Perfect (his real name, by the way) is a household face thanks to his role in Channel 10’s long-running TV series Offspring and stage shows ranging from snarky satirical solo cabarets to light-hearted musicals such as South Pacific, 9 to 5 and his first original musical Shane Warne the Musical.
Perfect is in town performing in Candide at Sydney Opera House, before heading home to Melbourne to join rehearsals for the lead role in Beetlejuice the Musical, the movie spin-off Broadway show he wrote the music and lyrics for.
The “wunderkind” label was attached when Perfect was in his early 20s, but “I never felt like I was one”, he says as we step into the bright sunshine.
He’s also a playwright (2013’s The Beast, staged by Melbourne Theatre Company), a singer (bass-baritone) a composer and lyricist with two Broadway shows to his name – King Kong (which opened in New York in 2018) and, more recently, Beetlejuice.
“I remember looking at the empty shop and saying to myself ‘This could be your life if you don’t get out and make something of yourself.’ That experience, he says, “put me off disappointing people for life”.
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