The Pun

Massive Act-Attacks

By Stu Leader ⋅ May 24, 2006 ⋅  Email This Post ⋅  Print This Post ⋅ Post a comment

Once a year Melbourne is buzzing with Comedy Festival vibes. Artists from all over the world are shipped in for our entertainment, and scores of local performers take to the stages alongside them. From massive halls to tiny spaces in the back of obscure pubs, rooms all over the city have people crammed in waiting to laugh. Many people will have heard of some of this year’s top international performers; Daniel Kitson, Ross Noble, and Rich Hall. But how about Christina Adams, Anthony Menchetti or Matt Elsbury? Not quite as familiar. These are just a few of the high-quality local performers who work hard to get the word out about their shows.

With cash at the ready, large international (and Australian) acts are able to purchase advertising to make sure we all know what they are doing during the festival. Once you’ve seen the ad, your interest is more likely to be sparked and now you know about the show??you can be convinced to come along. For local acts the cost of most advertising is prohibitive, and the small space to let an audience know about your show in the festival guide is often not enough to get your message across. They are dwarfed by bigger budgets, paid publicists, better venues and name recognition.

Audiences love a sure thing, and why not? Deciding what to spend your hard-earned money on is difficult, and you don’t want to shell out only to be disappointed. It’s also exciting when you have the opportunity to see someone rarely on our shores. When your favourite television star comes out once in a blue moon, you don’t want to miss out. Unfortunately, choosing only to go along to big internationals means excellent local acts have theatres sitting only half full (or empty as it most likely feels to them).

It doesn’t have to be a choice though. Most shows during the festival only last an hour, leaving plenty of time to pop in a local act for double the laughs. With cheaper tickets than internationals, and the Melbourne International Comedy Festival making things easy by producing shows such as The Comedy Zone (where young local comics are selected by the festival and showcased as part of a small team of up-and-coming artists) and Moosehead shows (where performers are supported by the festival in their attempts to create a show that steps outside their comfort zone or takes on a new or different challenge), there are plenty of options that take the risk out of selecting how to spend your money. Audiences can check on performers who have been nominated for local awards or ask at the festival booth out front of the Melbourne Town Hall for some good advice.

There is a great tradition in the festival where at the end of a show the performer will recommend some other shows you should get out and see. While it seems to have dropped off in the last few years, you will still find plenty of people doing it. It’s testament to the idea that artists don’t see each other as competition’they don’t just want to see their own show do well, they want to see the shows of their fellow comics, people they have often performed alongside for years, do well. The festival is a chance to take a risk on shows we might not have at the top of our list, to participate in a vibrant festival which has open participation’anyone with a big idea and a room to show it in can be a part.

As an audience we only have ourselves to blame if we don’t look for the little known or smaller shows, which may offer something a tad different to the rest or fit a niche interest we have. Fostering these performers helps to diversify our choices, open doors for new talent to get bigger and better and ensures that comics will keep getting up there on stages for us. Every big act was once a small one that struggled for an audience.