What's so funny!?

Yes, where have I been? Well, it was an amazingly hectic time in April with Dom Romeo’s course in what is funny (which I shall review); of course there were many nights out at the comedy festival where I got to see a good many shows. And finally was weighed down by a successful couple of bookselling months.

How disappointed am I that I didn’t get a single review about the comedy festival!! At least I got to keep my proffered $100 worth of books.

So I’m back, to fix up the site and try to get into the comedy world. There’s lots to talk about.

g

The MICF gala was on Wednesday night at the Princess Theatre. The show was hosted by the very funny Shaun Micallef who managed to take self-deprecation to new depths. As always the gala highlighted some of the best acts performing at the MICF, all in aid of Oxfam. International guests included regulars such as Arj Barker, Jason Byrne, Otis Lee Crenshaw (Rich Hall) and acts new to Australia such as Russell Kane and Jamie Kilstein. Local regulars included Judith Lucy, Adam Hills, Dave Hughes, Denise Scott, Tim Minchin and newbie, Hannah Gadsby.

My favourite act of the night was Nina Conti who did a great spot with her monkey. I also loved Jason Byrnes in a very confused set including lycra clad wrestlers, cling wrap and an unfortunate audience member. Otis Lee Crenshaw, Mike Wilmot and Tom Gleeson had stand out routines.

Also look out for the opening number from the Chooky Dancers. Great!

The MICF gala will be screening on
Channel Ten on Monday 30th of March.

I started this blog nearly two years ago to have an excuse to enjoy comedy and learn a bit more about it. In that time I came across the work of Dom Romeo and his blog Stand and Deliver. Self-confessed professional nerd and writer, he is in town for the Melbourne International Comedy Festival. He answered some questions for me about his own career and love of comedy.

How many years have you been writing about comedy?

Fifteen years! *Shudders* It was December 1993, Barry Humphries was touring Australia and I was part of a team that would be editing Honi Soit, the student newspaper at the University of Sydney in 1994. So I timidly knocked on the stage door of Sydney’s State Theatre prior to a performance and asked if there was any chance of interview Mr Humphries. The Stage Manager told me to return to my seat, and she’d come back with Barry’s answer. She came and found me in the theatre and said, ‘Barry would much rather speak to someone from a student publication than from a glossy magazine; come backstage after the show’.

At the time I had no idea that mostly, people allow themselves to be interviewed when they have something to flog, and that one approaches an artiste via their management or PR people. Humphries was, as ever, a gentleman and a scholar, and gave me encouragement because he remembered fondly his student days editing his varsity paper. (Farrago, at the University of Melbourne).

The best bit of advice Barry Humphries gave me was the secret to success: “You have to make them need you. They don’t realise how much they need you yet.” Most of them still don’t realise, unfortunately.

What inspired you?

What ‘inspired’ me was the writing of John Lahr, son of Bert Lahr (who played the Cowardly Lion in The Wizard of Oz). John Lahr has written some of the best entertainment profiles – for The New Yorker – that you will ever read. Including a profile of Bill Hicks, who still seems to be everyone’s benchmark of contemporary comedy genius. He also wrote a biography of Barry Humphries, entitled Dame Edna Everage and the Rise of Western Civilisation. The work of Clive James – both is television writing and his serious essays on the arts – were inspirational. Richard Neville and his fellow Oz editors were early heroes. Kenneth Tynan’s writing on theatre was also inspirational. I’ve always been prone to over-analyse everything, with the ability to simplify and explain it, pointing out patterns and qualities, combined with an ability to ‘interview’ – more often than not I seem to be able to relax people into wanting to ‘have a yak’ at length.

What role do you think comedy has to play in society?

Comedy offers relief from the serious stuff, and enables ‘dangerous’, ‘unusual’ or ‘unpopular’ ideas to be voiced and considered, particularly those that don’t fit in any other parts of society. It can do good, but never directly – usually it’s a matter of putting ideas ‘out there’. A healthy society has a healthy sense of humour and can ‘take a joke’. Comedy is often about testing the boundaries – sailing close to the edge without crossing over into it.

Hi guys,

While I am ready for the Melbourne International Comedy Festival and will try to review as many shows that I can, I can't be everywhere! So I am looking for people to write one line reviews and send them to me via Twitter. See the sidebar if you want to subscribe to the wsf twits.

At the end of each day I will put all the reviews into a post and mail it on the list, so you can see who's hot and who's not at this year's comedy festival.

But please, I am looking for good reviews ending with a score out of 10 at the end. Remember, you've got 140 characters to work with. Get your friends to review too!

eg. Stephen K Amos was fantastic tonight. But he really needs new material - 6/10

And as a bonus, for every review, you will go into the draw to win $100 worth of books through my bookshop!

Every year we celebrate the winners of great films at the Oscars, the BAFTAs and Screen Actors Guild Awards. But of equal importance are the Razzies. The Razzies, for those of you who don't know are awards given to honour the absolute worst films that are made each year.

So while I'm not Hugh Jackman, I thought I'd let you know who the winners of this coveted award were.

Worst Picture: The Love Guru
Worst Actor: Mike Myers, The Love Guru
Worst Actress: Paris Hilton, The Hottie and the Nottie
Worst Supporting Actress: Paris Hilton REPO: THE GENETIC OPERA
Worst Supporting Actor: Pierce Brosnan, MAMMA MIA!
Worst Screen Couple: Paris Hilton and either Christine Lakin or Joel David Moore, THE HOTTIE AND THE NOTTIE
Worst Director: Uwe Boll, 1968: Tunnel Rats, In The Name of The King: A Dungeon Siege Tale, and Postal
Worst Screenplay: The Love Guru, Written by Mike Myers & Graham Gordy
Worst Career Achievement: Uwe Boll (Germany’s Answer to Ed Wood)

So it looks like Mike Myer and Paris Hilton swept up the awards this year. I look forward to seeing what terrible films come out in 2009!

Well, it’s the last day of 2008 and I thought I’d put together a little ‘Best of 2008’ post. For me, the year has been excellent, full of travel, work and as much comedy as I can fit in. Sadly, I didn’t get a chance to get to the Melbourne International Comedy Festival.

So, here are 10 comedy highlights for the year.

1. Flight of the Conchords – The boys, Gemaine and Brett continued their brand of comedy, moving from a radio show to a highly successful TV show. Kiwis in NY – comedy gold!

2. Jerry Lewis – One of the greatest comedians of all time, Jerry, now in his 80s toured Australia with great acclaim. Doing some comedy standards and talking about his friends (it’s easy when they are Dean Martin, Frank Sinatra & Sammy Davis Jnr). A great night out!

3. Chris Rock – On his first world tour, Chris gave a great set, talking about his life, raising kids and what the world might be like with Obama in power (before he won).

4. Spamalot – A left-over from 2007, Spamalot was what was in my stocking this time last year. As a Python fan, it was a great mix of The Holy Grail, singing and taking the piss out of many many other musicals.

5. Bill Bailey – The self-confessed ‘babbling bug-eyed druid’ was highly anticipated in his show Tinselworm, mixing his whimsical humour with music. Great show.

6. Hollowmen – A great piece of Australian comedy by Working Dog. It made fun of politics in Australia by looking at its inner workings. A dry comedy that hit the spot many many times.

7. Tropic Thunder – A standout comedy this year starring Ben Stiller, Jack Black & Robert Downey Jnr it took aim at other war movies, what it might be like as a movie celebrity and the craziness of it all.

8. The Savages – A super-dry comedy starring Laura Linney and Phillip Seymour Hoffman, trying to deal with the complexities of a demented father and the harsh realities of middle age.

9. Very Small Business – Another reason why Australian comedy is in good form. VSB was not to everyone’s taste, but the writing was taught, the lead unlikeable and the comedy dry enough to make me smile.

10. Tina Fey as Sarah Palin in the US elections – Finally, the US elections that seemed to be going on for about 2 years. With the rise of Sarah Palin, it truly added a bit of comedy that had sorely been lacking from the campaign. But the great Tina Fey added even more comedy to it on Saturday Night Live with a wonderful impression of the woman that we will be thankful never got to be the most powerful woman in the world.

And to finish off the year, here is a clip of Tina Fey doing her great impression. So whatever you are doing tonight, have a great night rocking in 2009 and hope to see you all on the new WSF blog that I will be starting up next year. Take care!

What were your highlights for 2008??? Tell me!

Merry Christmas to everyone out there that reads or stumbles across my humble blog. I hope you have a wonderful day today, full of cheer, love and goodwill. I hope the coming year brings great things and at the very least, that you have the chance to have a laugh.

I will be writing as soon as I've finished the Christmas leftovers.

All the best,

George

Shameless plug.

At the moment I'm working a few jobs. One of the ones I'm proud of is the development of a website which sells Christmas cards where 90c out of every dollar go to charities.

So if you need Christmas cards for this festive season, please check out the cards. And even if you don't like any of them, please let folks in your circle of friends or your company know and help great Australian charities, hospitals and community organisations!

www.charityxmascards.com.au

For those that don't know, Channel 9 in Australia produce a 20-1 tv show where they count down lists, such as "Favourite Film Quotes" "Sexiest People" etc. and get minor celebs and comedians to comment on the list.

It's pretty standard fluff and was copied from similar shows in the UK and the US. This week, they had 20-1 "Funniest People", so I just had to say something!

This list is as follows:
1. Robin Williams
2. Edna Everage - played by Barry Humphries*
3. John Cleese
4. Eddie Murphy
5. Jerry Lewis
6. Three Stooges
7. Billy Connelly
8. Magda Szubanski*
9. Wil Ferrell
10. Ruby Wax
11. Rodney Dangerfield
12. Owen Wilson
13. Ben Stiller
14. Roseanne Barr
15. Chris Liley*
16. Rowan Atkinson
17. Jerry Seinfeld
18. Benny Hill
19. Joan Rivers
20. Mike Myers

* - these people are Aussie (in case you are reading from somewhere not in Oz)

These is a fairly bleh kind of list. The list tends to focus on stuff that would have been on Aussie TV or in cinemas that people in general would have heard of. Shows like Black Books, Spaced, Father Ted or Vicar of Dibley have been screened but may not be known by lots of people.

If you check out the link you can see many unhappy people with comedians like Richard Pryor, Dylan Moran, Bill Bailey, David Chappelle, Bill Cosby or Chris Rock being left off the list.

But then again, these lists are always controversial. Who would have put on the list??? Who would you have left off?

Where have I been?

Some of you may have noted that I've not updated the website for a few weeks. I wish I could say that I'd developed the cure for cancer, been sunning myself on a beach aside my lovely girlfriend, or even getting through the last series of Dexter on DVD.

But I've just been dealing with reality which has been pretty busy as of late. This blog doesn't pay the bills [Click on an Adsense link!], so I've got a few jobs. BUT at the least I got to see Jerry Lewis on the weekend and seen what else is going on in the world of comedy.

SO, I'll be coming out with a few posts this week. So, make a cuppa tea, pull up your ergo friendly desk chair, read my ramblings and make the odd comment :)

Thanks.

g

Those of you who read this blog from time to time may have wondered why I have no new posts in November, or why my last entry was from August 2007.

Shite

Well, it seems that my server host had some sort of meltdown a few weeks ago. Now that everything seems to be running again, it seems it's running from last August.

Damn

So, let this be a lesson to you, that *I* should back up this blog from time to time :S Thankfully, I've got copies of my posts, so over the next few weeks if you get a sense of deja vu, you'll know why.

The world of comedy has changed in the last few months (and as of yesterday, Australia now has a Labour government!), so there's plenty for me to write about.

Remember to tune in, go out and have a great laugh :)

g

Steve Kaplan is an expert in comedy writing, working with people like Jack Black, Nathan Lane, Nia Vardalos (My Big Fat Greek Wedding). He regularly works as a consultant and script doctor for companies such as Dreamworks, HBO, Paramount and Touchstone.

In August he will be conducting seminars and workshops in Melbourne and Sydney. Whether you're writing a comedy screenplay, working on a sitcom script, writing a spec script, or directing or producing a comedy. Steve Kaplan's Comedy Intensive is a must for any serious professional.

The Course Outline includes

I. Premise

THE ART AND SCIENCE OF COMEDY
1. Introduction and Overview
2. Dying is Easy, Comedy is Hard
3. Comedy Perception Test - Are you seeing 20/20?
4. Funny vs. Comic - The difference
5. The Comedy Equation

II. Set-up

THE SIX HIDDEN TOOLS OF COMEDY
1. Winning
2. Non-Hero
3. Metaphorical Relationships
4. Positive (and Negative) Actions
5. Active Emotion
6. Straight Line/Wavy Line

Learn how to use these essential tools in your work

III. Development

APPLYING THE TOOLS
1. Entire History of Comedy... in 15 minutes.
2. The Commedia Intensive
3. Comedy Structure & Development
4. Comic Premise - The Lie That Tells the Truth
5. Comic Premise Exercises & Analysis
6. The Comedy Paradigm
7. Comedy Writing in Film and Television
8. Jokes and Other Weapons of Mass Distraction
9. Developing Unique Comic Character POVs and Personalities

IV. Payoff

COMEDY PRACTICUM
1. Script Analysis (TV and Film)
2. Clips from classic and current comedy TV shows and films demonstrating the principles and tools of Comedy
3. Exercises and demonstrations of comedy principles
4. Final Q&A

If you think you're funny, or would simply like to be funny-er, then go to www.epiphany.com.au to find out more!