by Laura Ferguson It’s my last show for the Comedy Festival 2018 and I am lucky enough that it is Giggly Gertie’s, the comedy skit show coming from the duo Chris Parker and Tom Sainsbury. I wasn’t sure what to expect going in to this show and I am all the happier for the surprise it gave me.
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by Laura Ferguson I had not seen Matthewson before, but had heard great things from his previous shows and his alumni status as nominee for the Billy T Awards brings a load of expectation with it. As a huge fan of The Male Gayz podcast, helmed by Chris Parker and Eli Matthewson, I heavily anticipated An Inconvenient Poof. Bounding on stage with a hilarious song from the 1970’s that seemed so perfectly tailored to Mathewson, I settled in for an hour I was sure would be full of laughs.
Lizzie Murray Lana, 20-something, Rotorua. A Sagittarius-cat owner-stand up comic with a “it was mutual” breakup haircut seeks romance, midnight snacks and ex boyfriends’ weddings. In her first solo NZ Comedy Festival entry, Lana dishes on her disastrous attempts at dating and faking having everything together.
by Laura Ferguson When I hear the term ‘chat show’ I usually think of bland people desperately attempting to be interesting while selling their daytime audience products they never want or need. If chat shows were more like Marcel Lucont’s A Chat Show, I would religiously watch all of them. Replete with Lucont’s ubiquitous red wine with which to imbibe, or more likely quaff, communion.
 Lizzie MurrayInquisitive eyes etched on paper in thin, cross-hatched strokes study me as I enter Thistle Hall. A slender ceramic pot with pursed lips judges my sock and shoe combo. Celia Kent’s first solo exhibition Expressive Features: The Nose Knows presents portraiture and pottery. Each piece is unique and screams character. The walls are adorned with her black and white illustrations while the anthropomorphic pots add soft blues, greens and foliage upon their tall plinths.
Corey Spence Loser happens to be my first show in the Te Auaha performance space, and walking into its Tapere Nui, I see an intimate space for a bigger theatre. Across the back curtain are movers projecting the eight original colours of the Pride Flag. Beside her mic stand is a box... full of Best Foods Mayonnaise. The show hasn’t even begun and I’m already excited to see what Urzila Carlson makes of this.
Corey Spence “Nah, fuck that”, Chopper exclaims as a bright light shines on an altar, where God tells him he’s dead for good. Sounding disgruntled (we presume as he’s obfuscated with a white sheet), Chopper convinces God to bring him back to life on the condition that he’ll rekindle the audience’s belief in the Divine within the show’s runtime. As the newly arisen Bogan Jesus, he has a few ideas to modernise religion and fix what’s no longer working for it. Heath Franklin’s Bogan Jesus is a balls-to-wall, full-throttle, beer-chugging, power-hour-and-a-bit of comedy; we take a trip with Chopper and his revision of religion to discover why we’re less religious today than we were before.
Lizzie Murray Ensemble is the perfect title for this exhibition. Four mature female artists are showcasing their very different talents. Wax, watercolour, beads and textile presented together offer a complimentary kaleidoscopic treat.
by Laura Ferguson “Sit down, be humble,” blasts Kendrick Lamar in BATS’ Propeller Stage. Well, I am sitting down, beer in hand, and indeed humbled. Not by Mr. Lamar, but by those who wield his work. Frickin’ Dangerous Bro’s Humble starring Pax Assadi, James Roque and Jamaine Ross, has left the stage slick with talent as the trio receive our deserved whoops, hollers and applause.
I admit, I went to this show tonight on the recommendation of someone else as I was not familiar with Frickin’ Dangerous Bro, being the network TV Grinch that I am. I had no idea that it was a comedy sketch show! (I know, I know, I could have at least read the show blurb, but that would have ruined my surprise.) I am quite partial to comedy sketch shows and this one mixed my love of social commentary with continuous, raucous laughter. by Laura Ferguson I’ve missed this. The anticipation of a show from a performer I haven’t seen before. It is true I have never had the pleasure of being an audience member for James Roque, but I have been following his articles on The Spinoff and thoroughly enjoy his openness and analysis of New Zealand racism. The freshness of Roque’s approach is obvious from the start as he aptly begins his show, Legal Alien: “I resolved to do something last year,” he says, a playful energy filling the stage. “I decided to say my name the Filipino way.” This premise leads us on a journey of a Kiwi-Filipino immigrant and the resolution to be a Pākehā induced ROH-ke no longer, but the reclaimed Roh-KEH instead.
Hamish Boyle We saunter into Circa One to the sound of light piano music. With a smooth pep, the Yamaha keyboard echoes across a set covered in classy portraits and art lining the high walls. A set not ready for this particular comedy show, but just as ready as the performers to accept its offers. As quick as a lighting cue, the music’s genre and beat shifts to electronica. Theatresports has asked us visually and sonically to rise up to meet it. This show keeps itself on its toes, and it never lets up.
by Laura Ferguson Before this show, The Bugle was just another podcast I was told I would love that sat undisturbed in my phone library. That has changed now that I have seen one of its hosts, Andy Zaltzman, and his politico brand of zany comedy. Right Questions. Wrong Answers is a brilliant offshoot from this podcast, bringing Zaltzman’s ranting energy tinged with whimsy and an effervescent imagination.
by Laura Ferguson One event I truly miss since moving from Christchurch is their annual World Buskers Festival. That’s one reason I look forward to the productions of Rollicking Entertainment starring husband-and-wife team Lizzie Tollemache and David Ladderman. Their latest offering, Seven Deadly Stunts, brings me more of what I crave in a busker festival-less world: excitement, thrills, fun and the bouncing curiosity of seeing feats even my imagination wouldn’t dare attempt.
Tollemache and Ladderman’s Seven Deadly Stunts is exactly as it sounds: seven sideshow acts that combine anticipation, vicarious fear and comedy. It delivers this in chainsaws, and no, that isn’t just an awkward substitution for spades. Hamish Boyle Our Country’s Good sees the first shipload of English convicts find footing in Australia after eight months at sea. As the officers bicker on whether it is better to punish or rehabilitate the convicts, 2nd Lieutenant Clark (James Boag) assumes the role of director of a play in which the convicts find personal growth. During rehearsals, Clark begins to fall for one of them. I left this performance with mixed feelings. There were as many moments that fell short of their potential, jokes that didn’t land or tragedy that required more nuance, as there were moments that were near dead-on lovely.
by Laura Ferguson ‘WARNING: DARK THEMES’ intones the piece of paper at the BATS Box Office. ‘Colourful language, sex, partial nudity, masturbation, abortion, sexual abuse, depression and suicide’: all are a hefty part of Spring Awakening, which I have braved thunder and lightning tonight to see. I confess to not knowing, well, anything about Spring Awakening before coming here tonight, but I can see people are excited. There is a certain frenzied fever-brightness to those who are already familiar with the musical. The infamy or perceived progressiveness or nostalgia from teenage years listening to the soundtrack of Spring Awakening pulses through the room as illicit desire would rush through blood.
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