DEAR DIVA’S FAREWELL.
The DNA team are devastated by the loss of Robbyne Kaamil, our Dear Diva advice columnist, who passed away unexpectedly last month. She kept her cancer diagnosis to herself; even close friends were unaware that she was not well. Robbyne was a comedian and actor, and an activist and volunteer in the LGBTIQ scene in New York.
We only now realise how little we knew her. Her advice column was always hilariously direct. She will be sorely missed. To those who knew her well, our sincere condolences.
To Robbyne… Thank you, and safe onward travels, Diva.
Matthew Phillp, an Australian journalist and author living in New York, worked with Robbyne on radio and remembers her with fondness here…
Ifirst met Robbyne Kaamil in the mid ’00s, when she joined D List Radio, the gay nightlife podcast I co-produced with party promoter Daniel Nardicio. She’d pitched herself to Daniel as a tell-it-like-it-is relationship expert, and he saw potential and invited her on.
The minute we handed her a mic she took off: finger in the air, gospel preacher cadence, unafraid to take up space, she wore a large hat. The first piece of advice she gave: it’s important to get laid at least once a month, followed immediately with a plug for her “Fuck Me Teddy Bear”, a small white bear embroidered with the words “Fuck Me” to be used when words weren’t enough. What wasn’t to love?
Working with Robbyne was effortless. Always on time and profoundly generous with her energy, she had the capacity to keep going even if she actually had no idea what to say next. She would also fluctuate, often mid-sentence, between being a no-nonsense diva with advice for people who “got baby mama drama or yo man be beatin’ yo ass” and a more subdued sophisticate who would say things like, “Oh darling, you look a tad perplexed.”
If we were stuck with a low-energy guest, she could carry their interview and by the end you’d swear they were more interesting than they really were.
Robbyne could be sent into any situation and she’d find a way to make it work. We once recorded the show on the downtown D train with guests getting on at various subway stops along the route. Robbyne maintained flawless on-air banter throughout while periodically subduing subway commuters who were bewildered at their unexpected proximity to a barely clothed go-go boy and radio show.
Similarly, at the LGBT Expo, amped up on free samples of over-caffeinated liquor, she and I tore through the Javits Convention Centre looking for potential interview subjects, while she periodically let out high-pitched diva belts, essentially losing the battle to seem like everything was under control.
When the show ended (we were cancelled for “on-air sexual harassment”) so too did an extremely potent chapter that had swept me up into a circle of nightlife people who became like family. Eventually, I distanced myself from nightlife, but Robbyne stuck around the scene and continued to perform, write and volunteer for causes.
I’m Australian and Robbyne was a native New Yorker, so while we hadn’t travelled the same distance to get where we met, we had both set out to land somewhere that might embrace us. We both found gay nightlife, and for that illustrious period we were kindred spirits.
By the time cancer took hold of her, Robbyne and I had not been in touch for a while. Nonetheless, the last time I saw her, earlier this year, she was doing the door at Club Cumming [Allan Cummings’ cabaret venue] and when she saw me, she enveloped me in a hug and frantically asked how I’d been. Like most people, I had no idea she was sick, and she gave no inkling of it that night.
It’s likely Robbyne chose not to disclose her prognosis because she wanted to live on her own terms. She knew she couldn’t impede it [the disease] for herself, so she did what it took to prevent it impacting those she loved. She faced it, took control of what she could, and bravely carried on doing what was important to her with the time she had.
It’s hard to imagine a more magnificent way for a person to have lived.