Chloe Walker
The Pun 2010 Reviews »
American business guru Tom Peters says that the secret to success is to ‘under promise and over deliver’. Funny Irishman and tiny Yamaha keyboard guru David O’Doherty appears to subscribe to this advice.
His first song for the evening instructs the audience to ‘please lower your expectations’. Then he tells us how bad he is at telling jokes. Then he laments that every review he has ever received has essentially said, ‘It’s good, I suppose. If you’re into that sort of thing.’ And then he over delivers.
O’Doherty’s sense of humour is …
The Pun 2010 Reviews »
When it comes to self-deprecating humour, Felicity Ward can deprecate with the best of them. Her performance at last year’s MICF, Felicity Ward’s Ugly as a Child Variety Show, contained a liberal sprinkling of anecdotes about her idiotic misadventures. This year she cracks open the Book of Moron, a hefty tome she has penned full of stories of her own stupidity.
Wearing a blazer and cravat and clutching a pipe to her mouth, Felicity sits in a comfy armchair and reads aloud from her book. Across the way onstage, fellow Ronnie …
The Pun 2010 Reviews »
The unofficial title of Reginald D. Hunter’s show is Trophy Nigga, owing to the media’s habit of booking him for commentary only when race-related issues are in the news. His response to such requests is to insist that he be introduced as ‘Reginald – King of the Blacks!’, which tends to be a dealbreaker.
He has a reputation for controversy and an obvious, deep-seated belief that everyone should get their thoughts, no matter how unpopular, out in the open. A recent profile in The Age said that he has been labelled …
The Pun 2010 Reviews »
Born in Egypt, brought up in Sydney and banned in Rockhampton, Akmal Saleh’s stand-up show It’s Not My Fault is based on extracts from his recently-published memoir, The Life of Akmal. Musings on being raised in the Coptic Orthodox Church, battling through ‘special English’ class as a new Australian, and the early days of his comedy career give us a CliffsNotes version of the book.
Akmal calls it like he sees it – and then ducks. His quip that ‘the Lebs took the credit for inventing felafel, and they also took …
The Pun 2009 Reviews »
Ben Darsow has aspirations to be one of the world’s great supermarket managers. In the meantime, he’s doing stand-up to get by. His show, Connected, is all about plugging in to the flow of life and using it to go for your goals and ‘be the best version of yourself that you can be’. But don’t be put off by the high-falutin’ self-helpy theme of the show – Ben is one cheeky little dude.
Hailing from Adelaide, Ben’s stand-up style is chilled out, friendly and down to earth. His material meanders …
The Pun 2007 Reviews »
Everyone has a tale of the one that got away. For Fox K, it’s Emily, last seen aged seven on a family beach holiday. Consumed by the notion that she could be his soul mate, Fox tells his story of his quest to find her (aided by his trusty sidekick, Stefan) and speculates on how his life might have turned out with Emily.
The show is a mixture of stand-up and storytelling with some video thrown in. It has a cosy feel, not just because of the small (but noisy) venue …
The Pun 2007 Reviews »
So you missed out on tickets for Dylan Moran, and you’re reading this review to see if he was shit so that you can stop kicking yourself for not being more organised, because you love watching ‘Black Books’ and you wanted to know if Moran is just like Bernard Black in real life, and you never get to go out and it’s not fair etc.
Well, prepare yourself because I have bad news. Moran was marvellous. He was very, very funny. He is just like Bernard’obstreperous, acerbic, surreal and slightly harried. …
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