Raygun musical: Comedian Stephanie Broadbridge advertising ‘completely legal parody’ amid lawyer action

Australian comedian Stephanie Broadbridge has launched a fresh effort to proceed with her musical homage to Rachael ‘Raygun’ Gunn amid the threat of legal action from the Olympic breakdancer.

It comes as Broadbridge issued an apology to the Olympian for the “negative backlash” she had received in the wake of the cancellation of the show, saying she never intended to cause “hurt or distress”.

Stephanie Broadbridge’s trial show for ‘Raygun: The Musical’ was cancelled just hours before it was scheduled to be performed in Sydney earlier this month, with the breaker’s lawyers threatening legal action.

Broadbridge said Raygun’s legal team had trademarked the poster for her show - featuring a silhouette of the dancer in her ‘kangaroo’ pose - and the owner of iD, Anthony Skinner, said he had received a letter demanding the show be called off.

But the comedian took to Instagram on Thursday morning to unveil a revised poster and name for the show, entitled ‘Breaking: The Musical’ and featuring a kangaroo silhouette rather than the Olympian.

The poster spruiks “A completely legal parody musical”, with the tongue-in-cheek claim that it is ‘Ranked No.1 Musical By The World Musical Sports Federation”.

The show lists dates for the Adelaide Fringe Festival, starting February 28, as well as shows in Melbourne in April and Sydney in May.

In a statement later on Thursday on Instagram, Broadbridge said she acknowledged that she had not reached out to Raygun before creating the title and poster for the original show.

“It was never my intention to mislead people into thinking that she was involved in the production,” Broadbridge wrote.

“She is not and continues to not be attached to this project in any way.

“I have changed the name of the show and the silhouette and will not use her name or the silhouette ever again.

“I am deeply sorry to learn that Raygun has faced negative backlash as a result of the media attention around the cancellation of the preview for the musical. The last thing I wanted was for anyone to experience hate or distress from this situation.”

Broadbridge said her show would be “based entirely on stuff I read on the internet” and “a fictional telling of a moment in Australian history.”

Gunn earlier this month explained the reasons for trademarking her name and likeness.

“Yes, I’ve trademarked my name and my now-famous kangaroo silhouette pose, which has been used in just about every piece of Raygun merch out there — which I’m not profiting from, by the way,” she said.

“And the reason we did that was because we were notified that there were applications from other parties trying to trademark my name and image for commercial purposes. I mean, totally wild.”