Waving the flag for drag

By Will Lowes

He was a superstar, the redhead with the best legs in Europe. He was part of a trio who, in the 1970s, had a weekly television audience of 20 million and were household names in Italy -“ and they still are.

His name is Neil Hansen, a quiet and unassuming lad from Perth, WA. So, how did he become part of a much-loved drag act, The Fabulous Flag Sisters?

It was an amazing trip. When I left Perth I went to drama school in London, and then on to Venice. I couldn’t continue with theatre work because I couldn’t speak Italian so I used my art school training and I was doing watercolours and portraits in the piazzas, he said.

There I met a journalist who told me if I was an actor I should be in Rome, where he knew an agent. So I went to Rome, started doing a few films and some musical theatre. Then the most unexpected thing on Earth happened.

It was about this time Hansen met Renzo Arbore, a young man about to start a new television show in Italy.

Renzo had seen a musical show the three of us -” Tito Le Duc, Mauro Bronchi and I -” had put on. We essentially sent up TV commercials, Hansen said.

We used the Andrews Sisters’ Drinking Rum and Coca-Cola, so we dressed up to do that number. We had never dreamed of doing drag until then. It was filmed in a great little theatre above a gay club. The show was a smash hit -” people like Sophia Loren came to see it and we had fabulous press as well.

The Coca-Cola number became the show’s theme, opening and closing each episode. We thought drag on Italian TV, it’ll be the end of our careers. But the show was popular with everybody -“ including the critics -“ and it became very mainstream.

We were given a name -” Sorelle Bandiera (The Flag Sisters) -” an ironic twist on well-known Italian war heroes known as the Flag Brothers.

Hansen is back in town for the SBS screening of a documentary looking at the history of The Flag Sisters. It tells the story of how a boy from Oz became an Italian superstar -” in a frock.

Filmed on location in Australia and Italy, the program features extensive archival footage, along with some of Italy’s showbiz greats, including Renzo Arbore, Roberto Benigni and Isabella Rossellini.

Having this whole thing erupting again and going back to Italy and being treated like a star, with the black limousine and all the trimmings again -” it brought back much more than memory lane, Hansen said.

It was very hard to come back [to Australia] again.

The Fabulous Flag Sisters will screen on SBS at 7.30pm on 4 July.