From Australia’s Jewish past

Stephanie Deste – actor, dancer, radio broadcaster and beautician – Part 2

Stephanie regularly appeared whilst performing in Rose-Marie on Melbourne’s Radio 3LO, giving Bible readings and reciting poetic, dramatic and literary works.  An article in May 1927 of forthcoming highlights on 3LO extolled Stephanie’s “exceptional elocutionary gift”, adding that “to hear her recite with a fine succession of pathos, tenderness, and fierce indignation was a revelation of dramatic art”.

The musical opened in late August 1927 at the Theatre Royal in Adelaide and finished on 1 October.  An Adelaide critic wrote the following description of Deste’s costume and “her marvellous acrobatic, contortional dancing” in the role of Wanda: “One can see her now, in skirt of long black silk fringes, straps and brassieres of sparkling silver sequins on her bare, lithe, brown body, her shining treacle-black hair drawn straight and tight to a knot behind her head, her deeply dark, inscrutable eyes gazing out on the audience as she folds her apparently boneless body into strange convolutions and sinks, out of sight beneath the rust-red tinged with golden feathers of a fan so enormous that it completely covers the folded-up body”.  From there, the show went to Perth, where it was very well received, as it had been in Brisbane.  The next stop was Newcastle, and it then toured New Zealand.  Following the Australian tour, it returned to Sydney to Her Majesty’s on 3 April 1928, as a farewell season, and the final performance was on 11 May.  It played to a packed audience, with the Totem Chorus being recalled eight or ten times” nightly.

In June 1928, she performed in a revue staged by the Kelso brothers called Ace High, at the Tivoli Theatre in Sydney. Her performance featured “her famous fan dance” from Rose-Marie.  Stephanie was contracted for the role of the sensuous ‘Azuri‘ in J. C. Williamson’s Australian production of the operetta The Desert Song, which premiered on 15 September 1928 at His Majesty’s Theatre in Melbourne.  During this time, she met Remigio Budica, a Jewish-Italian restaurateur and former opera baritone who had arrived in Australia in 1922.   He had been a cadet officer who had left his ship at Portland Victoria and hitch-hiked to Melbourne, where he established the Esperia Café in Exhibition Street.

Stephanie remained in Melbourne for quite some time, resuming her dramatic recitations and bible readings on radio 3LO.    Following a successful season with The Desert Song in Melbourne, the show opened at Her Majesty’s Theatre, Sydney, on 30 March 1929.  A critic writing in the Sunday Times commented on Stephanie’s performance of the Azuri character: “Her work is extraordinarily realistic, her acting finished, and her dancing sinuous and expressive”, adding that “she has the unusual quality of inspiring admiration tinged with just that touch of repugnance which the character calls for”.

In mid-May 1929, Stephanie left for London with the intention of travelling on to America.  Whilst in London, she produced the staging of a French-language version of the musical comedy Chu Chin Chow at the Casino in Brussels.  She designed the dresses, engaged the cast, rehearsed, and produced the play in conjunction with the ballet mistress and stage manager from His Majesty’s Theatre in London, using the scenery and properties from the long-running original London production.

In 1931, Remigo travelled to England, arriving on 4 June, reunited with Stephanie, and they were married in London later that year.   The couple had a daughter named Toti, born in Paris in 1932.  During her period in Europe, Stephanie performed in Rose-Marie and The Desert Song in Belgium, the Netherlands and France.  After her return to Melbourne in 1936, she remarked that wherever she played The Desert Song or Rose-Marie in Europe, “there seemed to be Australians in the audience, who came after the show to speak to me”. At one performance, she was “startled to hear a ‘Coo-ee’ suddenly in the audience”. The actress commented: “Dutch audiences are very prim and proper, adding that I myself faltered for a moment in my song”.

While she was working in Paris, Stephanie “spent most of her leisure studying modern methods of beauty culture”.  She studied at the Antoine School for a diploma in beauty culture. Returning to Melbourne in 1936, she established the Stephanie Deste Beauty Clinic, the following year, specialising in electrolysis treatments for hair removal. She starred in J. C. Williamson’s revival of Rose-Marie in Melbourne and Sydney in 1938, and featured on various radio stations during World War II, giving beauty tips and promoting her salon.

In 1944, Remigo died of tuberculosis, aged forty-five.  She did not remarry, later recalling that she was ‘always too busy’.  Another revival of The Desert Song in April 1945 proved she had lost none of the grace ‘which has contributed so much to her dancing success’ as reported in Argus.

In 1937, Stephanie met a well-known beauty specialist who operated a salon in Little Collins Street. The two formed a new company, Stephanie Deste Pty Ltd.   Stephanie used the radio to promote the clinic and she present segments on “Modern Make Up” and “Beauty Hints”.  The partnership initially worked well, but by mid-way through 1938, Stephanie announced that she was returning to the theatre with the revival of Rose-Marie.  Her partner initially set conditions, but it was not to be.  When Rose-Marie reopened at His Majesty’s Theatre on 25 June 1938, Stephanie was back in her role as Wanda.  Her company was wound up in May 1939 and in 1940 Stephanie opened a clinic at 82 Elizabeth Street, offering consultations at no charge and she remained there until September 1947.

Sadly, Stephanie’s husband died in September 1944 of tuberculosis, aged forty-four. The following year, Stephanie appeared in a revival of the role of Azuri in The Desert Song.   Barry Humphries, then eleven, and his mother were in the audience of one of the performances.   Barry recalled in 1972 that Stephanie “did a terribly sexy, voluptuous dance, practically a strip, it was; I’ve never got over it to this day”.  Despite the show’s “enormous success”, The Desert Song closed in late June 1945.

Next, Stephanie introduced the revolutionary Marigny cold-wave perm process, followed by, in 1949, the ‘Joan of Arc’ haircut—a short bob cut into page-boy style—which coincided with the film release starring Ingrid Bergman.  By 1976, her business had thrived, employing 40 people, and by the 1970s, Stephanie had become a well-known, flamboyant figure, often attending first-night theatre events in the company of Barry Balmer, a journalist, broadcaster and theatre personality.

Stephanie died on 14 April 1996, aged 95 years. She was survived by her daughter.  She was known as a woman of striking features well into old age.  She was one of Melbourne’s ‘’great personalities, an elegantly dressed, immaculately coiffured figure known for several generations for her stage and radio work and for her famous beauty salons.  Her lively character and personal style earned her a reputation as a Melbourne eccentric.

She is reputed to have taught a young (Sir) Robert Helpmann to do the circular splits.  Barry Humphries claimed that Stephanie was one of the inspirations behind his most famous character, Dame Edna Everage, most particularly concerning Dame Edna’s flamboyant spectacle frames. In a 1976 interview, Stephanie acknowledged her influence on Humphries, who had dubbed her “the nation’s depilator”. She confirmed that Humphries had copied Edna Everage’s glasses from her own characteristic diamante-studded winged spectacles.

 

The AJHS acknowledges the following references in the preparation of this story:

Australian Dictionary of Biography – Fay Woodhouse; Wikipedia; National Film and Sound Archives, National Library of Australia; various newspaper articles.

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