As you like it, on a bike
Tanya Piejus’s Harley Sportster is a bit of a star of the stage, as well as being a top ride.
IT WAS a Harley-Davidson motorcycle that got this year’s season of Summer Shakespeare off to a roaring start, the thunder of its engine signalling the start of the play in Wellington’s Civic Square.
It wasn’t quite as Shakespeare envisioned the opening of All’s Well That Ends Well but it fitted in perfectly with director Peter Hambleton’s idea of making ‘wheels’ the theme of the show.
It was the first star turn by the Harley-Davidson 883 Sportster, although not the first by its owner, Tanya Piejus, who has been involved in the Wellington theatre scene since 2005, taking turns as actor, writer, director and stage manager.
The Harley joined push bikes, a skateboard, a shopping trolley, a crocodile bike, and even a wheelibin, in providing transport for the play’s much travelled characters.
‘‘You have got a play that has got a theme of wheels and it is outdoors, you have got to have a motorbike surely, and if you are going to have a motorbike it might as well be a Harley,’’ Piejus says.
Appointed ‘‘Harley-Davidson Chauffeur to the Countess’’, Piejus was responsible for safely transporting the Countess (Petra Donnison) on and off stage during the show in February and March.
The pair practised before performances began, riding around the small stage area to make sure Piejus could turn comfortably with a passenger on the back.
‘‘I had to ride around it a few times, just to get the feel of the space. But now I know I can turn my bike in quite small circles, which is useful to know,’’ she laughs.
It was the first time she’d taken a pillion on the single-seat Harley, and she had to make a small adjustment before she could accommodate the Countess.
‘‘I have got a temporary back seat that I put on it for the play, that is a little modification I had to make, but there are no foot pegs, so she just had to lift her feet up.’’
Piejus has been riding motorcycles since 2002, taking lessons after moving to New Zealand from Britain.
‘‘It was while she was looking after her parents’ country homestead in the Wairarapa, 32 kilometres from Masterton, that she decided it was time to learn to ride.
‘‘I needed a bike to get in and out of town to go and do my shopping, so that was really the trigger for me getting my bike licence and then once that had happened, it suddenly became a lot more than just riding in and out of town, it became something I really enjoyed.’’
She’s always liked motorcycles, attributing her interest in bikes to her Dad, Tony, who had a Triumph Bonneville back in the UK when he was young.
Her 2011 Harley-Davidson, which she bought new from Wellington Motorcycles, is one of only two in the country in limited edition white and orange, and was a 40th birthday present to herself.
‘‘I had the money when I was 40 and I thought well if you can’t buy yourself a Harley for your 40th birthday, what can you do? I have had it for six years now and I love riding it.’’
She has another bike too, a Suzuki 650, which she uses as her commuter bike to get to work during the week, reserving the Harley mostly for longer road trips and weekend rides in the Wairarapa.
She’s done almost 37,000 kilometres on the Harley now, riding it as far north as Cape Reinga, around the Coromandel and taking it on a circuit of the South Island.
Piejus says she finds the Sportster with its ‘SuperLow’ frame easy enough to manage despite her diminutive 158-centimetre stature.
‘‘I struggle with getting bikes that fit me sometimes, but the nice thing about the one that I have got is it is deliberately a little bit lower to the ground for women.
‘‘I find it really quite manoeuvrable and I can keep up with the boys on their sports bikes which I probably wouldn’t be able to do if I was riding something bigger. This one is actually quite nippy.’’
It’s the fourth time Piejus has wangled a motorcycle on to a Wellington theatre stage.
She’s used motorcycles in three productions at the Gryphon Theatre, once using a borrowed HarleyDavidson backstage to provide the sound effect of an aeroplane flying over, and another time riding her Suzuki GN250 while doing an impersonation of Arnold Schwarnegger as The Terminator.
And while this year’s season of Summer Shakespeare was the sportster’s first appearance on stage, Piejus is hoping it won’t be its last.
‘‘I have still got a concept in the back of my head for a bikie gang version of Romeo and Juliet, which I would love to do with lots of bikes.
‘‘It would obviously need to be an outdoor production again. Probably. Unless it was a big enough theatre.’’