By Jenny Brown
Dressed as a giant chicken — or hilariously upstaging Daryl Somers on his own show — Denise "Ding Dong" Drysdale has been making us laugh for decades.
Turning 60 later this year, publican's daughter Denise is a true TV veteran, having made her debut on
The Happy Hammond Show as a 10-year-old. In the Swinging Sixties, Ding Dong became a magazine pin-up, entertained our troops in Vietnam with lifelong friend Patti Newton — and shimmied as Australia's first go-go dancer.
Since then, Denise has won two Gold Logies, reigned as Moomba Queen, worked with luminaries like Graham Kennedy, Ernie Sigley and Daryl Somers, fronted her own variety show and been honoured on
This Is Your Life.
Sometimes outspoken, but always funny, the divorced mother of two grown boys shares some secrets with
Woman's Day.
What was your first professional performance?
I was three years old. It was a Sinatra concert at Festival Hall and I had to walk up to comedian Stan Freberg on stage and say, "Sing
All of Me, Mr Sinatra." The gag was that I mistook him for Frank, and everybody laughed. I was hooked.
Have you always loved making people laugh?
I don't know where funny comes from; all I know is that my dad was one of the funniest people who ever lived and Mum told a good yarn as well. I think they both liked the fact that I was dancing and on telly. I did a show where I had to sing and I was so bad several people said I should be sacked. But they kept giving me more songs... it became a sort of novelty thing I suppose. But I never thought I was particularly funny.
Where did the nickname "Ding Dong" come from?
Ernie Sigley had a secretary called Denise Bell, nicknamed Ding Dong. When I came along and I was another Denise, I became Ding Dong as well.
Is it true that you got sacked from In Melbourne Tonight for eating a pie?
I was dancing on the show for about a year but I put on weight in the holidays and they told me to lose it. Pete Smith always says I got sacked for growing breasts! Anyway, the producer caught me coming out of the canteen having a pie and I got the bullet. They couldn't do it now. Is it too late to sue and tell them they're responsible for me weighing myself four times a day?
Despite the pie, you went on to become Australia's first go-go dancer?
It was around 1965 when the first disco in Australia, the Persian Room, opened on Collins St. It was five pounds to get in; very, very elegant. I used to go-go dance there, with a drummer for background music, in my black fringed dress. I won a $20 bet for getting the Premier, Sir Henry Bolte, up on the dance floor to go-go with me!
And you were also a pin-up "Girl of the Year" for Everybody's magazine?
I certainly didn't think of me as a bikini girl! I never thought I looked sexy, but a US soldier wrote to the magazine and said I was lovely, so I won Girl of the Year. That's when I lied and said I could sing and ended up on tour with Ray Brown and the Whispers. I had curves everywhere and I used to worry about my weight all the time. I tried every diet — the grape and water diet, the no eating diet — but the more I thought about it, the fatter I got.
Entertaining the troops in Vietnam must have been a real eye-opener?
It was the first overseas trip for Patti McGrath (now Newton) and me in 1967 so it was very, very exciting. All we knew about war was from John Wayne movies. We'd been so protected. Suddenly, there we were holding the hands of two young Aussie soldiers as they lay dying after a landmine blew up their jeep. Hours earlier we'd been laughing and joking with them. Nothing could have brought home the reality of war like that.
And your next visit was just as traumatic?
Yes, I went back in 1969 and a Sydney singer called Cathy Wayne was shot dead on stage at an airbase in Da Nang. It could have been me, or any one of us. The shocking thing was that the army and government refused to take any responsibility, because we weren't officially sponsored entertainers. All the people in the show had to put in money to send her body back to Australia.
Yet you'd happily do it again?
I would love to be able to say I entertained our troops in 1969 and 2009. There's no greater honour. I don't believe in war but if we have troops overseas I will go and entertain them — as if they're not going through enough!
Tell us about your long-running TV partnership with Ernie Sigley...
We worked together on
The Ernie Sigley Show for two years from 1974 and later on
The Ernie and Denise Show in the '90s. If Ernie walked through that door now we could do an hour-long stand-up routine straight away! We're still friends and our heads are still in the same space. I used to play shocking practical jokes on him — loo blue in his shower, Dencorub on the toilet seat — and frightened the hell out of him. I don't know how he's still alive.
And the two of you even recorded a hit single, Hey Paula?
Yes, it sold more than 100,000 copies and won a Gold Record. When Ernie suggested the idea I said, "Why don't we give the money it makes to charity?" and he said, "Yes, lovely idea." Except it turned out we could have bought a house each! I don't think he's ever forgiven me.
What's next for Ding Dong?
I'm up for anything — except men! No offence to anyone, I'm just not good at that. In hindsight, apart from my beaut sons Pete and Rob, I don't think I was ever supposed to be with anybody. I'm not a shy retiring little thing who needs looking after.
Denise's memories of Woman's Day
Over the years I've done a lot of stories with
Woman's Day, but the one that moved me most concerned my trip to Mongolia with aid worker and author Christina Noble. We went there to help underprivileged kids, and to make a documentary, and it was quite an experience.
When we got off the plane in Ulan Bator it was -26°C, and there were children with no jumpers or jackets or hats sleeping on bits of tin in the sewers; unbelievable. When I got home, I used to go shopping at Coles and cry, because we have so much here in Australia. It made me realise just how lucky we are in this country.
I'm 60 this year too and I'm wondering if it's something my mother read in the magazine that made her clucky! I think that's where Mum saw stories about Shirley Temple earning a million and decided to put me on the stage!
We lived in a pub and she taught me to cook using
Woman's Day recipes. I still use Parisian Essence — which was very big back then but nobody's heard of it today — to flavour sauces and gravies. It's very tasty and it's the cheapest food additive around.
So here's to another 60 years for
Woman's Day and me!
Return to the Woman's Day 1960s page 
