By Adam Maidment

Copyright manchestereveningnews

By day, Avril Eventhal was the typical doting Jewish housewife living in Prestwich . But, by night, she transformed into an eccentric Gay Village performer dressed in leopard print and often found on the stage clutching a feather duster. In the 1970s and 1980s, the two sides of Avril couldn’t be much further apart. Compared to the likes of American drag queen Divine, she gained a cult-like following in the gay bars of the North and was even once lovingly described as ‘an audio-visual assault on the audience’. But the full extent of Avril’s lavish performing career was never truly realised by her family until after her death in 2017 at the age of 70. Trawling through the vast treasure trove of costumes, posters, fan letters, reviews, and studio master tapes in her attic that she had kept hold of over the years, they discovered a remarkable life, a lust for the spotlight, a divisive music career and a real devotion that continues today. “I always knew her as my batty, eccentric aunt who would often talk about performing in the clubs,” Avril’s niece Jo Rosenthal, who is a freelance exhibition curator, tells the Manchester Evening News . “I was always intrigued but I didn’t really know the extent of it all – I was too young at the time to really take it too seriously. Stay connected with our City Life newsletter here “This was also amongst what was a very orthodox, very conservative and straight-laced Jewish community at the time. But she’d still turn up for Passover in fluorescent and loud eye makeup amongst all these people in their Sunday best. She was always a very intriguing presence to me. “When she died, I went to her house to help my uncle sort everything out and I just discovered this shrine to her career. There were posters of AIDS benefit gigs she did in the 80s, pictures from outrageous photo shoots and all sorts of newspaper clippings. She, quite literally, kept a record of everything she did.” Having always been ‘naturally very drawn’ to music , Avril first started by trying to make it as a pop-rock singer and songwriter in the 1970s writing and sending rock and roll demos to anyone she knew in the music industry. But it never became anything serious. In fact, her performances at the local working men’s clubs would often end up with her getting bottled off stage. “She didn’t have the typical looks to make it into that world,” Jo explains. “She was quite unconventional in every sense. She was the first person to admit that she wasn’t conventionally talented – and that was part of the joy of it all. “She managed to realise that the key was to not fight against it and to just embrace it. She never let that hold her back, let’s say.” One night in the early 80s, Avril was booked to perform at gay venue Manhattan Sound, in Spring Gardens. It would prove to be the performance that changed everything for her – realising she could find her superstardom in the local queer audiences who were drawn in to her magnetic force. “She was ridiculous, she was outrageous and just unashamed,” Jo said. “She didn’t hide her flaws, and she was just the embodiment of camp. It was the perfect booking.” From then, Avril got herself a manager, and she went on to record a number of tracks inspired by the Hi-NRG scene that was popular in the gay venues of the time. Taking on the stage name of Avril A, some of the songs she recorded included the likes of Little Lady Dynamite, Man Power, Paris Is For Lovers, Sex Slaves Of New Orleans, I Need Love, and Hard Up For A Man. “She was seen as a fringe act, and a bit of a curiosity,” Jo says. “But actually these songs have managed to stand the test of time. They still hold up today, I feel. They’re earworms!” Through her music, she was able to gain some national recognition. She appeared on a pilot episode of The Gong Show, presented by Frankie Howerd, and also appeared on TV with Michael Barrymore. In an 1987 interview with Gay Life magazine, she told a reporter: “I’m not caviar, love. I’m beans on toast.” The Manchester Evening News once described her as the ‘world’s worst songstress’. In another interview, she proclaimed: “‘I have my piano tuned to my voice – it’s a case of Mohammed and the Mountain, we bring the mountain to Mohammad. I have the piano detuned to Honky Tonk because I can’t sing in concert pitch.” Jo also discovered that Avril has her very own fan club, which still exists today and is run by fan Nicola Jones. Nicola said she first discovered Avril whilst working in Manchester’s bars in the mid-80’s and getting to watch shows from the likes of Eartha Kitt, Sylvester, and even Lynne Perrie, who played Ivy Brennan in Coronation Street from 1979 to 1994. “Lots of the gay clubs had great acts on and Avril was frequently on the bill,” Nicola said. “She stood out because she was so earnestly invested in what she did and did it with huge aplomb. Her ‘housewife tip’ videos would be playing in the background and were just so utterly hilarious, it just wasn’t done. She was probably the pioneer of the TikTok era – if she’d still been alive, she’d definitely have gone viral and be the superstar she aspired to be. She’d have a go at anything!” Nicola said she remembers seeing Avril at venues like Napoleons, Archway and the Hacienda, where she once played the same bill as Julian Clary and his ‘Joan Collins Fan Club’ persona. “She continued to be part of the scene for many years and my best friend, MIchael ‘Polly’ Pollard, had her doing many one-off performances for years later at his bars including Metz and Taurus,” Nicola says. “In the advent of social media, a few of us reconnected and started sharing memories of our times and when we organised a reunion. Naturally, Avril was delighted to be the guest of honour. “She showed us that you can be anything you want to be and if that’s a woman in her forties prancing on a dancefloor with boas and boys, then why the hell not! True hutzpah.” Discovering the vast archive – and realising people still looked up to Avril today – led Jo to work with the Manchester Digital Music Archive to help compile everything together. It’s now also resulted in a vinyl record of Avril’s ‘hits’ that have been collected and released together for the first time. Released this week, Housewife Superstar has been remastered using tapes from the archives and put out by the Sheffield-based Memory Dance label. Fans have described it as something they’ve ‘been waiting on for decades’. “It’s that same music that Avril performed during her shows,” Jo explains. “They’re very much the hits in inverted commas, but there’s actually many people of a certain age that will know of Paris Is For Lovers if you just mention it to them – she is still very beloved.” Jo says she also has plans to continue delving deep into the archives and feels there is more waiting to happen, including a documentary and an exhibition. “I just kind of feel like her story needs to be told,” Jo explains. “It’s very unique – this Jewish housewife who is also this gay club legend. It says a lot to me about those early days of the gay scene in Manchester, and showed that the diversity of that community also happened to include straight Jewish housewives from the religious suburbs of North Manchester. Sign up to the LGBTQ+ Bulletin newsletter here “Her story is really powerful and quite timeless. It’s about being whoever you want to be, regardless of talent and regardless of what people say. It’s a reminder that there doesn’t always need to be a rulebook. Her story is also very joyful and celebratory.” Digging through the archive, Jo said she found fan mail that was sent to Avril over the years. “She kept a copy of every single letter that was ever sent,” Jo explains. “It was really touching to see. “There were letters from young teenagers, who had poured out their hearts to her and confided in how they had been rejected by their family after coming out. She would just try to raise their spirits and make them feel loved. She was actually quite a gentle soul.” Avril began to cut down on her performances in the early 90s with a show at Manchester Mardi Gras becoming one of her last times on stage. Whilst ailing health saw her limit the number of public appearances she made, besides the occasional fan meet-up to mark a celebration or anniversary, Jo said she still never gave up the thought of headlining another show again. ““She never ever stopped wanting to be on stage,” Jo said. “She just lived for it. One of the last conversations I remember having with her was her telling me that when she sorted her knee out, she’d be back performing. “She really did get her life force from being on the stage. She spent years really doggedly trying to make it in the music industry, she never gave up on it, and she adored it when she got it. She found her audience, she found her people.” And fan Nicola says its not just Avril that seems to be having a resurgence in familiarity right now, either. She believes there is a real longing for people to learn more about that period of time, and discovering how vast Manchester’s gay scene truly was. “I think there’s a definite moment of nostalgia re-emerging,” she explains. “There’s a recognition now that there was a lot more happening at that time than the general narrative that the gay scene was just about Canal Street. There’s more stories out there – those of us of that era went through a bit of a **** time with things like the AIDs crisis and Clause 28.” Avril A’s Housewife Superstar album can be bought here . The Avril A fan club can be found on Facebook . An album launch party of Housewife Superstar will also be taking place at New York New York, in the Gay Village, on October 22. Join our Manc Life WhatsApp group HERE