When Marcia Hines became a star in Australia, Donna Summer – who grew up with her in Boston – offered her congratulations. But there was a time when the queen of disco considered Hines, who was thrice voted Australia’s queen of pop, to be a pest.
“I was best friends with Donna’s younger sister Linda,” Hines explains. “Donna was about four years older and, to us, she was the coolest chick in the world. Whenever she’d leave the house, Linda and I would go through her things and look at her clothes.”
Marcia Hines (left) and Casey Donovan are paying tribute to Donna Summer in a new show that will tour nationally.Credit: Simon Schluter
The two teenagers made every attempt to cover their tracks – but their efforts were usually in vain. “You know how you can just tell if someone has touched your stuff?” Hines says. “Donna would know straight away. That’s why she hated us!”
Earlier this year Hines decided to craft a tribute to the woman who sold more than 130 million records globally. The result is a new show, Marcia Sings Summer, with special guest Casey Donovan, which tours nationally from October.
Just as Hines looked up to Summer, Donovan was inspired by Hines. At the age of 16, Donovan won the 2004 season of Australian Idol with the support and encouragement of Hines, who was a judge on the reality singing contest. “Back then a little seed was planted where I thought, ‘Maybe one day I’ll get to share the stage with Marcia’,” Donovan says. “Now, more than 20 years later, here we are.”
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Hines was also 16 when she got her big break, boarding a plane for Harry M. Miller’s production of Hair in Sydney – which she understood to be in Austria. “The thing is, Americans didn’t learn much about Australia,” Hines told this masthead in 2023, “but I got here and realised this is the best country in the world.”
Hines, Donovan and Summer share another connection: all three rose through the ranks of musical theatre. Summer, for instance, appeared in European productions of Hair and Porgy and Bess; Hines made her name in the Australian versions of Hair and Jesus Christ Superstar; and Donovan has starred in Chicago, Sister Act and Kimberly Akimbo.
“There’s nothing like a theatre upbringing,” Hines says. “I actually think that’s what made Donna such a charismatic performer.”