I found the Comic’s Lounge in North Melbourne and decided to check out their Thursday night show. I took the train into town a couple hours early and wandered to a few hapless bars before heading in to buy my ticket at around 7:30pm. The show didn’t start til 8:30 so I wasted some time at the bar and asked about international acts and if any Americans ever come through, a bystander remarked “no, cause Americans aren’t funny.” I wanted to ask why then the only thing on tv here is American sitcoms but there was no need for acrimony. The place seated about 450 and there were about 250 on a Thursday which I thought was pretty good.
The emcee was alright, a lot of trite jokes but sometimes clever…when he was about to introduce the first act he wanted the crowd to give a big American/Las Vegas over-the-top ovation so he asked if there were any Americans in the crowd, naturally I didn’t raise my hand but some poor sap in the front did (and he pretty much wore it the rest of the night), the emcee encouraged “so go ahead and be American…but not too American, don’t go bombing a small country or anything.” I thought that was kind of funny, but later all the American jokes started getting old (annoying and hackneyed).
The emcee was alright, a lot of trite jokes but sometimes clever…when he was about to introduce the first act he wanted the crowd to give a big American/Las Vegas over-the-top ovation so he asked if there were any Americans in the crowd, naturally I didn’t raise my hand but some poor sap in the front did (and he pretty much wore it the rest of the night), the emcee encouraged “so go ahead and be American…but not too American, don’t go bombing a small country or anything.” I thought that was kind of funny, but later all the American jokes started getting old (annoying and hackneyed).
The first act was this redneck (Australian Larry the Cable Guy) who made a joke about how crumpets take forever to cook and how fire suits should be made of crumpets and then he joked about how somebody would have to explain that to the American…and I agreed.
The next two acts were younger guys who were more my style, witty/sarcastic. I ended up talking to them during the intermission and Peter Sharkey started asking me which comedians I liked, I told him obviously Seinfeld but lately I’ve been watching a lot of Doug Stanhope and David Cross. He said he really likes Steven Wright and Mitch Hedberg which was funny cause I have both of those guys on my Ipod. He invited me to a free show that he does Monday nights in the CBD…Monday is Australia Day (celebrating the European settlement) so depending on my plans (there’s a beer festival near Fed Square) I hope to make it there for the 8:30pm show.
The closer was John Kats, he was pretty funny but nothing terribly noteworthy…I had to catch three different trains so I didn’t get home again until almost 12:30am. So my first comedy show in Australia was pretty good, and 5 acts for $15 bucks was quite a deal…I just wish I could be in Melbourne in April for the international comedy festival where there are supposed to be heaps of comedians at all sorts of venues all over the city for the whole month.
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