whole reason we’re there. 

And actually, those things, you know, being happy and loving people, are the two things that make Sharon phenomenal. Like I will spend hours talking to punters about anything. And I’ve had some really big chats about divorces and kids, and some of my favourite stuff is not what happens on stage, but what happens afterwards when I’m talking to people. And Sharon, and that love that she can give people, and that she can make people laugh by telling them how beautiful they look, and getting them to do rockstar poses, and act like idiots, and just crack up with laughter is amazing. Like if I could keep doing more of that I would be so happy. Like that is worthwhile.