Inside promoter Paul Dainty’s seven-year mission to bring Tina Turner - The Musical to Australia

“Tina Turner was always a towering figure.” Oprah Winfrey paid tribute to the Proud Mary singer during the In Memoriam segment of the recent Grammy Awards. “She is our forever goddess of rock’n’roll, who inspired millions, a moving symbol of grace and grit, soul and power.” And an artist with a rags-to-riches story as good as Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Dolly Parton or Ray Charles, and equally as ripe for a movie (like 1993’s What’s Love Got To Do With It, starring Angela Bassett as Turner) or, say, a biographical jukebox musical. Tina – The Tina Turner Musical, which combines 24 of the late music icon’s hits – including River Deep Mountain High, Nutbush City Limits, Steamy Windows and (Simply) The Best — with her turbulent yet triumphant story, comes to Crown Perth on February 27 following a nine-month run in Sydney for the Australian cast and crew. In 2017, English film and theatre director Phyllida Lloyd (Mamma Mia!) travelled to meet Tina Turner in her adopted home of Switzerland ahead of the production’s debut on London’s West End the following year. Lloyd asked the music icon why she wanted to help stage the musical tracing her life from the cotton fields of rural Tennessee through her early career working with abusive husband Ike Turner to a triumphant second coming as an international rock superstar in her 40s. “I don’t,” Turner laughed. “I don’t need a musical. I don’t need another show.” But she did it for her fans, especially now that she had retired from touring and live performances. (Turner quit the stage after completing her 50th anniversary tour in 2009). “I hope it will be a success,” the icon said. “I hope it will travel the world and serve (as) a reminder of my work.” Tina, the musical, has travelled the world. A Broadway run followed the West End season, then the show played three European cities before returning to the US. Melbourne-based concert and event promoter Paul Dainty brought Turner out to Australia for two tours during her zenith — the Private Dancer Tour, which hit the Perth Entertainment Centre on December 23 and 24, 1985 and Break Every Rule World Tour, which kicked off at the same venue in January 1988. “Back when I had nearly as much hair as Tina,” he quipped. He’s been trying for seven years to bring Tina, the musical, Down Under. Dainty was having dinner with Neil Diamond in Dunedin, New Zealand, nine years ago when a friend called out of the blue to share a whisper that theatre producer Tali Perlman was working on a stage musical based on Tina Turner’s life. The Aussie mover and shaker immediately — well, after dinner with Neil — made some calls to make sure he had a stake in the production. Dainty subsequently co-produced the Broadway run with Perlman’s Stage Entertainment and was an investor in the West End show, now in its fifth year. Paul Dainty and TEG-Dainty are the lead producer for the Australian instalments with Stage Entertainment the junior partner, while Tina Turner and her husband Erwin Bach have executive producer credits on every season. Dainty said that Turner didn’t have veto over any aspect of the musical but gave feedback to ensure the story was accurate. The superstar attended gala openings of the West End and Broadway productions. “She saw the show, she loved the show,” Dainty told The Sunday Times recently from Melbourne. “Even when we opened the show in Sydney last May she sent a beautiful message to the cast, which we read out on stage.” The successful Sydney season — reported to have 301 standing ovations for 301 performances — was three weeks deep on May 24 when Turner died at age 83 in her home near Zurich after a long battle with illness. “That was such a shock,” Dainty said. “Very, very sad.” The promoter adds that the “energy was amazing” at the first performance of the musical following Turner’s death. “One of the cast made a speech on the night,” he noted. “Tina was still playing in London and parts of Europe. The show still went on and that was what she would have wanted, and that reinforced the celebration of her life. “We will obviously acknowledge that date when it comes around again this year (in Perth).” The veteran concert promoter, who has toured ABBA, Bee Gees, Paul McCartney, Rolling Stones, David Bowie, U2, Prince and Diana Ross, places Turner among the pinnacle of all-time greats. “Phenomenal,” Dainty said from Melbourne. “She was such a beautiful person and (put on a) phenomenal live show. “She was an amazing live performer. She was stunning.” The promoter had plenty of time to get to know Turner off-stage, where he found her to be a warm, if larger-than-life, presence. “She wasn’t demanding,” Dainty recalled. “She was very grateful and appreciative of the success she was suddenly having (in the 80s). “She came from the wrong side of the traps. She had a tough, tough, tough life. “The last time I saw her was when they did a workshop for the musical in London before it ever went on stage,” he continued. “She came to that. She was so generous with the cast and the crew, the way she spoke to them. “She walked in the room and you were in awe of her. She’s something special,” Dainty added. “That word ‘legend’ is used a bit liberally everywhere but she was a true legend.” A true legend that had a special relationship with this country. Her manager following her emancipation from Ike right up until 2010 was Australian music mogul Roger Davies, who pushed her towards a grittier live stage show. From 1989 to 1995, she helped promote the New South Wales Rugby League competition (now NRL), cavorting with players in advertisements using her song What You Get Is What You See and re-recording (Simply) The Best with Jimmy Barnes. (In one of his tributes following Turner’s death in May last year, Barnesy wrote that he was paid “a fortune” to sing the duet but would have done it for free. “It was just awesome and it was literally a highlight of my career to sing with her,” he wrote.) Finding someone to fill her platform heels on stage was always going to be the most important, and difficult, part of staging the musical. Dainty says they needed someone who could sing, dance and act — a triple-threat. Early auditions were dispiriting until Ruva Ngwenya, who grew up in Melbourne with Zimbabwean heritage, walked in the room. “We auditioned for months for the whole cast but particularly for Tina, because you’ve got to be a brilliant singer and dancer and actor,” he explained. “You’ve got to be three in one. “Ruva is amazing,” Dainty continued. “We have two or three other back-up Tinas, like all the other shows around the world, because there are eight shows a week to do, with 24 songs per show. “I was there when Ruva came in and auditioned. Everyone looked at each other and we knew we’d found the main Tina. It was magic. “You get goosebumps, you just know,” he added. “When she left the room, we all high-fived. ‘We’ve got Tina’.” Ngwenya plays Tina opposite Tim Omaji, better known as singer and dancer Timomatic, as the abusive Ike. Dainty says there are 80-90 cast and crew on the road with The Tina Turner Musical. “It’s a big, expensive show.” Stepping back to the development stages, Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Katori Hall was recruited to pull together a script. Hailing from Memphis, Tennessee, Hall drew on her mother’s obsession with Turner — her older sister is named Tina — as well as the superstar’s incredible journey from picking cotton in Nutbush to global fame and acclaim. Hall visited Turner’s tiny hometown to find her titular museum run-down and … not much else. Tina Turner Highway doesn’t even run through the crossroads littered with a few wooden buildings. The Tony-nominated scribe said Turner was “authentically black”, proof to future generations of artists of colour that you can be yourself and succeed. “There would be no Beyonce without Tina,” Hall said. “There would be no Rihanna.” During her Grammys tribute, Winfrey agreed that her departed friend was a “special kind of role model” — one whose influence will continue beyond her death thanks to her music, and her musical. “Those big wheels of time keep on turning,” Winfrey said, invoking the chorus of Proud Mary. “Tina’s voice continues to speak to all of us.” Tina – The Tina Turner Musical begins Tuesday at Crown Perth until April 6