I think I’ve fallen in love. What did you say? What’s her name? It’s Anna Vanosi. And where is she from? She’s from Milan. She’s 35 and she’s a classical singer. And pianist. And a trained actress (Edinburgh Napier). She has travelled all round Asia. What do you mean, how do I know? She told me. In her one woman show, Late Bloomers’ Tales: Chasing Time Through Songs, where she talks us through her life story so far and intersperses this with songs.
Eccentric but enchanting. A real life Italian diva
Well okay, she’s a little… quirky. She does sing Santa Baby at one point and in another song she shakes the maracas. She says she has been smoking hash in Asia and I’m not going to argue with it. But she is adorable. Eccentric but enchanting. A real life Italian diva. She is the sort of person you want to jump out of a cake when you get home from a hard day’s graft. Or she could address international businessmen as a motivational speaker. I can see her perhaps on a reality show, being discovered at long last after years on the Free Fringe. Maybe she will be the next star to be revealed on Strictly.
She says some marvellous things. She asks, “How old does your soul feel?” and says hers feels ancient. She claims that “the world is full of dickheads only too happy to tell you that Santa Claus doesn’t exist”. Then she sings Que sera, sera. At one point it gets a little awkward. No, not the bit when she talks about her vibrator while playing the song Good Vibrations in the background. It’s the bit when she says, “Your penis is getting larger and larger”. Is she looking at me or the single lad two rows in front? Thankfully, she quickly explains that she is talking about her own inner penis. What a relief.
I think we are supposed to be together for fifty minutes. When it gets to an hour, I do start to wonder whether this is going to be a Ken Dodd-style experience. She has certainly got at least another four hours in her. She has booked a 160 seat venue but there are only nine people sitting in it. It doesn’t matter. She will surely book it again next year. Her spirit is far too big for a converted broom cupboard.
Late Bloomers is a one woman show but wow, what a woman. I don’t know that there is a point to any of it other than to fall in love with the auburn-haired bella signorina. But that’s point enough. "I am only a second hand Ford Fiesta", she cries. "No Anna", I want to cry back. "You are a Ferrari."
