Latest Features

The one-woman unstoppable force of nature that is Penny Ashton is currently touring Australia with her musical comedy that takes the world of Jane Austen into a whole new stratosphere of hilarity. Penny chats all things Austen and her unique family connection to the work.

How did you come to write this show?
In 2008 I brought an improvised Jane Austen Musical (Austen Found) to the NZ Improv festival and it was hugely well received. I had a lot of fun poncing about in my bonnet and dress and got a taste for the whole Regency world brought to life. I then decided to write a solo show with the similar silliness of an improv show combined with some laser focussed feminism, musical numbers, numerous direct quotes, endless innuendo and voila! We have a deeply silly feminist musical with as many balls’ jokes as you can shake a ... stick at. That was 2013 and I have been touring it non-stop essentially ever since. 

You're (distantly) related to the real Mr Darcy: I had no idea there was a real one, does he look like Colin Firth?
I am related to Thomas Langlois Lefroy who some theorise is the inspiration for Mr Darcy. It's a touch tenuous but an excellent publicity angle so I run with it wholeheartedly, lol. As to looks, from the small amount we have, not overly. The attached miniature shows he was a natty dresser but more of a traditional Bingley look I'd say. 

How did you discover this fascinating family connection?
My Australian uncle had gotten really into genealogy and was sifting back through the maternal line to 1843 when my 4th Great Grandfather, Irishman Gerald De Courcy Lefroy emigrated to WA aboard the Lady Grey. My uncle then went up one branch on the tree to his uncle Thomas Langlois Lefroy, my 5th Great Uncle and subject of the book and movie Becoming Jane. Tom Lefroy flirted with Jane Austen when in her very early 20's and whom she writes to her sister about; "I am almost afraid to tell you how my Irish friend and I behaved. Imagine to yourself everything most profligate and shocking in the way of dancing and sitting down together." They couldn't pursue it further as neither had the dosh to make a proper, upper-class go of it. 

What is your favourite Jane Austen story?
Sense and Sensibility. It was my gateway drug. In fact it was after seeing it on the big screen in London in 1996 that I was completely hooked. I loved Edward's charm, Brandon's steadfast devotion (we ignore Marianne being 16), Willoughby’s hotness, Kate Winslet's luminescence and Emma Thompson's script and excellent acting. I have adapted it myself, and I directed it in Wellington last year, which went better than I could have dreamed of because ... Jane Austen. 

Did you study classic literature or come to it through theatre and performing?
I started an English degree but dropped it faster than you can say "tedious lectures". I pivoted to classics and drama and learned very useful drama theories of men from the 1950's and 60's or 500BC which I use every day of my acting life ... not. But I had the best time at university being in 15 shows in 3 years and getting heavily into comedy. I have been onstage with dancing and theatre from age 4 and have rarely been offstage since. The enforced covid breaks being the longest chunk. I have been improvising since 1987 and been with a professional improv company for 25 years which led to the Austen improv as I love her stories. Especially through the characters and dialogue. I definitely came to this through performing, I was a stand up and cabaret artist first but managed to combine all strands of my performance and literary appreciations into this show. With alacrity!

Why do you think people connect to Austen's work so many years later?
Austen may have been born 250 years ago but her central themes of the search for love AND security remain as prevalent today. Also, she was a proto feminist struggling to be taken seriously as a woman, lucky we solved that right?? Right???? Sense and Sensibility is about a solo mother and three daughters’ facing a housing crisis after their provider has died, battling to survive in a time of respiratory illnesses and war. Sound familiar? All her heroines marry for love AND money. Affection is all well and good but enough pounds to pay for bloomers goes a long way. But love  was also essential; "Poverty is a great evil, but to a woman of education and feeling it ought not, it cannot be the greatest. —I would rather be a teacher at a school (and I can think of nothing worse) than marry a man I did not like." – Jane Austen

Austen loves an alliteration, what would the title of your book be in the Austen style?
Well given my dating history Promise and Promiscuity fits the bill, lol. Or perhaps Stroppy and Stroppyability, Feminist and Femi-nasty. To paint a vivid picture!