Community
13 November, 2024
Bluey the hottest ticket in town as families flock to sold-out shows
The free tickets were snapped up in just a couple of hours.
Forget the rodeo, the hottest ticket in Mount Isa this year will turn out to be for Saturday’s Bluey
Live Interactive Experience, held as part of the Civic Centre’s 50th birthday celebrations.
The story behind the scenes of how the Civic Centre rolled out the show is at times as action packed at the events on stage.
The initial 800 tickets for the free series of performances were exhausted within two hours, which prompted council staff to reevaluate the capacity of the audience floor space, allowing a further 200 tickets to become available, which promptly sold out in 10 minutes.
That led to a series of phone calls from frantic parents unaware they were also supposed to have their own ticket to watch the stage show.
The flood of calls prompted council staff to be as flexible as possible – allowing parents without a ticket to also attend.
An email was sent out to parents in the following days with strict instructions to arrive 30 minutes prior to their specific performance time to ensure there weren’t hordes of Bluey enthusiasts left waiting on the Civic Centre lawns in the midday heat.
The next challenge was moving 1000 children and parents through the auditorium in allotments of 250 people at a time over the course of just a few hours, which proved a logistical challenge for the staff.
It required all hands of deck, including three Civic Centre workers and six library staff who had been commandeered for the occasion.
There were also strict rules about how the show was presented, with any promotional social media requiring approval from the BBC and union regulations stipulating the actors could only remain in the Bluey costumes for 22 minutes per hour due to the heat, which added pressure to the need for a swift transfer of audience between the strict 18 minute performances.
The Civic Centre crew were able to manage the potential chaos and parents and kids enjoyed an afternoon of dancing, songs and ball games with Bluey and Bingo unaware of all the work that had gone on in the background.
“I think Bluey is popular because it’s just good Aussie humour,” Mount Isa mum Kathryn Veivers said.
“There are a lot of jokes that go over the kids’ heads but are very relevant for parents. It’s all about living in Australia.
“We managed to go online to get our tickets at the right time – I phoned my sister and told her to jump on and get her tickets at the same time. They all sold out so quickly.”
Grandmother Kathy Green said she watches Bluey with her grandchildren, Grace and Claire.
“It is educational for the kids,” she told North West Weekly.
“It teaches the children good values and good morals – it talks about issues that are very relatable to families.”
As the golden anniversary celebrations for the facility comes to a close, Mount Isa City Council tourism and marketing officer Erica Shaw invited locals to consider the type of acts they would like to appear on stage at the Civic Centre.
“We are always thinking of new ideas to use the Civic Centre for the benefit of residents, and we are always open to new ideas about the type of shows that could come,” she said.
“If Mount Isa residents have ideas of what they would like to see at the Civic Centre – whether it is a musical performance or a comedy act or something else – they can get in contact with us and we can see if it’s possible.”