Join Mel's Melbourne Blitz

FRANCES GRANT checks out the latest stage extravaganza designed to draw Kiwis across the Tasman, not to mention Melbourne's restaurants, unpredictable weather and hometown humour

Everyone's a joker on this autumn weekend in the state capital of Victoria. The jester that is the Melbourne weather performs its old quick-change routine, switching from balmy to southerly chill in a matter of mere minutes.

The tram to St Kilda Beach is running late and when it arrives, overcrowded. But you can't stop an Aussie bloke with access to a mic. When there's a lull in the in-transit chatter, the driver grabs his chance. "Your pleasant conversation is welcome, passengers," he informs his startled charges. "Otherwise I start to fantasise I'm driving a hearse."

His captive audience quickly assesses the talent. "A wacko, mental driver," notes one passenger on her mobile phone.

Perhaps it's the spirit of the Melbourne Comedy Festival, now in its final days, that's bringing out the inner idiot. Or perhaps it's that the hottest ticket in town is Mel Brooks' musical comedy The Producers and the king of the politically incorrect himself is in the city for the opening.

"It's good to be the king," Brooks tells a delighted audience during the curtain calls at the Princess Theatre, giving his blessing to the Australian version of his multi-award-winning Broadway show. The line is one of Brooks' most famous. It's from his movie History of the World Part One and makes, as do many of his trademark gags, a guest appearance in The Producers.

No one ever lost a buck underestimating the public taste. The Producers' aim is to pay homage to this showbiz maxim. The Broadway show has proved its premise, winning a record 12 Tonys.

The stage version is based on Brooks' breakthrough 1968 movie of the same name. Oily Broadway producer Max Bialystock is suffering a string of flops and in despair until he learns from nerdy accountant Leo Bloom that, in theory, it would be possible to make more money from a catastrophe than a hit. Bialystock persuades Bloom to ditch the day job and together they hatch a scheme to find a guaranteed disaster and abscond with the investors' money the moment it closes. When they unearth a script written by pigeon-fancier and unreconstructed Hitler fan, Franz Liebkind, the pair know they've struck, well, Nazi gold.

Springtime for Hitler, a paean to the German dictator, is guaranteed to offend, revelling in such gleeful exhortations as "Don't be stupid, be a smarty, come and join the Nazi party".

But Bialystock and Bloom have wildly misjudged the sensitivities of their audience. Springtime for Hitler turns out to be a smash hit. "We knew we couldn't lose, half the audience were Jews," laments Bialystock in one of the big numbers, What Did We Do Right?.

It's the kind of stuff only a Jewish guy from New York could get away with. No one is immune from The Producers' skewers. Springtime For Hitler's director Roger De Bris and assistant are queer as folk, as they say. De Bris gets the show's most gorgeous frock, a crystal-encrusted number dubbed the "Chrysler Building dress", and the luvvies highlight is a hilarious romp, Keep It Gay.

The love interest is provided by assistant Ulla, a paragon of Swedish sexually liberal stereotyping, who takes the sing-song Scandinavian accent to levels unmatched since the days of the Muppet Swedish chef. Throw in a couple of gratuitous nuns, a fearsome regiment of sex-obsessed old ladies, a lesbian stagehand and you pretty much have an equal opportunity offender. Even one of Liebkind's pigeons gives us a Sieg Heil salute with, why how appropriate, its right wing.

Yet Brooks describes the show not so much as satire as "a love letter to Broadway", says star Tom Burlinson, backstage. Burlinson, who plays Leo (and who Kiwis may recognise as The Man from Snowy River) says The Producers is a pastiche of styles from the heyday of the Broadway musical. His character and Ulla give us a Fred and Ginger routine and there's even a bit of Judy Garland added to the Fuhrer by the mincing De Bris, forced into the role when Liebkind, on rehearsal night, breaks a leg.

Yes, this is a show which is unmitigatedly silly. Personal highlights include a couple of searing send-ups of the Nazi fondness for German oompah music: frightful folksong routines Der Guten Tag Hop Clop and Haben Sie gehort das Deutsche Band? Next line: "Mit a bang, mit a boom, mit a bing-bang, bing-bang boom."

The real show-stopper, however, is the show-within-the-show. Springtime for Hitler features such tasty numbers as brown-shirted, hot-panted chorus girls dancing in Swastika formation, outrageously camp costumes accessorised with giant beer steins, sausages and pretzels, and a rousing climax complete with tanks and paratroopers: "Springtime for Hitler and Germany, Rhineland's a fine land once more! Springtime for Hitler and Germany, Watch out, Europe, we're going on tour!"

The key role of Bialystock is played by Aussie veteran actor Reg Livermore, who wanted the part badly enough to audition, he says, the first time he's actually had to apply for a job since 1969.

Backstage, Livermore is glowing with the Brooks blessing. The Hollywood comic legend has encouraged the Aussie legend to make the role his own, rather than trying to become a Jewish Broadway producer. "He told me to, 'Give them the Reg they know and love'," he says. With the king's seal of approval, Livermore is prepared to back the show with high stakes. "I'll guarantee you'll love it. And if you don't, shoot yourself," he warns.

Happily, Reg is right. After opening night, self-termination is not necessary, leaving me free to head out to St Kilda's cafe strip for Sunday brunch with a whiff of the sea and to read the local papers' rave reviews. "It is crass, ridiculous - and may well be the best show we have ever seen in Melbourne, if not Australia," says the Herald Sun.

After breakfast, a quick goose-step - sorry, stroll - through the St Kilda market, with its long row of craft stalls, then it's time to conquer the rest of Melbourne. The place to get an overview of the city is from the observation deck of the Rialto Towers, with views west to the Dandenongs and east over the port of Melbourne, spanned by the sinuous Westgate Bridge, the longest in the Southern Hemisphere. Even here we're not above a Mel Brooks moment. "Ah, a naked woman sunbathing on a roof," says one fantasist looking through the free binoculars.

Back on earth, I march over to inspect Melbourne's newest civic space: the oh-so-modern Federation Square. Its hulking buildings with their askew angles and relentlessly geometric facades have not made the square universally popular. But today it certainly fits the satirical mood: this is just the kind of degenerate architecture the Fuhrer would have hated. The Melburnians, too, are embracing the area, crowding round the food stalls of a Thai culture festival and sauntering through the National Gallery of Victoria's impressive new annex, the Ian Potter Centre.

The Producers' Ulla's taste for "herrings of many flavours" has reminded me of an oddball favourite among Melbourne's extensive range of ethnic eateries: Akvavit, a Swedish establishment in the South Bank complex of restaurants and shops on the Yarra River.

From there, a pleasant afternoon, can be had on a cruise up or down the river. I hop on board the boat to Williamstown, a pretty village sitting between the mouth of the port of Melbourne and Port Phillip Bay.

The pilot has a moustache wider than the Westgate bridge and, yes, he's yet another Aussie joker: "We usually get you to try on the lifejackets. But they're still wet from yesterday." Vat? Oh ja, ha ha, so funny. In Melbourne, zey all haff vays of makink you laugh!

In this town, it seems, every public transport driver with a hostage audience knows, it's good to be the king. For the king's one-liners are guaranteed laughter and adulation. Just watch the rapt reception for Mel Brooks, as he schmoozes the delighted audience at The Producers' opening night. They live, the king tells them, "in the best city in the world starting with Mel".

* Frances Grant flew to Melbourne courtesy of Qantas and was a guest of Tourism Victoria.

HOW TO GET THERE

Qantas has three-night packages to The Producers from $749 each twin share, including air fares, accommodation, and show tickets. Call Qantas on 0800 767 400 or see your travel agent.

THINGS TO SEE

The view from the Rialto Towers, on Collins St, is the best in Melbourne. Cost $12.50 (adult).

The central city, with its huge David Jones and pedestrian malls, is the place for keen shoppers, who may also want to check out the Queen Victoria Market and the fashionable Chapel St and Toorak Rd.

The St Kilda Sunday market, with its art and crafty stalls, is the place to find that something different.

River cruises, either down through the port or upriver, leave from below the South Bank Centre. A return trip to Williamstown will cost an adult $25.

For the punters there's the Crown Casino, also on the river. For the arty, there's Federation Square and surrounds, and the refurbished National Gallery of Victoria.

WHERE TO BE SEEN

Melbourne has many cafe strips but if you want to smell the sea, head out to St Kilda's Acland St with its delis and amazing cake shops. Brunswick St has a Bohemian flavour.

WHERE TO EAT

The Age Good Food Guide is the bible, dividing restaurants into ethnic categories, giving them a ranking and voting winners of each section.

Must visit for the foodie: Prahran food market, just off Chapel St.