Bananaland follows on from the success of their other creations including Muriel’s Wedding The Musical, and the one-woman opera The Call for Opera Queensland, which debuted in last year’s Brisbane Festival.

Miller-Heidke said she and Nuttall brought Bananaland to life during the pandemic, when they needed some absurd comedy to get through the dark times.

“It’s quite different to what’s come before. It’s definitely much more of a sort of riotous comedy,” she said.

“Especially in the depth of Covid, we wanted to create something that was just bursting with joy. And so it’s quite hilarious. I think so anyway.

“My tour got cancelled and cancelled again. And we, my partner Keir and I, after working on The Rabbits and then Muriel’s Wedding The Musical, we’d had this sort of deep hankering to create something ourselves from the ground up to make our own story and characters but hadn’t ever really had the time to focus on it.

“And so Keir started to go to the cafe every day and he got into a deep writing routine and we came up with the first draft of Bananaland and pitched it to Lou Bezzina at Brisbane Festival who really liked it and has gotten behind it and been this amazing support.”

Three Brisbane Festival supported workshops later and the show is now ready for its debut. Miller-Heidke said this highlights how vital it is that new productions are given that support from the earliest stages.

“It’s risky. They have to be bold – it’s not like putting bloody Rocky Horror show back on again,” she said.

“In Australia, new musicals are very rare and precious, and I think it’s because they are hard to make and they are expensive to make. So we’re just so grateful that Lou Bezzina and John Kotzas at QPAC have had the vision and just the faith in us and in this project because we know we’re very lucky to be allowed to do it.

“Those workshops are always incredibly productive and the show, has changed quite dramatically for the better. It’s amazing.

“That’s part of what I love about this art form, I think is it’s so collaborative and being in a room with Simon Phillips, our amazing director and the cast, we’re all raising this massive barn together.”

Bananaland follows Ruby, a 21-year-old idealist and her unintentionally hilarious protest band Kitty Litter. One fateful day when they take the stage they’re shocked to find they have a sold-out audience of small children. One of their songs has accidentally become a massive hit with preschoolers.

There’s plenty of hooks in the score and razor sharp observations of life on the road.

“One of their songs accidentally without their knowledge, becomes a hit for basically kids under five. And then they’re forced to wrestle with the decision to, whether they become a kids band, and follow the money, or whether they stay true to their morals, their morals and their politics, and make quote unquote `real art’.

“So there’s those two strands of music, the crazy theatrical sort of pop, the punk music. And then there’s the catchy kids music.

“And then there’s the third strand, which is the characters singing their hearts and their emotions. And that’s more, I’d say, sort of a more pure, authentic kind of style of songwriting.”

She hopes it leads to more Australian productions getting the support they need to tell Australian stories.

“It is a very Australian show and we’re embracing that,” she said.

“We wanted to make something that was unashamedly Australian. Australian audiences are keen to see themselves reflected back on stage, particularly within the context of a musical – it’s rare.”

Brisbane Festival Artistic Director Louise Bezzina said the world premiere of Bananaland showed the importance of supporting and creating new Australian works.

“Brisbane Festival has a long and cherished history of championing new work and we are so delighted to once again partner with QPAC to bring these new shows to life,” Bezzina said.

“We know how incredible these creatives are and that the end results will be something unique, quintessentially Australian and wholly magical.”